APRIL 12 - 25, 2006
TOP O' THE NEWS
- Best and Worst WiFi Hotels
Recent Best WiFi Hotels and Worst WiFi Hotels lists from traveler-feedback site HotelChatter highlighted both the near-universal availability of wireless Internet access and some of its most frustrating aspects. Not surprisingly the properties rated “Best” all provide free access, but simple sign-on procedures and consistent, high-quality connections in both guestrooms and public areas were deemed equally important. Top marks went to Kimpton, Omni, Holiday Inn Express, Marriott Residence Inn, the boutique André Balazs properties in New York, LA and Miami, and Klein’s two properties in LA and New York.
On the other hand, factors that put a property firmly on the Worst list included high and/or inconsistent fee policies, inconsistent, unreliable or overly-limited access, and confusing or incomprehensible usage policy agreement screens. There’s widespread sentiment that charging for access comes across as nickel-and-diming the guest, especially as it’s usually done only by higher-priced properties which presumably have a little extra margin in the room rate.
High-speed access in general seems to be an emotional issue for many guests, probably because we’ve come to rely on it so much. My two personal pet peeves are:
- hotels that charge for “24-hours of access” but define that as “midnight-to-midnight”, so if I stay there overnight I’m charged twice.
- hotels that charge for access but also expect me to trouble-shoot the connection with the vendor when it fails to work consistently, which happens far too often. When so many hotels provide free access, any hotel charging for it ought to take responsibility for fixing any problems. At the very least they ought to connect you to the vendor’s support line instead of telling you to dial it yourself.
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PEOPLE ON THE MOVE
- Paula Winkler promoted to Chief Information Officer for Carlson Hotels Worldwide
- Jeff Clarke named CEO and President of Cendant Travel Distribution Services
- Shelly Edwards joins Solution Q as Sales Associate for Hospitality
Paula Winkler has been promoted to Chief Information Officer for Carlson Hotels Worldwide, moving up from Vice President of Technology and program executive for Carlson Global Solutions at Carlson Hotels' parent company, Carlson Companies. Before joining Carlson, Ms. Winkler worked for a private network services firm in Minneapolis, and earlier had spent 12 years with Electronic Data Systems.
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Jeff Clarke has been named CEO and President of Cendant Travel Distribution Services, recently re-named as Travelport. Mr. Clarke joins TDS from CA (formerly Computer Associates) where he had served as Chief Operating Officer since 2004. He began his career at Digital Equipment Corporation, serving thirteen years in several financial, operational and international positions before joining Compaq, where he rose to Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President of Finance and Administration before being asked to lead Compaq’s integration with HP.
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Shelly Edwards has joined project management software vendor Solution Q as Sales Associate for Hospitality. Ms. Edwards most recently served six years as New Business Development Manager for Ramesys (now RedSky IT), and had earlier held management positions with systems integrator Datatec and Northwind.
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PROPERTY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
- Northwind announce Four-Diamond Service enhanced support offering for Maestro PMS
- Rosen Hotels and Resorts chooses Visual One’s PMS suite for new Rosen Shingle Creek resort
Northwind announced its Four-Diamond Service enhanced support offering for the Maestro PMS. Four-Diamond Service includes the expansion of expert 24/7 system support, and new initiatives covering free Web-based transition assistance for newly trained hotel staff for three months after Maestro is installed, personalized online training classes, webinars and DVDs, and professional operations consulting services. (www.maestropms.com)
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Rosen Hotels and Resorts has chosen Visual One’s PMS suite for its new Rosen Shingle Creek resort close to both the new Orange County Convention Center’s North-South complex and the UCF Rosen School of Hospitality Management. Rosen Shingle Creek is scheduled to open in September of 2006; modules to be implemented include PMS, Preventative Maintenance, Restaurant POS, Club Management, Sales & Catering, Guest Activity Scheduling, Web Page interface, Spa, Golf course management, Dining Room Reservations, electronic registration card, Accounts Receivable and interfaces to Expedia, Passkey, and TravelClick. Shingle Creek will be the first Visual One property to use multiple Check In/Check Out/Guest Service Kiosks, to let guest use their room keys to charge at all Point of Sales outlets, and to use Electronic Signature Capture at the POS outlets and at check-out. (www.shinglecreekresort.com, www.v1s.com)
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RESERVATIONS
- Cendant renames Travel Distribution Services division as Travelport, considers outright sale
