RoomKey Property Management Blog Hotel Property Management Solutions

By Jeff Sefton

After your property management system evaluation team has been formed, it’s time to begin building a “high level” system requirement list.

These initial requirements will get broken down into a more detailed list at a later stage – at this point think about the system in modules such as:

• Front Desk
• Reservations
• Housekeeping
• Accounts Receivable
• …and so on until you have them all covered

System Flowchart

An easy way to work through the modules is to lay out the system flow by using post-it notes on a wall, a whiteboard, etc. If you are able to meet in an area where you can keep the notes up for further meetings, great! Otherwise take a photo and post the notes again at your next meeting, or perhaps tape them to a flip chart that you can bring to each meeting.

Start with a reservation and how it flows though the system – while at the same time thinking about the reservation from the guest’s perspective and reviewing all the touch points the guest experiences during their stay.

The flow charting process will help the team understand how the information flows through the system as a whole (and not just how a single module works).

Next week’s post will discuss how to expand your property management system requirement list.

Photo Credit: Dan Paluska

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As an independent hotelier, what are some of the risks associated with choosing not to comply with PCI standards?

One of the risks is brand damage – a data breach will likely have a negative impact on your property’s reputation and erode the confidence of your customer base. This can obviously effect revenue and profits over the long term.

The most notable risk is the direct financial penalty. Each credit card company has its own set of fines and penalties – each of which is designed to be very costly to your business.

In addition to the risk of direct fines from credit card brands like Visa, there is also the possibility of receiving financial levies from payment processors or merchant banks – these organization can also be fined by card associations and have the authority to pass fines along to individual hotels that are deemed responsible for any data breaches that occur.

What is the Cost?

Some figures are astounding – Visa fines can be as high as $100,000 per month and up to $500,000 per data breach. The total cost of correcting a credit card data security breach is estimated to be between $90-$300 per card.

In the most severe cases, security infractions can result in your hotel having its ability to process credit card payments completely revoked or lead to law suits from the various affected parties.

For a different perspective on PCI and some of the risks associated with non-compliance, check out this short video (12 min). The video focuses more on the retail sector and POS systems but the information is very relevant to hoteliers.

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By Jeff Sefton,

Choosing a strong and diverse evaluation team to help select the best tools to run your hotel is a good first step in gaining buy-in from your hotel team – It is important to have everyone on-board when a new property management system is selected for your property.

Everyone involved in your organization from the owner, hotel management company and senior management to the front desk, reservations, sales and housekeeping department needs to be invested and committed to the project.

Project Manager

Prior to beginning the evaluation process, it is important to designate a project manager that will be accountable and see the project through from start to finish.

The Project Manager is usually the first person appointed to the evaluation team. This choice may already be determined…possibly a consultant has been hired for the job, a manager at head office, a manager at the hotel, someone in operations or someone in the information technology department.

Evaluation Team

• Evaluation team members might consist of operation managers that use functionality geared to specific roles as well as front line staff that would use the property management software on a daily basis
• Staff in various positions such as Front Desk Clerk, Reservations Clerk, Housekeeping Managers or Supervisors, Sales Staff, Accounting Staff, Concierge Staff and staff in the Information Technology Department would be able to offer different perspectives
• Consider representatives from these departments to be included in the evaluation process – Their experience with past systems as well as their department processes and their insight into what functionality they need to best serve the hotel guests will be very valuable when building your requirement list.

Setting Expectations

• The Project Manager should set expectations and objectives of what is to be accomplished during the evaluation process and provide this information in writing to the team
• Setting expectations and objectives will help to keep the evaluation process on track
• The team needs to understand that although comments and suggestions are appreciated and necessary, not everyone’s wants will be fulfilled
• The goal is to choose the best system to meet the property’s business needs while providing the best overall tool for all departments
• There will be some areas and functionality that will require compromise
• Sorting out items that are needs as opposed to those that are wants is essential during this process.  Items that are determined to be needs should be qualified as such.

There is no shortage of information regarding Payment Card Industry (PCI) data security standards – so much, in fact, that it can become pretty confusing. For the purpose of this post, let’s focus on how PCI applies to different organizations.

The 4 PCI Merchant Levels

First and foremost, it’s important to understand that PCI Compliance is required by any organization that stores, processes or transmits credit card data. In the case of the hospitality sector it affects the largest chain hotels right down to the smallest independent B&B’s.

Level 1

• Over 6 million credit card transactions per year
• Requirement: annual on-site audit + quarterly network scans

Level 2

• 150,000 to 6 million credit card transactions per year
• Requirement: annual self-assessment + quarterly network scans

Level 3

• 20,000 to 1 million credit card transactions per year
• Requirement: annual self-assessment + quarterly network scans

Level 4

• Less than 20,000 credit card transactions per year
• Requirement: annual self-assessment + annual network scan

PCI and Property Management Software

Because so much credit card data flows through your property management system, selecting the right PMS solution provider can go a long way towards your hotel becoming PCI compliant.

