Alton Towers owner's hotel boss blames 'lazy' staff for room intrusions after the Travelodge keycard sex assault case

Ramesh Ganeson, vice president of hotel operations at Merlin Entertainments, warned that room security failures across the UK hotel sector stem from staff who are "not being trained well enough or being lazy" and risk destroying guest confidence. Merlin, which runs hotels at Thorpe Park, Alton Towers and Chessington, rolled out a full staff retraining programme after a barrister's review found the security problem was industry-wide. The review was commissioned after a man sexually assaulted a woman at a Travelodge in Maidenhead, having been handed a keycard granting access to her room.

Barrister Paul Greaney KC found room security failures were widespread and not limited to Travelodge.

Ganeson said the sector's key technology itself is robust — only 'human error' allows intruders in.

Hotels across the sector are now revisiting and strengthening their room-security procedures following the Travelodge case.