workin' hard for the money

The jury is still out on whether or not my room attendant job is going to pay the bills.

Be kind to your chambermaids, folks. This is one tough job.

Since beginnning about six weeks ago, my body has been dealing with one adjustment after another. Of course, much of this has been due to my weakling status as a longterm desk jockey, but also the job is physically demanding and time expectations and conditions challenging.

I haven't stepped on a scale recently, but I am pretty certain I've been losing any flab I had.

Sore shoulders and arm tendons at first, followed by a left thumb that almost stopped working (from flipping pillow cases), followed by tightening back and ab muscles, followed by hands that cracked raw and bleeding from linen changes. Throw in a few head colds on top of this and the picture isn't very pretty.

On the bright side, my knees are taking on shape again and I am more flexible than I've been in years.

The time and pay restraints are challenging. Yesterday and today are the first two days I can say I finished within my time frame -- that is, approximately half an hour per room. For the first month I was getting paid for 6 hours work a day (as part of 'training'), but since that time I get paid by the room. Twelve rooms = 6 hours work: if you take longer than that time, you only get paid for the 6 hours. It has generally been taking me 1 to 2 hours longer than the goal, so I have been technically working for free to finish my rooms. Apparently others in the past have had the same problem getting their times down, and one co-worker, who is speedy now, says it took her six months. (It won't take me that long.)

The problem, as I see it, is that management treats all rooms as equal, when obviously they are not. Some rooms have one double bed, others two doubles; rooms visited by business clients are barely used while rooms used by families with children or partiers are obviously well-lived in. A stayover room needs cleaning and making the bed(s), while a checkout requires cleaning as well as stripping the bed(s). Add to these time restraints the necessity to restock your trolley (up to four times a day) and hunt down evasive supplies, waiting for service elevators and a daily staff meeting and the half an hour required per room is actually cut down to about 15 minutes.

Stripping and changing the beds is still a challenge. I am getting close to half an hour on the more difficult rooms.

But on top of the time and physical challenges, I'm not sure the hours I'll get will be enough. When I interviewed for the job I was told it was 30 hours a week, 6 hours for 5 days, with the possibility of going full-time. But the room numbers fluctuate. It is near Christmas and on some days, like today, I only had 8 rooms to clean (only four hours pay). I was just told yesterday I may have '4-5 days off around Christmas' (though I'm working Christmas Day). Many of the women have been at the hotel a long time and the camaraderie is actually excellent. Management has not been totally upfront about the terms of pay or hours, but on the other hand they are very fair, keeping lines of communication open.

It's a challenge on many levels, and one I'm not completely averse to, but the money concerns will ultimately decide if and when I find something else.