A few questions to ask your property management software vendor:

1. Is your PMS provider PCI Certified?
2. Does your PMS vendor offer a program to help you become PCI compliant?

Be proactive and find out how your PMS provider can help you attain the highest level of data security possible for your property and work to reduce the PCI compliance burden for your hotel.

In an upcoming post we’ll look at the risks associated with your property not becoming PCI compliant.

Photo Credit: Purple Slog

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How GDS and IDS Reservations get to your hotel.

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This visual was inspired by 7 Deadly Myths and Solutions for PCI Compliance

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‘Why are there bugs in your software?’ is one of my least favourite questions

It’s not really a bad question and as a rather heavy user of software myself, I completely understand it. It’s just a little bit frustrating and tends to nag at me – sort of like when your mother keeps asking when she can expect her first grandchild.

I like to dream that we have faultless software that installs and runs like a finely tuned automobile. This lets me live on a beach and check my email which only contains suggestions for new features and enhancements. My computer never crashes, slows down or beeps at me for no apparent reason and my blender only makes perfect lime margaritas. Ahhhhh!

Back to reality – All software has bugs. Our software has some. Multi billion dollar corporations with hundreds of programmers and quality assurance staff have some. They are as inevitable as ants at a picnic. Even the software we use to write the RoomKey PMS software you use has bugs. We try very hard to create programs that work perfectly but it just doesn’t happen. I think it all boils down to the fact that people (who I think can also have software bugs) design software and people are not perfect.

Most of the random program features in our software are now due to the complexity of the RoomKey program. Some would argue that as a piece of software ages it should have fewer bugs. This is probably true to some extent. Programs written in prior years that have been in use for a while and have had most of their bugs removed, work pretty much as advertised. We run into some speed bumps in this theory when the software changes.

Change is a good thing. It keeps the software current and relevant. Change is necessary. Computer hardware changes constantly and the software must keep up. Business practises change over time and software must change to match. The more knowledge people have available, the more they want their software to keep track of it. Change presents some challenges to the programmers (which is also good).

Let’s look at RoomKey specifically. It was originally written a number of years ago. At first, it made reservations, checked people in and out, posted charges to their accounts and reported on all the above – Simple. Over time, it’s gotten a bit more sophisticated. A reservation alone now takes many factors into account. If you merely examine the rates portion of a reservation we need to look at:

1. client type
2. number of adults
3. number of children
4. date
5. number of nights
6. occupancy
7. room charge
8. Is it a package?
9. minimum nights restrictions on the rate
10. maximum nights restriction by date range
11. Groups…

The list goes on. As you can see, it is no longer a simple process and this is only one part of a reservation which is also only one part of the program. A calculation error in any one of these parameters, a typing mistake like ( or [ instead of {, an error in compiling thousands and thousands of lines of code or a sneezing fit while typing and bumping your keyboard (true story) leads to…. you guessed it…. a bug!

When you look at how complex the program has become, you can see that there are many ways for bugs to creep in there. The more complex the machine, the more things can go wrong with it. Luckily, there is a very dedicated team of programmers and support people here at RSI whose job it is to try and make sure the bugs go away and your experience is pleasant and productive.

Do we do a good job of debugging? I think so. Is it perfect? No, not yet but we’re working on it. The dream lives on.

Stay tuned for future posts including: Why does it take so long to fix some of these bugs?!

Do you feel that RoomKey PMS is running slow? Here is a list of things to check that may address the issue:

1. Check their Reservation Display: Systems Configuration > Property > Contacts / Preferences  (7 days is a good benchmark)
2. Reset your router
3. Install any Window’s updates
4. Inquire about any new anti-virus programs that may have been installed on the computer recently
5. Speak with your Internet Service Provider to verify if there are any issues at your specific location
6. Do you share your internet connection with guests?  If so, during high usage time your internet connection will run slow.  Consider setting up a separate internet feed for the Front Desk to prevent this from happening.
7. How old is your modem?  Sometimes older version modems, although connected to an excellent service provider, will run slowly.  Newer modems sometimes have functionality that helps enhance the features offered by your service provider, thus, helping maximize your speed.
8. Are you on wired or wireless?  If you are on wired, check the cable connected to your computer; is there any damage to the wire or frayed ends?  Damaged cables can affect you speed as well.
9. How old is the computer you are using?  Older computer are sometimes incapable of attaining the speed you want to reach.

Consult your on-site IT person or third party IT provider – they should be able to help you find the answers to all these questions.

Image Credit: PhotoMonkey

When refunding a guest credit card the “debit” to the credit card will calculate under “Other Charges”.  It is important to note that the “Credits” on a guest folio are a total of all Credits (not just payments).  Therefore, your “Credits” is adding up to the total of the Credit Card credit as well as the refund that you made on the guests account.

Did you know that if you do not pick a folio in the Group Wizard that it will automatically default to Folio 8?

To ensure accurate billing upon check-out, always make sure a Folio Number is selected when creating a group using the Group Wizard.

(Click image to enlarge)