Haunted Hotels and Nasty Spirits: True Tales from the Front Desk
Some hotel guests check in with nothing but a suitcase and a need for sleep. Others, apparently, bring along a little extra baggage—of the supernatural variety. In a recent post on Reddit’s r/TalesFromTheFrontDesk, one hospitality worker recounts a morning shift that started with missing keys, a nervous trainee, and a guest adamant that her room was plagued by “nasty spirits” telling her to open her legs. If you thought the only spirits at hotels came in mini-bar bottles, think again.
It’s a tale as old as hospitality itself: the weird, the wild, and the downright ghostly. But as this story (and its jaw-dropping comment section) shows, sometimes the real hauntings aren’t from the afterlife—they’re from the living.
The Haunting Begins: A Rookie’s Baptism by Bizarre
Our story opens with a new night auditor still learning the ropes—alone for the last half hour of her shift. The guest in question, a regular, had just checked out after a weeklong stay. But instead of the usual “forgot my charger” or “can I leave my bags here?” requests, she left behind a much stranger concern. According to the trainee, the guest was adamant: “There’s nasty spirits in that room telling her to open her legs!!” No demands for a refund, no wild accusations—just an urgent plea to have the General Manager “cleanse” the room, because, as she stressed, “it’s very important.”
The new auditor, seasoned only by prior experience at a “much sketchier hotel,” kept her cool. Her advice? “Don’t listen to the spirits.” Practical, if not exactly exorcist-level support.
When Spirits Go Beyond the Mini Bar
Reddit’s hospitality veterans flocked to the post with stories of their own spectral encounters—and the all-too-human causes behind them. The top comment, by u/Various_Jelly20, summed up what many hotel workers have come to suspect: “Drugs are a hell of a drug.” He shared a story of a woman who, guided by the ghost of her grandmother, handed over a credit card cut in half at check-in. “The number will still work if you put the halves together and type it in,” she insisted. The things they don’t teach you in hotel management school.
But not every haunting is chemical—sometimes it’s all in the mind. As u/NocturnalMisanthrope pointed out, “Sounds like mental illness. It’s unfortunate that so many people without that excuse believe in that nonsense.” Others, like u/NotThatLuci, have learned to roll with it: “People are crazy.” She recounted a guest who whispered about “the shadows passing” outside her window and told the front desk not to worry—they were “here for me.” That was just the beginning of a three-day stay so unnerving, a co-worker quit on the spot and couldn’t even talk about it afterward.
From Haunted Rooms to Nasty Brews: Defining "Spirits"
Of course, when a post mentions “nasty spirits,” the puns practically write themselves. Some commenters took the conversation from the paranormal to the potable. “So… Malört?” joked u/SkwrlTail, referencing the notoriously foul-tasting liquor. Others one-upped him with tales of truly cursed concoctions: “Bugweiser and Clamato,” “Bugweiser LIGHT and clamato”—the mere mention enough to make fellow Redditor u/SkwrlTail “throw up a little.”
It turns out, “nasty spirits” come in many forms: those that haunt, those that are imbibed, and those that are both (looking at you, Jägermeister).
When Your Hotel Needs a Priest (or a Therapist)
The real horror, for many front desk staff, isn’t the ghosts—it’s the unpredictability of guests who believe in them. “Do the spirits subscribe to her OnlyFans?” quipped u/Nearby_Cauliflowers, finding levity in the absurd. But others took a more serious tone, noting the fine line between eccentricity and crisis. For many staffers, supernatural claims are just another form of customer service challenge—sometimes handled with humor, sometimes just endured until checkout.
Take it from u/unholyrevenger72, whose hotel is allegedly haunted by a “female apparition” and a “male poltergeist.” The ghostly woman is known to get into bed with guests, but, he assures, “she don’t say anything.” Silver linings, right?
Lessons Learned: Expect the Unexpected
If there’s one thing the r/TalesFromTheFrontDesk community agrees on, it’s that no amount of training prepares you for this level of weird. Whether it’s disembodied voices, shadowy figures, or guests who slice up their own credit cards on ghostly advice, hotel staff face a unique brand of “customer service.”
So next time you check into a hotel and the desk clerk seems a bit frazzled, remember—they may have just fielded a request for an exorcism… or at least, a deep cleaning.
Have you ever had a haunted hotel stay—or worked the front desk during one? Share your spookiest (or strangest) tales in the comments below. And if you’re a hotel worker with a ghost story, we’re all ears. After all, in hospitality, every shift is an adventure… and sometimes, it’s downright supernatural.
Original Reddit Post: Nasty Spirits