Below is an illustration of the service problems from an email conversation I had with a friend who stays in Sydney hotels (and hotels around the world for that matter) very regularly. He's graduated from one of the world's best hotel management schools, and has lived and travelled on just about every continent. Of course it's just one person's opinion, but from what I have heard from other sources it's just about bang on.
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Service in Aus isn’t up to US standards for the same hotels. It’s the whole "I’m not beneath you complex, so I’m not going to bend over backwards to serve you. In big us cities all the employees are immigrants so they don’t mind serving you the customer and they respect you; they know they have to work for their money from tips. And in the South and Midwest they don’t think they're beneath you but they are genuinely pleasant so it makes up for it. 5 star hotels in the US have good staff. Asia of course is completely subservient as with Latin America and Africa and in Europe its not subservient but they have a tradition of fine service. So we are pretty much just ****ed here (Australia) ****ing work shy peasants. ****ing convict blood.""
Moral of the story? Don't expect too much from Australian hotel workers, and you'll have an absolutely great trip.
