Anytime Anywhere Access

Harish Chib explains why providing high speed Internet access does not require high technical knowledge but must not compromise on quality and ease of use

If you have it, flaunt it. That I definitely the mantra when it comes to high-speed internet access. The five-star hotels have incorporated it and now others are following suit. Glance through the service listing of any hotel. If they have high-speed internet for guests, you would find it right there at the top of the list of services and facilities offered.

High-speed, anywhere, anytime internet access on the hotel premises builds hotel brand value and attracts the right kind of guests.

Connectivity in conference rooms is not enough any more. Guests want easy access anywhere, anytime of the day or night. The business traveller of course has come to expect it but now the leisure traveller demands it as well. As demand drives supply, it is quite clear that any time there is talk of a hotel launch, revamp or enhancement, high-speed internet access tops the list. It is not just the large chains that can afford to maintain the service. Nor is high in-house technical knowledge critical to offer the service.

High Speed Internet Access

All one needs is high-speed bandwidth from a service provider. Wi-Fi devices need to be placed at strategic points, covering all the areas where a guest is likely to be that is in the lounge, by the pool, in the rooms, restaurants. That is because the Wi-Fi signal does not get through solid walls easily. But it is still a better bet than tearing down the plaster and drilling holes in the walls, pulling cables all over the place, at the end of which, guests are still limited to the internet plug point.

Now any laptop with a PCMCIA card can access the net via Wi-Fi signals emitted by the device. But since the hotel has invested in the service and it costs to maintain, it would like to recover the costs and treat it as a revenue source.

Maintaining Quality

There is another side to it - quality of service. It is true that providing high-speed internet access has become a must. Hotels without access are losing guests and create a negative image for themselves. But providing just the access is not the end of the road. Instead it is equally important to provide a high-quality, automated service as well.

Internet access management software like 24online is ready to control and charge guests for internet access.

What Does The Software Offer?

The software offers prepaid cards to authenticate and authorise guests' usage so that unauthorised persons do not gain access to the hotel internet facilities. In addition, internet traffic data can be monitored and retained to meet the requirements of cyber crime regulations.

The hotel can generate prepaid cards by itself and offer these to guests at the front desk. Cards can be of various denominations based on time that is hourly, daily, etc or on actual usage. The hotel can even define a combination of both.

Hotel personnel can maintain regular reports to gauge peak and non-peak hours. Based on the analysis, the hotel can devise special packages of its own, offering discounts for off-peak times, specially crafted packages for corporates and frequent visitors.

Thus hotel spread internet use across the day, reducing bandwidth costs while keeping the guests happy. In the process, guests can be directed to the hotel or partner websites or carry partner ads, enhancing the hotel's presence and raising additional revenues.

Ease-of-use

Web self-care ensures ease-of-use to guests with easy password change facility. In addition, the guest can pull up reports of his or her own usage, making the entire process quite transparent.

For all this, the hotel need not invest heavily in technical personnel to manage the software and easy integration with the hotel property management system results in fewer glitches later. The company provides training initially and 24online is extremely user friendly even for a lay person. Most technical problems can be solved via the web and company support personnel are available over phone and chat to solve these problems.

Individual software to manage internet access and billing would mean higher cost and more time spent in deployment, upgrades and troubleshooting. So what hotels need is a single, complete software, that lets them generate their own prepaid cards based on their analysis of guests usage, bill guests, manage bandwidth and raise additional revenues through online ads.

(The author is vice-president-marketing-product at Elitecore Technologies, which offers 24online, a complete hotel billing and bandwidth management software with worldwide deployments. He can be reached at harish@elitecore.com. Product details are available at www.24onlinebilling.com)