If you have ever cancelled a hotel room last minute, you will know the annoying feeling of having to pay up for service you won’t use. 

However, by using a clever trick, you can avoid paying at all – even if you cancel on the night you are supposed to arrive.

This loophole works as long as you haven’t pre paid for the room – so try to make sure you book for free or with a small deposit, just in case.

The advice comes from hotel industry insider Jacob Tomsky, who spent years as a hotel concierge.

“Call the property directly and ask for the front desk,” he wrote in a blog post on traveller.com.

He advises hotel guests to say the following in order to dodge a late booking fee, if they are cancelling hours before their stay.

“I've had a personal emergency and won't be able to check in tonight; however, I have already rescheduled my meeting for next week. 

“Do you think you could just shift tonight's reservation to next Friday without a penalty?”

Then, Jacob suggests you follow up the next day and cancel the rescheduled booking altogether, “as you are well within your rights to do”.

Through using this loophole, you will avoid paying a fee on a room you would never have ended up staying in.

When calling up the hotel, Jacob says the best method is to keep things short and simple.

“Remember, it's me on the other end of that line: I've got about 10 minutes left in my double shift and I've been standing up for 13 hours straight,” he says, speaking with experience as a concierge.

A Quora user recently revealed useful items every hotel guest should pack to avoid bacteria and bed bugs.

That item is a mattress protector, as mattresses are one of the few things in a hotel room that may never get cleaned.

Other users suggest taking a blacklight on holiday with you to scope out the cleanliness of your hotel room.

Backlights will show up body fluids in the room, including sweat and urine – so if the room is ridden with these, you should request a room change.