When I worked in Hotel security, we used this tool a lot to gain entry to rooms with lock issues. The number one problem was the batteries dying before they could be changed and making it impossible to open.

Of course, that also means that anybody who has a this inexpensive tool can access a door that only has a lock that can be opened from the inside with the lever.

There are permanent fixes for the issue, but if you are staying in a hotel and you do not see anything to secure the lock from the inside, there are ways to frustrate or delay an intruder.

Close the bottom gap: if you are already conscious of traveling secure, I am sure you have a couple of rubber wedges for doors in your travel kit. Jam a towel in the gap and secure it with the wedges. If it is visible from the outside, the burglar may rethink twice about breaking in an occupied room. But if it is somebody else with nastier intentions, this will help frustrating the crap out of him, waste time and hopefully making enough noise to warn you.

Jam the lever. Your imagination is the limit. again use towels shoved inside the lever so the string does not have space to work. A piece of foam like used in the pool noodles stuck between the end of the handle and the door, again to stop the string from going in. Your biggest suitcase laying down on the floor behind the door so the tool cannot even be introduced also work, just make sure it is heavy or secured enough it cannot be moved.

And, if you add a portable vibration alarm, you probably double the chances of getting the bad guy to stop what he is doing and run away. Check Amazon as they are a bunch of them and really inexpensive. I would go for one that you can adjust the sensitivity level.

You may have noticed I made the above recommendations from the point of view of you being in the room, Why? Because Life is above Property. If you leave the room, secure valuables either taking them with you or using the room safe or a hotel safe it it is available. Or better yet, don’t take them with you unless they are life or death.

Travel as in most of life less is invariably more. And most importantly: never take along anything on your journey so valuable or dear that its loss would devastate you.

The Accidental Tourist.

This is a movie I watched back in 1988 and I don’t remember much about it, but that quote stuck with me ever since. And it is a darned good rule to follow.