The management of a new five-star hotel has found out the hard way that guanxi, or connections, still play an important role in doing business on the mainland - and that it is not a good idea to ruffle the feathers of local officials. The Yintian Hotel, located in Liuyang in Hunan province , was suddenly plunged into darkness at 8.40pm on Monday, its opening day, after local electricity bureau officials retaliated for what they felt was a slight by the hotel's management. The order to cut off the electricity supply to the 150 million yuan hotel was given by two senior officials of the city's electricity bureau, Zhou Jiaoyao and Li Licai , Xinhua reported. The pair were apparently miffed because the hotel director failed to deliver personally an invitation to the hotel's opening party. The invitation was delivered by an assistant, Xinhua said. As the entire hotel - and nearby residents - sat in darkness, and as hotel operations came to a standstill, a female manager of the hotel and an assistant raced to another hotel, where the two angry officials were drinking with colleagues. Mr Zhou and Mr Li insisted the power would remain off for the whole night - but promised to reduce the duration by one hour for each bottle of baijiu, or grain alcohol, the two female hotel employees consumed. After the women downed seven bottles of the strong alcohol - and rebuffed unwanted romantic advances - the order was given for the electricity to be turned back on. The hotel said the incident had caused financial losses, as customers in the hotel, restaurants, health club and other entertainment venues demanded refunds and compensation. A representative of Hunan Electricity told Xinhua the two officials, who had since been fired, had 'created very bad influence in the society' and 'seriously damaged the image of the electricity system'.