Traveling with a disability calls for a fully accessible hotel room. Well, finding an accessible hotel room is not an issue on today’s date. But, after you board the accessible room you might be faced with a couple of unexpected challenges. Inquiries by contacting the hotel and online site ratings of accessible hotels can only give you an overview of suitability but, the actual understanding happens only after you board these rooms. So, it is good to have prior information on the possible issues that might crop up during your stay at one of the wheelchair-accessible hotel rooms so that you can at least plan for them in advance.
List of common issues in handicap friendly accommodations & their possible solutions
You find that your booking isn’t confirmed only on arriving the hotel reception.
It is best not to completely rely on phone reservation or online reservation systems especially when the concern is handicap friendly accommodations with wheelchair accessible room. A usual way of preventing the hassle can be to call the hotel a day or two prior to your arrival at the hotel to make sure that your booking has been confirmed. But, even then exceptions might just happen when you find that your room has been allotted to another guest. What you can do in this case is, you can ask the hotel authority to compensate for the inconvenience that they have caused and at the same time transfer you to a nearby accessible hotel that meets your needs.
The issue of one single sized bed
This is one of the most common problems that are faced by disabled travelers who are usually accompanied by a care assistant. The facility of separate beds is a basic necessity that accessible rooms must fulfill. But, mostly the scenario is that the accessible rooms that have a roll-in shower only have a king-size bed. There are a few ways to resolve the issue. One, you can ask for a rollaway bed. Two, if you’re accommodating in a major city, there are high chances of finding a nearby hotel that fits your needs or you can push the hotel by complaining to the main reservations line and they might upgrade you to a room with the needed accessibility feature.
Improper bed height making it inaccessible
Today, there are several accessible hotel rooms that do not have the right height bed. They are usually pretty high off the ground. This is extremely inconvenient for the people in wheelchairs. After all, not every wheelchair is equipped with a seat elevator facility. So, getting in and out of the bed becomes a big issue. This is one problem that is difficult to resolve. Thus, it is essential to report issues like these to the hotel management so that they can keep this in might while remodeling or answer similar questions that come in later from other disabled guests.
Unstable shower seat
Some hotels provide flimsy and unstable shower seats in the accessible rooms which are inappropriate to support individuals with major mobility issues.
