With cleaning as many as 17 rooms per shift, Fatima Amahmoud's job at the Moxy Hotel in downtown Boston sometimes seems impossible.
There was the time she saw three days’ worth of blond dog hair stuck to the curtains, bedspread, and carpet. She knew she wouldn’t be able to finish it in the 30 minutes she was supposed to spend on each room. The dog’s owner had declined daily room cleaning, an option that many hotels have promoted as environmentally friendly but that for them is a way to save on labor costs and deal with the shortage of workers since the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, housekeeper union members have waged a fierce battle to restore automated daily room cleaning at major hotel chains, saying they are facing unmanageable workloads or, in many cases, reduced hours and a drop in income.
The conflict has become a symbol of frustration over working conditions among hotel workers, who were left out of work for months during pandemic closures and returned to a sector struggling with chronic staff shortages and changing travel trends.
More than 40,000 workers, represented by the UNITE HERE union, are locked in difficult contract negotiations with major hotel chains including Hilton, Hyatt, Marriott and Omni, demanding higher wages and a reversal of service and staff cuts.
At least 15,000 workers have voted to strike if no agreement is reached after contracts expire at hotels in 12 cities from Honolulu to Boston.
The first strike began Sunday, when more than 4,000 workers walked off the job at hotels in Boston, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle and Greenwich, Connecticut, UNITE HERE said.
“We have told the manager many times that it is too much for us,” said Amahmoud, whose hotel is among those where workers have authorized a strike but have not yet walked out.
Michael D'Angelo, Hyatt's chief labor officer for the Americas, said the company's hotels have contingency plans in place to minimize the impact of the strikes. “We are disappointed that UNITE HERE has chosen to strike while Hyatt remains willing to negotiate,” he said.
In a statement before the strikes began, Hilton said it was “committed to negotiating in good faith to reach fair and reasonable agreements.” Marriott and Omni did not respond to requests for comment.
The labor unrest serves as a reminder of the pandemic’s continuing toll on low-wage women, particularly Black and Hispanic women, who are overrepresented in front-facing service jobs. While women have largely returned to the workforce since shouldering the burden of pandemic-era furloughs — or dropping out to take on caregiving responsibilities — that recovery has left a gap in employment rates between women with college degrees and those without.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. hotel industry employs about 1.9 million people, down 196,000 workers from February 2019. Nearly 90% of housekeepers in buildings are women, according to federal statistics.
According to UNITE HERE, it is a workforce that is overwhelmingly made up of women of color, many of whom are immigrants, and that is predominantly older.
Union president Gwen Mills characterizes the contract negotiations as part of a long-standing fight to get compensation that allows service workers to support families, comparable to that in traditionally male-dominated sectors.
“The work in hospitality is generally undervalued and it is no coincidence that it is disproportionately women and people of color who do this work,” Mills said.
The union hopes to build on its recent success in Southern California, where it won significant wage increases, higher employer contributions to pensions and fair workload guarantees in a new contract with 34 hotels after repeated strikes. Under the contract, housekeepers at most hotels will earn $35 an hour starting in July 2027.
According to the American Hotel And Lodging Association, 80% of member hotels are facing staffing shortages, and 50% cite housekeeping as their top staffing need.
Kevin Carey, the association’s interim president and CEO, says hotels are doing everything they can to attract workers. According to the association’s surveys, 86% of hoteliers have raised wages in the past six months, and many have offered more flexibility with hours or expanded benefits. The association says wages for hotel workers have increased 26% since the pandemic.
“This is a fantastic time to be a hotel worker,” Carey said in an email statement to The Associated Press.
Hotel staff say the reality on the ground is more complicated.
Maria Mata, 61, a housekeeper at the W Hotel in San Francisco, says she makes $2,190 every two weeks when she works full time. But some weeks she’s called in for only one or two days, forcing her to max out her credit cards to pay for food and other expenses for her household, which includes her granddaughter and elderly mother.
“It’s hard to find a new job at my age. I just have to keep the faith that we’ll get through this,” Mata said.
Guests at the Hilton Hawaiian Village often tell Nely Reinante that they don’t want their rooms cleaned because they don’t want her to work too hard. She said she takes every opportunity to explain that refusing her services creates more work for housekeepers.
Since the pandemic, UNITE HERE has regained automated daily room cleaning at a number of hotels in Honolulu and other cities, either through contract negotiations, complaint filings, or local government ordinances.
But the issue is back on the table at many hotels where contracts are expiring. Mills said UNITE HERE is pushing for language that makes it difficult for hotels to silently encourage guests to opt out of daily housekeeping.
The U.S. hotel industry has rebounded from the pandemic despite average occupancy rates that are still below 2019 levels, largely because of higher room rates and record spending per room. Average revenue per available room, a key metric, is expected to hit a record high of $101.84 in 2024, the hotel association said.
David Sherwyn, director of the Cornell University Center for Innovative Hospitality Labor & Employment Relations, said UNITE HERE is a strong union, but it is facing an uphill battle over daily room cleaning. Hotels see cutting services as part of a long-term budget and staffing strategy.
“The hotels say the guests don’t want it, I can’t find the people and it’s a huge expense,” Sherwyn said. “That’s the struggle.”
Workers resent what they see as attempts to squeeze more out of them while dealing with irregular schedules and low pay. Although unionized domestic workers generally earn higher wages, pay varies widely between cities.
Chandra Anderson, 53, makes $16.20 an hour as a housekeeper at the Hyatt Regency Baltimore Inner Harbor, where workers have not yet voted to strike. She is hoping for a contract that would raise her hourly wage to $20, but says the company came back with a counteroffer that “felt like a slap in the face.”
Anderson, who has been the sole breadwinner in her household since her husband went on dialysis, said they had to move to a smaller home a year ago, partly because she couldn’t get enough hours at work. Things have improved since the hotel reinstated daily room cleaning earlier this year, but she still struggles to afford basic necessities like groceries.
Tracy Lingo, president of UNITE HERE Local 7, said Baltimore members are applying for pensions for the first time, but the biggest priority is to bring hourly wages closer to those in other cities.
“We are so far behind,” Lingo said.
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Associated Press journalist Jennifer Kelleher in Honolulu contributed to this story.
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