All Hail Chargerback.com, Saviors of Lost Hotel Crap!

Like most frequent travelers, we've had trouble in the past with the infamous hotel lost and found. We know we left it in the room, but where is it now? Do hotel maids really steal all our stuff, or is there a trapdoor somewhere between the room and the lost goodie bin?

Travelers have been trying to solve this mystery for years, and while we certainly have to split the difference in terms of who's to blame (we left it there, after all), we can all agree that there is, at times, something going on behind the scenes that prevents our lost from being found.

In comes a new service, Chargerback.com, that hopes to help remedy this on-going problem. And like most solutions these days, it takes the entire process online. In this case, retrieving a lost item is, supposedly, just a few clicks away. Free to use, guests submit their lost item and stay information to the hotel via Chargerback's website. The catch? The hotel also must enter the found item's description into Chargerback, so there's gotta be some cooperation here. If there is a match, the system notifies the two parties. Hooray!

Chargerback is already being used by some big name hotels, including the Luxor in Las Vegas and the Atlantis in the Bahamas, and thus far 30 U.S. hotels have signed up with the service. This is a very, very good thing. Hoteliers take note. Get on board.

We don't think it's a question of whether guests will use this service -- I mean, why not? -- but it will do us no good if the hotels ignore this service. We'd like to see a few zeros added to the end of that 30. There's also no guarantee that the new electronic system will solve any problems. In theory, the website minimizes the chance for error in the way of a bad callback number or misplaced message, but it does not solve the issue of a staff member who forgets to log an item or a phone charger that gets up and walks away. But, we'll be optimistic and keep hope alive. That's what Jessie said, right?

We're curious to see if the industry invites this new idea as the future standard. We'll let you know how it goes when it comes time for us to use it (which shouldn't be long). You do the same!