The front desk is a hotel's reception and the people around it; the house has no understanding with any of them and plans arrivals that need nothing from them.
In a five-star property the front of house is several people rather than one counter. A doorman stands at the street, a bell desk handles luggage, reception checks guests in, a concierge keeps the restaurant lists, and after midnight a night manager watches over all of it. A visitor to a guest's room passes some or all of these on the way up. None of them plays any part in the reservation.
The house has never sought an arrangement with a hotel, which guests sometimes find surprising. The reasoning is simple. Anything agreed with a desk must be written somewhere in the hotel's own systems, handed between shifts and remembered by staff who change with the seasons. An evening that asks nothing of reception leaves nothing at reception, and it cannot be withdrawn by a new general manager.
A guest need not inform the desk, the concierge or the night manager of anything. Nor should a guest ask reception to expect a visitor by name, to send someone up, or to hold a message for her. Each of those well-meant courtesies creates a note in a log that outlasts the stay.
A minority of hotels require late-evening visitors to sign in at the desk or to be accompanied from the lobby. The office would rather learn this when the reservation is made than discover it at the door. With a line in the thread, the arrival is timed so that the guest steps down to the lobby and walks back up with her, which is how any guest returns with company. The guide to hotel visitor policies reads the common rules closely.
She crosses the lobby as a resident would, knowing beforehand which side the lifts are on. A guide to front desk etiquette traces that walk from street to corridor, and the journal note on what the night porter notices considers the view from behind the counter.