The Great (?) Vegas Hotel Soap Scam

 Hi there

Just after I arrived in Las Vegas last August I went into my bathroom at the Rio Hotel to wash my hands.  

Hey, where was the soap - ?  The bar of soap that should be on the bathroom counter?  

The only soap was in the container in the shower - the container that was in a frame that was fixed onto the wall  - and it was liquid soap.  To wash my hands, I would have to stand in the shower cabinet. Or wiggle the liquid soap bottle out from its casing every time I wanted to use it.  And then put it back again, ripe and ready for the hundred showers a day I would undoubtedly have to take during the projected 47c temperatures in the Vegas heat.

I rang housekeeping.  "Could I have a bar of soap please."  I told them I wouldn't even have minded a bottle of liquid soap.  As long as it was portable.

"Of course, Ma'am. We'll deliver it to you instantly.  The soap should have been put in your room in the first place."

About an hour later, there was a knock on the door.  A housemaid stood there, clutching two tiny sweetly-packaged bars of soap.

"Thank you," I said.  I handed her a tip.

It wasn't until I got home that I read a hotel review -

It was a scam.  To get those tips.  

And wait, there's more ...   After the Rio, I moved over to the Flamingo Hotel, to be more central.  Can you guess what happened to me there?  I bet you can...   

The same thing that happened at the Rio was happening at the Flamingo!  There was no packet soap or bottle of liquid soap on the bathroom counter.  Or anywhere in that bathroom.  Only the liquid soap fixed on the shower wall.

And so, I tipped another housemaid...

above:  And just to show you that it can rain in Las Vegas.  Very heavily.  Especially in August,  I got a text from management telling me not to leave the building because of severe flooding.  It was all clear by following day.