Influencer’s Travel Hack Backfires After She Ships Clothes Straight To The Hotel To Avoid Luggage Fees

A popular social media influencer, actress Megs DeAngelis, recently took to TikTok to showcase a failed attempt at a travel hack. In the video, DeAngelis can be seen in the reception area of a hotel querying the whereabouts of two packages she had mailed ahead of her arrival. The person behind the counter informed her that the establishment did not have them, and it was not because the shipping company did not deliver.

DeAngelis had attempted to ship her clothes directly to the hotel in an effort to avoid paying luggage fees on her trip. In a video caption, she explained that she thought this would be a clever way to save money, but things didn't go as planned. The text across the video reads: “When you think you’re being smart by shipping your clothes to a hotel so you don’t have to carry a giant suitcase.”

In the footage, DeAngelis addresses someone outside the camera’s scope, asking for her luggage "that should have been" shipped to that location. The male staffer could be heard saying, “We had to return those because they weren’t [for] a guest that we had.”

DeAngelis protested, claiming she had verified with the hotel beforehand and was assured it was okay to send her luggage there. She asked the employee if it was alright to send luggage while not being a guest, and he replied yes. However, when DeAngelis inquired about what happened to her packages, the real conundrum dawned on her.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘return them’?” she asked the hotel employee, who responded, “UPS had to take them back.”

DeAngelis doubled down on why this was not supposed to happen, saying, “That’s why I called.” She explained that in her communication with the hotel three days prior, she even suggested marking her luggage for a person under whose name a room was reserved. Instead, the staffer told her it would be best for her (DeAngelis) to put her own name on the request since she would be asked for her ID when she came to claim her baggage.

“So where did they go?” DeAngelis asked in the video, and got the response: “to the [UPS] center.”

A Terrifying Confrontation

The most “terrifying” part of the ordeal was standing up for herself. DeAngelis expressed this in the video’s caption, where she claimed she was “shaking” throughout the confrontation and asked, “Why is standing up for yourself so terrifying?”

A Follow-Up: UPS Delivered Her Parcels to the Wrong Address

In a follow-up video, DeAngelis filmed herself phoning UPS, the company responsible for the delivery. The conversation depicts the confusion taking on another dimension when a call center agent told DeAngelis that her packages had been delivered to the wrong address.

They also admitted not knowing where her luggage was at the time of the call and gave her a new delivery date. DeAngelis used this opportunity to answer questions in the thread of her earlier video, claiming she could not travel with the baggage as they were for a brand campaign and that she had them shipped from the source straight to the destination, and not via her departure point or home.

DeAngelis’ Fans Relate

DeAngelis’ second video sparked a slew of reactions on social media, with many followers relating to similar experiences with UPS. “If you have Twitter(X), go on there and tweet them,” one fan recommended. A reported issue with UPS, where some users tried to call but couldn’t get through.

However, not everyone was sympathetic towards DeAngelis. One user lashed out at her for trying to take a shortcut, saying, “Everyone [is] just jumping on [to] your side, but I have to say, instead of trying to go the cheap way out, just do it right and bring [your luggage] with you.”

Hotels React: The Importance of Verification

A hotel worker shared their perspective on the incident. They said that some hotels contract with a freight handling company that charges for shipping, but they only accept packages marked correctly under someone's name so they know who to deliver them to.

The worker emphasized the importance of getting confirmation in writing and suggested that DeAngelis should have done this before attempting to send her luggage directly. They also pointed out that it's irresponsible for hotels not to verify the contents of cases beforehand, especially when it comes to safety concerns for staff and guests.