Advanced technologies are critical components of the hospitality industry today, and a yardstick by which guests increasingly choose to rate the services offered, says Sapna Kulshrestha.
Hotels are becoming aware and receptive to changes that IT is bringing to this sector, and all new properties of major hotel chains are evaluating IP telephony tools.
Advanced technologies such as wireless LAN, wi-fi and IP telephony, have become critical components of hospitality today.
VK Giridharan, Telecom Head, Enkay Technologies India Pvt. Ltd says: “Four or five years ago, telephone systems in hotels used to be a revenue generator, however due to the high penetration of mobile phones, guests staying in hotels avoid using room phones for making external calls, hence, there is a drastic change in the way hotels decide on the telephone system.”
As guests today expect a distinctive form of communication services, hotels too must meet the competitive challenge with the best possible technology. Hotels like Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces, The Oberoi Group, The Leela Palaces, Hotels & Resorts, and ITC Maurya, among others, have introduced IP-based solutions in part or whole, in their establishments.
Thus, new generation IP telephony systems are becoming popular, with features such as real-time billing and intelligent speech recognition that are simplifying guest services.
At the most basic level, IP telephony and intelligent communications can drastically reduce the operational cost for hotel communications, while simplifying the technology and expertise needed to leverage advanced capabilities.
“This helps hotels and resorts deliver personalised and responsive customer interactions every time, achieving high customer satisfaction and selling more services, as seen in our newly opened hotel at Udaipur,” says Gayatri Dravid, manager national media, PR and corporate communications, The Leela Palaces, Hotels & Resorts.
As per IP system providers, IP telephony makes a considerable impact in managing all operations of hotel industry. For back-end operations, there could be IP-based contact centre for reservations, IP-based video surveillance systems, IP-based unified messaging systems for guests, integration of IP telephony with supplier database, wireless IP-based mobility for support staff, and so on.
Additionally, guest experiences can be greatly enhanced by deploying IP telephony solutions and related accessories.
Some examples are XML based push-and-pull services for guest rooms phones, common billing services for all guest related expenses, unified messaging services (not just voice mails), single button help desk for all services, service tracking and benchmarking, integration of other subsystems like RFID and guest privileged cards, and suchlike. IP-based video telephony is in demand, which can considerably enhance the guest experience.
Asheesh Pandia, Siemens Enterprise Communications Pvt. Ltd says: “Today’s IP telephony systems offer tons of features which are useful to guests as well as for back-office staff. The real need is to integrate multiple hotel systems with IP telephony system. This will embed the hotel operations workflow with communication systems, thereby eliminating delays, and will further enhance the guest experience.”
However, hotels are more ready to spend on IP Telephony to adequately support their back-office operations, rather than every guestroom. That’s why most of the IP systems being installed in hotels in India are, in general, hybrid systems that combine IP telephony in the back-office with analog systems in the guestrooms.
Magesh Ramamurthy, IT director, Four Seasons Hotel, Mumbai says: “It does add a lot of value to back-office functions like speed dial, personal address book, easy conferencing, and all other services. Having said that, IP phones have many features and buttons we still feel has to become user friendly before we implement it for our guests, otherwise it may not be a technology guests can operate by themselves.”
Deepak Manocha, general manager, Courtyard by Marriott Pune Hinjewadi, concurs with this statement.
“Personally, I feel the guests have no patience to understand the complicated IP system before using it and thus, considering IP as a value addition for guests is questionable,” he says.
One of the benefits of IP telephony though, is in terms of cost saving for the establishment. IP PBX offers free communication, as calls are no longer transmitted via the PSTN, but through a broadband internet connection, avoiding PSTN tolls and charges.
Another significant benefit of IP telephony is its ability to converge many services into a single network architecture to handle remote access, data routing, and unified messaging. This means less equipment, easier integration for IT staff as well as efficient flow of communication between branches at various locations across the globe.
Also, with voice and data merged onto one common IP network, the need to maintain separate networks is eliminated, simplifying the remote management of the PBX and maintenance of IP systems which do not require regular maintenance contracts.
Moreover, IP telephony allows for flexible integration of older and newer applications which minimises any compatibility problems in future. IP telephony system manufacturers have further eliminated this concern by adopting a common protocol, ensuring that users can choose from a wide range of applications into the future, retaining the capital investment in their IP PBX.
The hospitality industry is a highly specialised telephony market and the addition of hospitality specific features such as intelligent speech recognition for more efficient guest services, and in-building wireless communications, are a value addition for the business. This is evident in the growing number of hospitality-specific feature sets now available in the market.
