Reported by Wang Chih-ya, Taipei
Legislator Kao Chia-yu was brutally beaten by her boyfriend in the hotel room, and the indifference of the Grand Forward Hotel staff repeatedly missed the chance of rescue. This tragedy evoked the pain of the bereavement of Wang Chih-ya, whose MediaTek engineer brother died at the Le Méridien Taipei hotel. If and only if the hotel staff could be more alert and empathetic, tragedies like this could have been avoided.
Regarding the incident of Kao Chia-yu being beaten, the focus of public opinion is condemning the violence and punishing the perpetrator. In addition, the public also suggested amending the law to prevent criminals from using private photos to intimidate and blackmail victims. However, the family member of Wang Ching-chieh, the victim of the sudden death at the Le Méridien Taipei hotel, can definitely strike a chord with Kao Chia-yu. What should be paid more attention to is the poor crisis handling methods of the staffs of both hotels, which means the safety of customers cannot be guaranteed and such neglect leads to the calamity.
Kao Chia-yu mentioned at the press conference that her boyfriend, Lin Bing-shu, threw her bag into the corridor at night. Moreover, he then stepped frantically on her stuff. At that moment, a waiter of the Grand Forward Hotel passed by and checked out, but Lin Bing-shu roared and prohibited the waiter from helping pick up the items on the ground. After that, the waiter just walked away as if nothing had happened. According to the situation described by Kao Chia-yu, Lin Bing-shu’s behaviors were apparent signs that his emotions were out-of-control. As a frontline staff member of the hotel, how could he have the audacity to walk away and ignore the possible danger, not taking the safety of the customers into account? We cannot help but question that waiter, “Would he react the same if the person in that room was his relatives or parents? Would he still be that indifferent and unconcerned?”
Within the two days of Kao Chia-yu being restricted to that room, Lin Bing-shu had constantly contacted the hotel staff for ice packs and medicines. According to only common sense, it can be associated or inferred that someone might be injured or uncomfortable. Nevertheless, the hotel staff never happened to understand the situation. Instead, all they did was deliver the ice packs and instruct Lin to get medicines as required. Was such carelessness due to the lack of alertness of the hotel staff or they simply don’t care about their customers? Regardless of the reason, what the staff had done was a total dereliction of duty. The crisis management training of the Grand Forward Hotel is clearly a failure.
Even if the waiter was worried about his personal safety and did not dare intervene in person, or he was not sure about the situation and thus he did not rush to report to the police, he should report to his superior as a responsible worker. He should have reported that there was an unusual situation in that room and kept caring about the ongoing situation. However, from the information that has been released, the hotel staff did not follow up at all, repeatedly missed the opportunity to rescue Kao Chia-yu.
We are indeed heartbroken when we learned the dealing method used in this violent tragedy. It was completely the same as the one used in the death of Ching-chieh, and both lack of alertness and empathy, causing the misfortune which could be prevented.
When the staff of the Le Méridien Taipei hotel received the first call for help at 19:36 from Wang that he felt chest tightness and could not breathe air, the staff who went to check had lack of common medical knowledge. The staff mistakenly thought that he felt unwell only because he went swimming without having dinner. Thus, they only provided him with sports drinks and chocolate. The lifeguard on duty was even more outrageous. He claimed that he was busy taking care of other elderly and children at the time, completely forgetting his duty as a lifeguard. Even seeing Wang’s symptoms continue, he did not check his blood pressure and heartbeat. Instead, the lifeguard asked Wang to walk around until he passed out. That was when the lifeguard finally called the ambulance, which was 44 minutes after the first call for help. We would like to ask if it was Cai Bo-han at that time, the chairman of the Le Méridien Taipei hotel, would they still wait for 44 minutes to call an ambulance after he fainted?
A senior hotel employee told us that most of the hotels are very reluctant to call ambulances, worrying that it will cause panic among other guests, and even attract reporters, causing social news and affecting reputation and business. Is calling an ambulance due to the fact that they are afraid of affecting business more important than people dying in the hotel? Since the current law does not stipulate hotel staff have the responsibility of reporting emergencies, the unscrupulous hotel staff have the audacity to commit acts that are harmful to the safety of customers and to the hotel itself.
The lack of vigilance and empathy of the hotel staff caused Wang to lose his life unreasonably, becoming the wrong soul of the Le Méridien Taipei hotel. The Grand Forward Hotel in New Taipei City also missed the chance of saving Kao Chia-yu from being beaten to swelling. The safety issues of hotels have repeatedly occurred and have become a public safety issue in Taiwan. One of the two hotels is next to the Taipei City Hall (Le Méridien Taipei) and the other is next to the New Taipei City Hall (Grand Forward Hotel). Ko Wen-je and Hou You-yi are the two leaders of the two countries in the future. It is hoped that these two leaders of the Government can take the lead in putting forward practical and implementable supporting measures for hotel public safety. It is hoped that Wang’s death and Kao Chia-yu’s injury can arouse public attention to the serious problem of hotel safety. We call for promoting the amendments of the hotel’s public safety law, which strictly emphasize the hotel’s obligation to save people to be implemented. If hotels already know about the emergency but still hold back and give excuses for preventing the intervention of the government, the hotels have to take the whole responsibility. Regardless of whether it is Civil or Criminal Laws-related, it is required that the hotels receive a penalty, avoiding the same regrets from happening again.
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