Doing these simple things when you first arrive at your hotel room can make a stay much more comfortable.

You’ve just arrived at your hotel room. The journey was very tiring, and now all you want to do is take a quick shower and then flop down on the bed and rest. But wait, there are a few things that you really need to do before you can totally relax. Here are our must-dos on entering your new accommodation.

Beware bedbugs

Nothing is worse than waking up covered in the telltale bites of bedbugs. And it’s a bigger problem today than ever before, with the critters’ populations rising rapidly worldwide. So check all over for signs of them. Of course, you probably won’t find actual bedbugs – they’re tiny and scoot when scrutiny comes near – but rusty bloodstains show where they’ve been.

Consider the climate

You check in on a lovely, cool morning, and your room is fresh and inviting. But deep in the night, it’s a sweltering sweatbox. To your horror, you find that the air conditioning didn’t do its work, and now you’re stuck with a very uncomfortable time if no one’s available to help. Avoid the night sweats by checking that the controls on your aircon actually work.

Dump the comforter

Since you’re going to be sleeping between the sheets and not lying on top of the bed, why even worry about the comforter? Well, the hotel doubtless put fresh sheets on your bed between guests, but it’s entirely possible that it didn’t wash the comforter. So you could well be sharing it with a stranger, and you have no idea what they might have been doing.

Stay switched on about lights

For such a small thing, a light switch can make a huge difference. And that difference can be felt at night, when you stumble into your room and realize that the switch is not where you expected it to be. Figuring out where it is and how it works as soon as you get to the room, when it’s still daylight, will help avoid this embarrassing problem.