Ravinder Raina, country head, PNS divison, NEC India, says: “We offer an unparalleled range of IP telephony solutions with distinct features that make it vital for deployment in the hospitality industry.”
At a corporate level too, IP telephony workers can virtually connect through a variety of devices and come together in real-time to reach collective decisions, and can use the service during business meetings or as a low-cost means of conferencing with other hotels across the world.
This also helps hospitality service providers deliver personalised customer interactions every time, deepening customer relationships.
As the Avaya Global Connect management emphasises: “With recent world events, many organisations are reassessing their emergency communications capabilities, and are looking at their preparedness for the unexpected. A critical element of any business continuity plan is a reliable communications system.
IP telephony based solutions, when deployed correctly, are designed to be inherently reliable and provide a platform for deploying intelligent communications applications.”
Hoteliers agree that the transition to IP Telephony systems does offer great promise, as the system delivers advanced communications that can enhance the guest experience, improve customer service, and optimise operational productivity and costs.
Nonetheless, in reality, the implementation of internet protocol telephony in hotels still remains slow.
KP Sapkota, regional manager IT, South-West Asia, InterContinental Hotel Group, explains: “IP Telephony is a great tool for customer satisfaction, however convincing hotel owners about it is still difficult.”
As a matter of fact, hotel IT decision makers consider the large initial investment to be the major speed bump to the road to IP, especially the economy and mid-segment hotels.
Also, IP telephony requires network-grade cabling to guest rooms; depending on how existing cabling is installed in a hotel, replacing it can represent a major cost.
However, Pandia says: “IP telephony costs should be viewed on the basis of TCO and not just capital expenditures. Over a time frame of five years, it has a better value proposition for TCO. For Greenfield properties, it is always best option to deploy future proof technology.”
Nevertheless, current costs are affordable for higher-end hotels, but can still be high or prohibitive for mid-market and economy properties. Raina agrees: “There could be some disinclination among the budget hotels in deploying the IP telephony solutions due to cost. As far as the high-end star hotels are concerned, they are keener on deploying the IP telephony solutions for a superior and larger customer experience.”
Nikhil Kapur, general manager, Ista Bangalore, says: “We feel IP telephony is a cutting-edge technology required by modern hotels. We too plan to upgrade all our properties to IP systems in the near future, although initially for conference facilities and public areas.”
Another main concern about IP telephony is the Quality of Service (QoS) which is a critical requirement. Giridharan counters this fear by saying: “Voice quality is not so much of a concern anymore, as we know these days we have network with 1G to desk.” Thus, although internet telephony is still a challenge, managed service providers with MPLS network can offer better voice quality services, suggest telephony providers.
At the same time, for IT staff that previously maintained voice and data separately, transition to the new system could involve extensive training to administer and maintain a system which is a converged network. With all data and voice transmissions routed through the single network infrastructure, workload for IT staff may also increase.
Another reason hoteliers are slow to adopt IP telephony is that they don’t see enough of a compelling reason to do so. Most IP telephony systems were developed initially for the corporate office market and are only gradually gaining hospitality-specific features.
At present in India, hotel chains like IHG and Starwood have started deploying full IP telephony,Ltdwhereas other hotels are looking at IP ready systems on which it would be easier for them to migrate to pure IP, based on their feature and solution requirements.
For instance, the upcoming Holiday Inn property in Cochin would feature end-to-end communication solutions. Sunny George, vice president, IndRoyal Group (developer of the project) says: “Being a business hotel, we wanted to ensure that we invest in the right communication technology to delight our guests.”
While hotels plan to go beyond just providing full tele/video conferencing facilities and wi-fi enabled rooms to adopting Unified Communications (UC), the IP telephony is all set to gradually replace its analog counterpart.
Many hotels are looking at enterprise communications as an investment to generate revenue and also a competitive edge to give differentiated services. Ramamurthy agrees: “IP telephony is a great value-add as it will serve and justify the true internet presence.It would be great to have 3G facility if provided by ISP, to be made available for guests.”
The IHCL management states: “Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces realises that the international corporate traveller is increasingly getting savvy, discerning, and demanding. Taj has already introduced technology systems including wi-fi, IP telephony, RFID and integrated entertainment systems in all its India hotels”.
Guest expectations will continue to evolve, and the experience of tomorrow will be significantly impacted by advances in media and connectivity technology.
Given these advances, hoteliers will be expected to provide a variety of new solutions to meet the changing needs of their guests. With the right tools and equipment, the hotel industry can reap the benefits of IP telephony, while avoiding the risks and pitfalls.
