“Website warns of bed bugs in Myrtle Beach area”

Website warns of bed bugs in Myrtle Beach area

Posted: 26 Nov 2010 02:18 PM PST

A website is naming names about who has bed bugs - including many hotels along the Grand Strand - and the hospitality industry isn't happy about it.

The American Hotel and Lodging Association is disputing claims by the website BedBugRegistry.com that certain hotels have bedbugs, Pam Inman, the association's vice president and chief operating officer, said at the Myrtle Beach Area Hospitality Association's annual meeting Nov. 18.

As of Wednesday, the website, based on anonymous posts from travelers, listed reports of bed bugs at 28 hotel and time share properties in Myrtle Beach, North Myrtle Beach and Conway. There are bed bugs along the Grand Strand, even if some in the hospitality industry don't want to admit it, said hotelier Frans Mustert who oversees one property that has been listed on the site.

The website would initially take down claims challenged by the association, Inman said, but increasingly will not.

BedBugRegistry.com allows users to report bedbug sightings at hotels and private residences on the site. The reports are usually anonymous and are not verified by the site.

"It's not just to help people avoid bed bugs in hotels. It's to also demonstrate how quickly the problem is spreading and how bad it's become," website creator Maciej Ceglowski said. "We're not a black list. We're not here to stigmatize hotels."

There's a system for refuting claims that flags a post so that readers know it is disputed and so that the report will not show up in search engine results, said Ceglowski, who is based in San Francisco. Reports of bites will be taken down unless an actual bed bug is seen, he said.

Without definitive proof a claim is false, Ceglowski said he's not interested in adjudicating differences between hotels and the posters, nor does he have the means.

Lane's Professional Pest Elimination Inc. treats about 10 hotel rooms for bed bugs each week during the peak summer season on the Grand Strand, said David Morisch, a business development manager with the company. Many people aren't educated about the bugs, Morisch said

"A lot of people view bed bugs as it has a nasty or dirty connotation with it and generally where we see most of them is in your higher end places," he said.

Mustert, president and CEO of Oceana Resorts in North Myrtle Beach, said he's not concerned about one of his company's hotels being listed on the website. An anonymous poster claims on BedBugRegistry.com that the Patricia Grand hotel, which is managed by Oceana, had a bed bug in April 2009. The post states the person didn't know for sure which room it was in, but thought it was No. 3407.

The Patricia Grand doesn't have a room 3407, Mustert said.

Regardless of the claim's merit, Mustert said he doesn't think it will affect business. The website may have initially been harmful when only a few hotels were singled out, he said, but as bed bug sightings mount, individual reports matter less.

"The website is slowly becoming obsolete because every property has bed bugs," Mustert said.

For those hotels that haven't had bed bugs yet, it's only a matter of time until they encounter the pests, he said. Many hoteliers won't admit that they have had the bugs out of fear it will hurt their business, Mustert said.

Ceglowski said he plans to stick with the website and that despite increased media reports - including reports of bed bugs in a New York City department store and a movie theater - there is not enough awareness of how pervasive the problem is. Nothing has curbed the spread of bed bugs so far and they're becoming "a fact of life," he said.

"The problem hasn't stopped spreading and it's spreading very fast and the possibility we can't control it makes me scared," Ceglowski said.

It doesn't spread as fast as people think, Mustert said, as a three-bedroom condo might have it in one bedroom while the other two will be unaffected. Oceana hotels instruct guests on how to identify a bed bug, he said.

The company has established a protocol for handling bed bugs and trains its staff every six months to ensure the guidelines are followed, Mustert said. If a bed bug is found by the guest or during a routine inspection, exterminators are called immediately, he said. The hotels will also launder the guests clothing if they are at risk of having bed bugs, he said.

The system has been effective in rooting out any infestations early, Mustert said.

Ceglowski said he recommends that people avoid a hotel if it has 10 or more complaints. Otherwise people should use their best judgment when considering whether claims are legitimate because "people say all sorts of things on the internet; not all of them are true." Travelers shouldn't hesitate to call a hotel if they have concerns about bed bugs, he said.

Guests should inspect their room on arrival for the pests and not put their luggage near the bed.

Hotels shouldn't take the blame when the bugs are found, Ceglowski said.

"It's not [a hotel's] fault. Someone is bringing a bed bug to their room and then they have to kind of live with the stigma," Ceglowski said.

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