- Travelocity Business releases tools to help increase compliance with corporate hotel programs
- Internet Brands acquires community travel sites Wikitravel and World66
- TIA/D.K. Shifflet survey reports more trips booked online in 2005 than by any other method
- Hyatt Hotels & Resorts extends partnership with Expedia
- Hong Kong Disneyland selects SynXis’ RedX for online reservations services
- CHIP Hospitality implementing iHotelier CRS for website and reservations services
- GenaRes integrates its central reservations system with EZ Yield’s V2 system
Cendant Corp. has announced that it is considering an outright sale of its Travelport division (previously known as Travel Distribution Services, TDS) as an alternative to its previously announced plan to spin-off the division to shareholders. Travelport includes the Galileo GDS, the Orbitz and CheapTickets Web sites and Gullivers Travel Associates travel agency. (www.travelport.com)
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Travelocity Business’ consulting unit has introduced two tools to help companies increase compliance with their corporate hotel programs. One tool confirms that company-negotiated rates with each hotel supplier appear correctly in the GDS, avoiding the task of manually validating the many thousands of rates loaded after annual hotel negotiations. The other tool crosschecks a company's negotiated hotel program against unapproved rates that may appear as company discounts in the GDS, also known as "squatter" hotel rates. (www.travelocity-business.com)
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E-commerce operator Internet Brands has acquired Wikitravel and World66, two community travel guides which currently attract over 2 million visits per month. Both websites utilize wiki-based collaborative editing technology; Wikitravel offers more than 12,700 travel guides in 10 languages, while World66 delivers nearly 80,000 articles on more than 19,000 destinations worldwide. (www.internetbrands.com)
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A new survey from the Travel Industry Association of America (TIA) and D.K. Shifflet & Associates reports that last year, for the first time, more trips were booked online than by any other method. Over a third (35%) of transportation reservations were made online, up 25% from the year before; phone calls to carrier 800 telephone numbers was next most popular, but were down 16%. Hotel bookings followed a similar trend, with one quarter of reservations being made online in 2005 (24%), up 9 percent from the year before; most bookings were made on hotel chain websites, followed by other online booking services. Phone calls to chain 800 telephone numbers were almost as popular, but were down 5% from 2004.
Interestingly, trips booked online involve significantly higher average spending ($754, excluding transportation costs) than trips booked offline ($406) or with no advance booking ($219). Internet-booked trips also entail more activities (2.3 on average) than do trips booked offline (1.7 activities) or with no advance bookings (1.5).
(www.tia.org, www.dksa.com)
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Hyatt Hotels & Resorts has extended its partnership with Expedia to embrace marketing initiatives as well as distribution. (www.hyatt.com, www.expedia.com)
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Hong Kong Disneyland has selected SynXis’ RedX Distribution Management System for online reservations services and travel agent promotion of its two properties, the Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel and Disney’s Hollywood Hotel. (www.disney.com.hk, www.synxis.com)
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CHIP Hospitality, the management company of Canadian REIT CHIP, is implementing TravelCLICK’s iHotelier CRS for website and GDS reservations, online advertising and as the call center interface for its self-managed reservations center. CHIP Hospitality manages over 30 properties across Canada. (www.greatcanadianhotels.com, www.travelclick.net)
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GenaRes Worldwide Reservation Services has integrated its central reservations system with EZ Yield’s V2 system, which allows hoteliers to update and manage their rates and availability on the Internet wholesaler sites such as Travelocity, Hotels.com and VirginHolidays.com. The 271-room Flatotel in Manhattan, New York, is the first property to use the integrated system. (www.genares.com, www.ezyield.com)
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MARKETING / MANAGEMENT
- Preferred Hotel Group extends agreement with Lanyon
- Lodging Interactive launches SEOTracker search engine optimization, analysis and competitive benchmarking application
The Preferred Hotel Group has extended its agreement with Lanyon for its HODpublisher and DRSpublisher products and added Content Control Center/RFPpublisher. Preferred has been a Lanyon customer since 2002. (www.preferredhotels.com, www.lanyon.com)
