Washing Underwear in the Coffee Maker: Survey Reveals Hotel Guests' Worst Habits

Booking platform Hotels.com surveyed Americans about their behavior in hotels and the unwritten rules of etiquette during short trips. The results, published by Travel + Leisure, revealed some surprisingly odd guest habits.

More than half of respondents stressed the importance of being considerate toward fellow guests — for instance, not slamming room doors late at night. Meanwhile, 40% of participants named rudeness toward hotel staff as the worst offense of all.

Pets, Leftover Food, and Toiletries from the Cart

A notable share of respondents — 41% — said they're bothered when other guests let their pets roam the hotel unsupervised, and would be willing to complain to staff about it. Another quarter (25%) admitted to sneaking food from breakfast to eat later, while 16% confessed to taking toiletries from a housekeeping cart at least once — a habit familiar to fans of "Friends" from one of Ross Geller's memorable antics.

The Worst Habit: Washing Underwear in the Coffee Maker

But the survey's most cringe-worthy revelation was washing underwear in the in-room coffee maker — a habit 5% of respondents admitted to.

This isn't the first study of its kind. Earlier, the polling agency OnePoll, commissioned by the same platform, surveyed 2,000 adults in the UK, with results published in late June showing that 23% of Britons named washing laundry in a hotel kettle as one of the worst etiquette violations.

Etiquette expert William Hanson wryly remarked that people who do this should be "banished from society." Meanwhile, late last year, blogger Tara Woodcock shared what she called a "viral hack" for washing laundry in a hotel coffee maker on social media — but after a wave of backlash, admitted it was actually a joke.

Around Prague, based on reporting by novinky.cz