2. Front Office Function Front Office Manager (FOM) Revenue Management Reservations Guest Services Night Audit Desk Staff Concierge Bell Staff
3. Front Office Functions With Other Positions Front Office Manager Revenue manager Establishing room rates Reservation manager Managing the reservation process Desk staff Guest registration Concierge Guest information Bell staff Guest assistance Night auditor Managing the Front Office related accounting and data collection process
4. Responsibilities of Front Office Functional areas PMS & its management Revenue & reservation management Management of guest Services Accounting for guests Data management
5. Front Office: The PMS & Its Management PMS : Computerized system Room rates, reservations, and room assignments Guest histories Reservations Other selected guest services Management information functions Accounting information
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8. Revenue & Reservations Management: Practicing Yield Management Yield Management strategy based on room demand Forecasted room demand Rate strategy 90-100% occupancy Offer no discounts 70-90% occupancy Offer discounts up to 10% 50 - 70% occupancy Offer discounts up to 20% Less than 50% occupancy Offer discounts up to 30% Yield Management A strategy using demand forecasts to maximize RevPar. A strategy using demand forecasts to maximize RevPar. Demand for rooms > supply, sell at “rack rate” Demand for rooms < supply, offer at discounts
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10. Managing Guest Reservations: By Types & Delivery Methods By reservation type By delivery method Transient sales : rooms and services sold primarily via Front Office & its staff Group sales : rooms and services sold primarily via Sales & Marketing department, and given to the Front Office for recording and servicing. Global distribution system : great use by travel agents worldwide. Hotel direct : effectiveness of the telephone sales effort is important. Walk in : “curb appeal” is important. Internet : accuracy of current info on web-site is important. Franchise 800 numbers : significant source of transient room reservations.
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12. Managing Guest Services Variety Of Guest Services Airport transportation Parking cars Handling luggage Providing directions to local attractions Making restaurant reservations Taking guest messages Routing mail Newspaper delivery Management of safety deposit boxes Supplying directions for areas within the hotel Setting wake-up calls Providing guest security via careful dissemination of guest-related information Handling guest concerns and disputes
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14. Managing Guest Services: Front Desk - Arrival (continued…) Five-step registration process Minimize wait / make guests feel welcome Greeting guests Reg card serves as the record of guest’s stay Authorize (validate) the card at time of registration Accommodate guest preference for room types (location, view, bed type & amenities) Issuance of keys Control issue of guestroom keys for guest safety Confirming the info on reg card Securing a form of payment Room assignment
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20. Night audit function: eight keys item Accounting For Guests: Night Audit Posting appropriate room tax and tax rates to guest folio Verification of accurate room status (in PMS) of all rooms Posting any necessary adjustments or allowances to guest folios Verification that all legitimate, non-room charges have been posted, throughout the day, to proper guest folio Monitoring guest account balances (e.g., guest’s credit limit) Balancing and reconciling Front Desk’s cash bank Updating and backing up electronic data maintained by Front Office Producing, duplicating and distributing all management mandated reports (e.g., ADR, occupancy %, business source, in-house guest lists)
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23. Data Management: Locking / Security Systems Recodable locking system Increasingly utilized to ensure guest safety Installed cost is about $300 - $500 per guest room Independent & stand-alone (no wiring back to PMS is necessary) Managing a recodable lock system Be trained to issue duplicate keys only to confirmed registered guests Maintain an accurate data system that actually identifies registered guests and their assigned room numbers
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Editor's Notes
This Front Office organizational chart (hotel department responsible for guest reservations, registration, service and payment) is in a 350 room full-service hotel.
Concierge/s is/are the individual/s within a full-service hotel responsible for providing guests with detailed information regarding local dining and attractions, as well as assisting with related guest needs.
Re-engineering is re-organizing hotel departments or work sections within departments.
Figure 6.2 shows guest tracker PMS hotel management features. PMS requires its own care and maintenance; any installed back-up system (redundant hardware and/or software operated in parallel with the system it serves) hardware related to PMS should be inspected and tested on a regular basis.
Do several math exercises so that students understand the formula of RevPar; another way to express RevPar is actual room revenue / number of available rooms. .
Explain why forecasting demand is important to maximize RevPar with the examples of college football game, and night before Thanksgiving. Sell-out indicates 1) a situation in which all rooms are sold or over-sold. A hotel, area, or entire city may, if demand is strong enough, sell out, 2) a period of time in which management attempts to maximize ADR.
Yield Management is a strategy based on room supply and guest demand for rooms, that seeks to maximize RevPar by offering discounts on days when demand is weak, and eliminating discounts on days when demand is strong. Rack rate is the price at which a hotel sells its rooms when no discounts of any kind are offered to guests.
While Yield Management is a method to control room rates, “Closed to Arrival” (CTA) and “Minimum Length of Stay” (MLOS) strategies are a method of managing occupancy, depending on room occupancy. For all these methods, forecasting room demand is an important job of the Sales and Marketing manager. Use Figure 6.4 (Forecast Room Demand) to describe the concepts of “Closed to Arrival” (CTA) and “Minimum Length of Stay” (MLOS). To enhance students’ understanding of these two strategies, Question 3 in “Issues at Work” in Chapter 6 ask students: in which specific circumstances would it be best to employ CTA versus MLOS to maximize occupancy? The text also discusses the practice of “over-booking” (a situation in which the hotel has more guest reservations for rooms than it has rooms available to lodge those guests) as one method to manage occupancy; use second case study to facilitate discussion with students about ethical issues involved in over-booking, from the hotel’s and the guests’ perspectives.
Depending on the location, type, size and characteristics of hotel, levels of guest services vary greatly.
Registration (reg) card is a document that provides details such as guest’s name, arrival date, rate to be paid, departure and other information related to the guest’s stay. Valet is originally a term used to identify an individual who cared for the clothes of wealthy travelers; its most common usage now is in reference to those individuals responsible for parking guest vehicles.
Validation means 1) the card is being used legally, 2) the card has sufficient credit remaining to pay for the guest’s estimated charges 3) a “hold” for a dollar amount determined by Front Office policy has been placed on the card to ensure the hotel’s payment.
“ Walked” indicates a situation in which a guest with a reservation is re-located from the reserved hotel to another hotel because no room was available at the reserved hotel. Ask students whether they have experienced dealing with walked guests; determine the training aspects relating to this situation, the policy regarding walked guests at the organization(s) they worked at, and how they managed such a difficult situation without diminishing the reputation of the hotel.
Bucket check is a procedure used to verify, for each guest, the accuracy of that guest’s registration information.
Night author is the individual who performs daily review of guest transactions recorded by the Front Office; night audit is the process of reviewing for accuracy and completeness the accounting transactions from one day to conclude or “close” that day’s sales information in preparation for posting the transactions for the next day.
Hotels increasingly implement express or self-check in / out systems to meet guests’ needs and wants; Question 4 in “Issues at Work” in Chapter 6 asks who (business travelers versus leisure travelers) demand or prefer the speed of self-check in / out to human interaction of a front desk agent, and how this relates to consumer loyalty.
Call accounting is the hotel internal system to document and charge guests for their telephone use. Question 5 in “Issues at Work” (Chapter 6) addresses the issue of decreased revenue from telephone services in the hotel; ask students to list three specific methods they would employ to encourage in-room telephone use in a hotel.
Re-engineering is re-organizing hotel departments or work sections within departments.
