Hotels ordered to stop providing disposable items

Eighty-one hotels, including five luxury hotels, have been issued rectification notices by Shanghai's culture and tourism authority since July 1 for providing guests with unrequested disposable items.

The six items are toothbrushes, combs, bath scrub sponges, razors, nail files and shoe-shine pads.

The five top hotels were The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Shanghai Pudong, The Longemont Shanghai, JW Marriott Hotel Shanghai at Tomorrow Square, Regal International East Asia Hotel and Wyndham Grand Plaza Royale Oriental Shanghai, according to the Shanghai Administration of Culture and Tourism.

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Shanghai Pudong and Wyndham Grand Plaza Royale Oriental Shanghai were found to have provided shoe-shine pads without requests. 

The Longemont Shanghai offered all of the items except bath scrub sponges.

At presidential suites in the Regal International East Asia Hotel, toothbrushes and bath scrub sponges were found by officials. The JW Marriott Hotel Shanghai at Tomorrow Square provided nail files without requests. 

In total, 1,029 hotels have been inspected since July 1.

Other hotels such as Ziteng Hotel, Tianlin Hotel, Shanghai Ledao Hotel and Shanghai Xianfeng Hotel have been issued with notices and ordered to fix problems.

Hotels will first be asked to rectify the issue or face a fine of between 500 yuan (US$72.6) and 5,000 yuan if they continue to provide such items under Shanghai's new domestic garbage-sorting regulations which became effective on July 1.

More than 7,000 hotels citywide will be inspected with random checks, according to the administration.