Living & Moving — Hotel laundryIllustrated Guide: Hotel Laundry in Bangkok, Laundry vs. Dry Cleaning, Prices, and How to Order
If a Bangkok hotel's booking page lists "Laundry (additional charge)," does that mean you can use a washing machine yourself? On the same page, "Laundry service," "Dry cleaning," and "Washing machine" mix things you wash yourself with things you hand to the hotel. Adding laundry shops in town, the diagrams below look at 4 kinds of washing by who washes and where, whether the price is per item or per kg, and how to fill in the slip.
Hotel laundry in Bangkok: telling apart the words listed under facilities on a booking page
Sorting booking-page words into washing it yourself or handing it over
Top: words on a booking page. Bottom: who does the washing and where
01The top row shows the words on a booking page (the Japanese and the English for the same item); the bottom row shows who does the washing and where. "Laundry," "Dry cleaning," and "Ironing service" marked as an additional charge are all services where you ask the hotel to do the laundry.
Four kinds of washing, sorted by who washes and where
1An in-room washing machine (Washing machine) appears under room amenities
First, the in-room washing machine. On a booking page it simply appears under room amenities, with no "additional charge" beside it.
Even at places called serviced apartments, some rooms have no washing machine. Whether you can wash in the room depends not on the type of property but on whether the booking page lists a washing machine under room amenities. If it does not, look for a self-service laundry in the building (section 2 below).
2A self-service laundry in the building is a Laundry room. Check for Laundry detergent to see whether detergent is provided
Next, the room in the building where you wash your own clothes. If "Laundry" has no "additional charge" and a separate "Laundry service, additional charge" appears near it, it is a laundry room in the building. The service you hand laundry to and the facility where you wash it yourself are listed under the same heading.
On a property's own website, the laundry room in the building is sometimes called a self-service launderette or a laundromat. On the official site too, the paid "Laundry & dry cleaning services" is listed separately.
3Laundry service is priced per item. Same day or next day depends on when you hand it in
How do you hand laundry to the hotel? You write the number of items for each line on a form called a laundry list, put the clothes in the in-room bag (sometimes there is one bag for laundry and another for dry cleaning), and call the front desk from the room phone. When I sent everything in together, even my underwear came back ironed (the form is itemized, so anything that does not need ironing can be sent separately).
Whether laundry comes back the same day depends on what time you hand it in. Hand it in before the morning cutoff and it returns that evening; after that, it returns the next day. Even after the cutoff, if there is still time for express or 3-hour service, paying the surcharge gets it back the same day.
What laundry service comes to, read straight down the totals section of the slip
The amount adds up in this order
02The surcharge is not added to each item; it is added only once, after the subtotal. On a tax-inclusive slip, the Grand Total at the very bottom is the amount to pay (the "++" slip comes in the next paragraph).
When the slip arrives, the first thing to look for is the tax note. On a slip marked tax-inclusive, the item prices already include tax. On a slip where prices carry "++", a 10% service charge and 7% tax are added on top of the item total.
4Some neighborhood laundry shops charge per kg. Coin laundries take coins or an app
There are also 2 ways to get washing done in town without the hotel. A pickup laundry service weighs the clothes as a batch, and at a coin laundry you run the machines yourself. Both how the price is counted and how you pay differ from handing laundry to the hotel.
Per-1 kg prices on a shop's price list split into wash and fold only and a rate that includes ironing. Some shops leave socks and underwear out of the per-kg price, and weighing them in with everything else raises the price per 1 kg. Getting it back the same day carries a surcharge here too.
When I used a pickup laundry service, I put about 5 kg for wash and fold only into a supermarket bag and left it at the front desk until the shop came for it. The per-1 kg price was posted at the shop, the amount was set after the shop weighed it, I paid with Wise, and the laundry came back folded. At a coin laundry, on another day, I went myself, could not run the machines with the coins I had, and made change at a convenience store first.
Paying at a coin laundry: coins or an app
There are 2 ways: coins, or the chain's app
03There are 2 ways to pay, coins or the chain's app, and the washers and dryers both run on the same payment. In the app, the options are QR PromptPay, mobile banking, and credit card.
The 4 kinds of washing side by side, by booking-page word and by how the price is counted
| Booking-page word | Who washes | Turnaround | How it is priced | How to order |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Washing machine | You (in the room) | As long as your own wash takes | Check with the hotel | No order. The machine in the room |
| Laundry (Laundry room) | You (machines in the building) | As long as your own wash takes | Check with the hotel | No order. The machines in the building |
| Laundry, additional charge (Laundry) / Laundry service, additional charge | The hotel | Same day or next day by when you hand it in. Express and 3-hour service too | Per item (Per Unit) | Fill in the form, bag it, call the front desk from the room phone |
| Dry cleaning, additional charge (Dry cleaning) | The hotel | Same-day or next-day timing works the same as laundry service | Per item (priced separately from the laundry service) | Write it in the Dry Cleaning section of the same form |
| Not on the booking page (laundry shops in town, coin laundries) | Pickup: the shop / Coin laundry: you | Pickup depends on the shop (same-day costs a surcharge). At a coin laundry it is however long you run it | Pickup: per 1 kg. Coin laundry: check at the shop | Pickup: order from the shop. Coin laundry: pay at the shop and run it |
Five common misunderstandings about hotel laundry
- ❌ "Laundry, additional charge" means there is a washing machine you can use yourself
- ❌ Dry cleaning means washing clothes of any kind
- ❌ The price is a flat rate per bag, per wash
- ❌ Anything handed in during the morning always comes back the same day
- ❌ The item prices added up are everything there is to pay
Filling in a laundry list: fill in Guest Count yourself, leave Shop Count and the columns to its right blank
An example of a filled-in laundry list
Fill in only the "Columns you fill in" group and hand the "Columns the hotel fills in" back blank
04Write the number of items you counted yourself in the slip's Guest Count column. Shop Count, the columns to its right, and the totals are filled in by the hotel, so leave them blank.
In my case, at a hotel in Thailand, I only ticked the items on the slip and did not write the counts. The clothes came back on hangers with the slip clipped to them. The totals section was printed down to 10% SERVICE CHARGE, 7% TAX, and GRAND TOTAL, and only the amounts were handwritten.