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Internet marketing company Lodging Interactive has launched its SEOTracker search engine optimization, analysis and competitive benchmarking application. SEOTracker analyses a hotel’s website for Search Engine readiness and benchmarks it against the hotels competitive set with analysis and specific SEO recommendations. The report includes an analysis of keyword density, location, relevance and weight, an analysis keyword distribution among website pages, comparison with competitors' websites, SEO recommendations, telephone consultation and review. (www.lodginginteractive.com)
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REVENUE MANAGEMENT
- GenaRes integrates its central reservations system with EZ Yield’s V2 system
GenaRes Worldwide Reservation Services has integrated its central reservations system with EZ Yield’s V2 system, which allows hoteliers to update and manage their rates and availability on the Internet wholesaler sites such as Travelocity, Hotels.com and VirginHolidays.com. The 271-room Flatotel in Manhattan, New York, is the first property to use the integrated system. (www.genares.com, www.ezyield.com)
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SALES & CATERING, MEETING PLANNING
- Swisscom Eurospot acquiring meetings and events datacom specialist Core Communications
Swisscom Eurospot is acquiring meetings and events data communications and Internet specialist Core Communications Corp., which currently supports over 7,500 events annually North America. Swisscom will establish a new subsidiary to apply Core’s expertise to its portfolio of 2,270 hotels in 14 European countries, for which it already provides HSIA services. (www.swisscom-eurospot.com, www.core.net)
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GUEST SERVICES
- Desires Hotels offering downloadable podcast guides to local attractions
- W Hotels launches W To Go to let guests exchange text messages with hotels
- Langham Place Hotel, Hong Kong contracts with NXTV Asia for interactive video services
- James Hotel Group signs master agreement with NXTV
Desires Hotels is offering guides to local attractions in Miami, Atlanta and Puerto Rico in the form of podcasts which travelers can download to their iPods or other MP3 players from the hotels’ Web sites or at check-in. The podcasts, created by each hotel’s Manager of Desires, will be updated on a weekly basis. (www.tectonhospitality.com, www.desireshotels.com)
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W Hotels Worldwide has launched its W To Go mobile Short Messaging Service (SMS Text) in partnership with Upoc Networks. Guests can sign up at check-in to receive text messages from the hotel directly to their cell phone, for example to let them know when their room is ready after check-in, when a package has arrived, when their dry cleaning has been delivered, etc. Guests can also use the service to communicate with the hotel to confirm or change reservations for restaurants, spa appointments and any other needs. Guests will automatically be logged out of the service 24 hours after their stay, allowing for any continuing messages like the return of forgotten personal items. The hotels will credit the guest's account for all W communication minutes during their stay. (www.whotels.com, www.upocnetworks.com)
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Langham Place Hotel, Mongkok, Hong Kong has contracted with NXTV Asia for Video on Demand movies, high-speed TV Internet access, IP Video Games and a customized guest interface.
The James Hotel Group has signed a master agreement with NXTV for HD video-on-demand entertainment and wireless Internet services to its current and planned hotel properties. The first hotel to install the NXTV system will be the 297-room The James Chicago. The first James Hotel opened in December 2003, in Scottsdale, AZ; additional properties are scheduled to open in New York, Miami and Los Angeles.
(www.langhamhotels.com, www.jameshotels.com, www.nxtv.com)
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BACK OFFICE
- Inn at Harvard, Harvard Square Hotel implement priZem’s Labor Intelligence
The Inn at Harvard and the Harvard Square Hotel are implementing priZem’s Labor Intelligence application to improve labor forecasting and reporting. Time and attendance hours and wages data are imported directly from the hotels’ ADP Timesaver database, along with budget data from other applications, to produce labor reports with comparisons against forecast, budget and prior year. (www.harvardsquarehotel.com, www.theinnatharvard.com, www.prizem.com)
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SECURITY
- Rezidor SAS designates VingCard Elsafe as a preferred provider
- Jebel Ali orders Signature by VingCard locks for new Oasis Beach Tower
Rezidor SAS Hospitality has designated VingCard Elsafe as a preferred provider of electronic-locking systems and in-room safes for its 271 hotels & resorts in 49 countries in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), which operate under the Regent, Radisson SAS, Park Inn and Country Inn brands. The agreement covers VingCard’s Signature electronic locking system and Elsafe’s Sentinel Advanced digital safes.
Jebel Ali International Hotels has ordered Signature by VingCard locks for its new Oasis Beach Tower luxury hotel apartment tower.
(www.rezidorsas.com, www.jebelali-international.com, www.vingcard.com)
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