BEATING HEART THE HOTEL’S
Today’s property management systems can tap into apps and a whole range of other hospitality systems to offer hoteliers better customer insights, streamlined
operations and real-time connection with online marketplaces. Ross
Bentley looks at what is driving development and where the technology is heading
property management system, or PMS, is the engine that keeps a hotel running smoothly. At its most basic, it allows hotel managers to know how many rooms are vacant, how many have been sold and at what rate, and which rooms have to be cleaned. Traditionally, the PMS has linked to tele- phony and in-room entertainment systems, points of sale in restaurants and bars, and golf and spa booking facilities, so in-property services that a guest has used can be centrally captured and billed.
A
The PMS also interfaces with the hotel’s electronic locking systems, allowing key cards to be encoded and managed through the system, which automatically sends informa- tion about the room number and the length of
10 | Technology Prospectus 2016
a guest’s stay to the electronic locking system. Likewise, it is common for hotels to integrate their energy management system with their PMS so that room temperatures can be set for guest check-in and switched automatically to energy-saving mode when they check out.
Leaps and bounds In
recent
years, property management systems have come on in leaps and bounds. It is now possible to integrate them with a host of other systems and apps offering a multi- tude of functions.
Wherever hotels put their rooms up for sale – on their own or third-party websites, social media platforms and online travel agencies (OTAs) such as
Booking.com or Expedia
– today’s property management systems enable hoteliers to maximise their revenue by updating their real-time availability to all these different sales channels.
They are also being integrated with travel management systems to manage corporate bookings, as well as revenue management systems, to allow rooms to be sold at the right rate, at the right time.
All these functions help to maxim- ise revenue for a property, says Calum McIndoe, sales director at hospitality technol- ogy company Infor. He says: “Revenue management solutions use algorithms and historical information to advise if a piece of group business would produce less or more revenue versus natural booking pick-up.
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