Hilton Hotels Corp. and Carlson Hotels Worldwide this month became the first major hotel companies to announce online checkin, allowing travelers to register electronically for their rooms in advance of arrival. The moves are the latest steps industry players have taken to expedite arrival and eliminate long lines at checkin.
Hyatt Hotels Corp., Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide and Marriott International this year joined Hilton in implementing or at least testing another approach to the checkin line bottleneck: electronic kiosks in hotel lobbies
(BTN, July 19).While lobby kiosks allow guests to bypass the front desk entirely, online checkin still requires travelers to stop at the front desk, verify their identity and obtain a room key. Travelers, working from their home or office computers, can select rooms with features that best meet their needs and print the confirmations. Once a traveler checks in, the hotel is notified electronically of the pending arrival.
The service, however, is restricted to high-ranking members of the Hilton Honors frequent guest program.
"Remote online checkin for airlines has become a fairly accepted practice, so hotels were the logical next ones to try it," said Yasuo Sonoda, travel manager at Macromedia in San Francisco. "Any technology that allows our travelers to save time is welcome."
Sonoda noted that hotels have offered express checkout from guest rooms for a while. "It's a nice complement to be able to have express checkin as well," he said.
One valuable application will be for late arrivals. "There'll be no confusion if you arrive after regular hours. Since you're already checked in, there should be no question there's a room waiting for you," Sonoda said.
By automating the checkin process, hotels reduce staffing requirements. "Both online checkin and lobby kiosks really are about cost reduction," said Norm Rose, president of Travel Tech Consulting in Belmont, Calif. "All parts of the travel management value chain are under pressure to lower costs. For suppliers, the major cost is head count. If you can reduce front desk staffing, you're going to achieve cost savings," he said.
"Hotels always position these services as a way to provide added convenience for travelers," Rose said. "To some extent, this is true, but in another way it's not. There's a balance here, and we'll have to see how it plays out."
In the Hilton version of online checkin, which takes effect next month, travelers can check in 24 hours in advance. "Travelers can access their reservation via one of our brand Web sites. Since guest information already is stored within their online personal account, the hotel doesn't need to collect the same information at the front desk," said Tim Harvey, Hilton CIO.
The hotel front desk completes the pre-arrival work, so travelers' key cards and registration packets are ready for their arrival. When they reach the hotel, travelers exchange the confirmation receipt to receive their room keys and packets and can go to their room.
Initially, select hotels across all of Hilton's brands, which include Embassy Suites, Doubletree, Conrad, Hampton and Homewood Suites in addition to the core Hilton brand, will offer the service.
At Carlson, the service, which rolled out this month, is being implemented at all Radisson Hotels & Resorts in the Americas. Unlike Hilton, Carlson has made its program available to all travelers, regardless of frequency program membership. "Guests can utilize the service up until 6:00 p.m. on the day of arrival and at least two hours prior to checkin," said Bjorn Gullaksen, Carlson executive vice president and brand leader. Carlson has no timetable to roll it out at Country Inns & Suites, Regent International or its other brands.
Like many consumer technologies, online checkin can be a time saver until something goes wrong, according to Rose. "When that happens, suddenly there's an issue. You've checked in online, but need to change your reservation, for example, because of a last-minute conflict and you aren't sure there will be proper coordination. Compounding the problem with online checkin, there now are fewer front desk clerks on duty to help straighten things out."
Brian Stage, Carlson executive vice president for sales, distribution and reservations, acknowledged that hotels are following in the airlines' footsteps. "Because travelers have grown accustomed to the convenience at airports, they want to benefit from the same time-saving at their hotel," he said.
Requiring travelers to pick up the room key at the front desk means they are going to have contact with a front desk clerk, which Carlson sees as a positive. Accordingly, Carlson has no plans to introduce lobby kiosks precisely because it eliminates that human contact. "We know some of our competitors have taken this step, but we feel guests benefit from interacting with staff members," Stage said.
A spokesperson said Marriott is in the final stages of developing its own approach to online checkin. One scenario that will be tested would allow travelers to use wireless personal digital assistants to connect with lobby kiosks through the property management system. Depending on test results, Marriott expects to deploy wireless and Internet checkin sometime in 2005.
Starwood said it is looking into various online checkin options, but has no immediate plans to announce a decision.
In the long term, both online checkin and lobby kiosks are intermediate steps, according to Rose. "Until we have the ability to use our cell phone as the room key, there are going to be various steps like these. It's four or five years away, but you'll have the ability to have basically an electronic key. Everything will be identified through your mobile device."