HOLIDAYMAKERS in Australia have been filmed getting up before 6am to reserve sun beds at a hotel.
Sun lounger wars are a common sight throughout Europe in the summer, but the phenomenon now appears to be spreading across the globe.
At the Calile hotel in Fortitude Valley, Queensland, guests were filmed getting up at the crack of dawn, some as early as 5.45, to get their towel down to reserve their spot.
In a video shared on Tiktok by hotel guest Emily Cooper (@em.bamford) a steady flow of people are seen leaving their poolside markers, with all the beds reserved before 7am.
Other hotel visitors are filmed nervously watching the action from the balconies, perhaps worrying about missing out on a spot for themselves later.
The footage has been viewed almost 300,000 times, with a lot of people slamming those putting out their towels.
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One user commented: "I can't stand that type of hogging behaviour. Use the sunbeds while you're down at the pool but no calling dibs all day, when you're not even there."
Another wrote: "If you are not actively sitting there/at the pool area I would remove your towel."
A third added: "What a sad life."
However, those who did lay their towels down could be in for disappointment, with Emily saying that the hotel removes belongings if they're left for a certain amount of time.
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She said: "The hotel staff remove towels/belongings if unattended for 15 minutes. They time it."
There are some unwritten social rules about whether or not you can reserve a sunbed.
Etiquette expert William Hanson revealed how long you should wait before it's okay to remove someone's towel from a lounger.
He told the Mirror: "Reserving sun loungers with a towel for longer than 30 minutes is a big no-no, beyond that grace period it’s first come first served."
However, there are some caveats to that 30 minute grace period.
For instance, if someone is actually using the pool, then the lounger is still theirs to use.
Another video shared on Tiktok sparked debate about which nations are the worst offenders when it comes to sunbed hogging.
A German commenter wrote: "I’m German and live in the U.K. On my last holiday to Greece it was the English that had the towels out before 6 am."
Meanwhile, someone else said it was French holidaymakers who were the biggest hoggers, writing: "The French were up at 5am on my holiday I couldn't believe my eyes."
But one Brit admitted that we are just as bad as anyone else when it comes to sunbed hogging.
They said: "I’m at an English hotel in Spain and can confirm it’s us Brits. Lots of towels and no Germans."
The battle for hotel sunbeds is a well documented scrap and has been happening for years.
Some hotels have their own ways of dealing with it, like throwing towels off the beds if no one uses them for a certain amount of time.
Others have forced tourists to pre-book the beds, to prevent people from reserving them with towels, despite not wanting to use them until later.
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Holidaymakers have even taken to reserving spots on the ground at some resorts.
These hotel guests were filmed queueing up to be the first to put their towels down in Tenerife.
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