According to The Indian Express, in May 2019, a man checked into a five-star hotel in Delhi’s Aerocity with the plan to stay only overnight.
However, the guest stayed on the premises for more than 600 days over the next two years before checking out in January 2021 whilst paying nothing.
The incident came to light during the checking of records at Roseate Hotel, following which its board filed a complaint against the guest, a front desk manager, and a few other staff members for allegedly helping the accused pull off the con job.
As per the complainant, the guest stayed at the hotel for 603 days and owed the hotel a total of Rs 58 lakh (RM330,947.11), and he left without paying the bill.
While no arrests have been made, a police investigation is being conducted against the head of the hotel’s front office department and other staffers. Meanwhile, the head of the hotel’s front office department has been booked for criminal conspiracy, forgery and cheating, said the police.
“The hotel staff allegedly forged, deleted, added and falsified a large number of entries in the said guest’s account in the hotel’s Opera software system. This system is used to maintain and monitor stay/visit of guests and their accounts.”
“The accounts were falsified to conceal the actual outstanding dues from the senior management to avoid detection of their willful illegal acts,” reads the FIR lodged on the complaint of the hotel board.
As per the hotel management, the accused checked into the hotel on May 30, 2019, and was supposed to leave the next day but kept extending his stay. He finally left on January 22, 2021, without paying the bill, said the police.
“As per hotel rules, if a guest owes Rs 50,000 (RM2,852) to the hotel, the staff has to inform the seniors and push the guest for payment. However, this was not done in this case.”
“We believe they forged the records and even removed his name from daily reports where his hotel bills were stated,” said a senior police officer.
“The motive behind the large-scale forgeries and falsification of accounts of Dutta was to siphon off cash payments made by him…” reads the FIR.
We hope the investigations will close soon and that the accused is found and investigated for his actions.
