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HOSPITALITY
HOTELIER OPTIMISES
SHERATON AUTOMATES
NEW IDEAS SYSTEM
DELIVERY ALERTS
S
heraton Hotels is part of the Starwood the security managers on duty. Personnel must
Hotels & Resorts Worldwide group respond and acknowledge within a certain
and maintaining a safe and secure timeframe, otherwise the alert is escalated
environment for its guests is a primary to the next level. For ½ re alerts, internal ½ re
objective. marshals are contacted with details of where
In order to minimise potential disruption the alarm has been triggered and all hotel staff
to business continuity from emergencies, the are informed of a general evacuation order.
company employed a ½ re alert system that The implementation of message master
checked the status of ½ re detectors and a enterprise alert has delivered a number
Menzies Hotels, a major hotel chain
technical system monitored other business of business bene ½ ts. According to Olivier
in the UK, has installed new revenue
critical functions such as emergency doors Uytterhoeven, director of IT for Starwood
management software throughout its
and temperature sensors. Hotels Brussels, “message master enterprise
estate, which is a mixture of three and
While upgrading the mobile phone alert enables us to more effectively protect
four-star quality hotels across the country. service used by the hotel, Sheraton deployed our customers, our people and our
Menzies Hotels is currently message master enterprise alert noti ½ cation operations. It gives us greater ¾ exibility over
implementing IDeaS V5i, from hospitality work ¾ ow software from Derdack at how we run our business and ensures that
revenue management and optimisation
the Sheraton Airport hotel. A separate we can respond quickly and ef ½ ciently should
systems provider, IDeaS with the following
installation acted as a centralised noti ½ cation an emergency occur.”
modules: Best Available Rate (BAR),
work ¾ ow hub based at the Brussels Sheraton The roll out has led Sheraton to identify
to manage pricing decisions while
Towers that also controlled the Four Points other areas of its business that could bene ½ t
incorporating competitive rate information;
hotel to integrate with both the ½ re and from Derdack’s noti ½ cation work ¾ ow
Multi-Property, which allows authorised
technical alerting systems and provide a software. For example, diners at the Sheraton
access to roll-up reporting in user-
single noti ½ cation source for business alerts. Towers restaurants can press a button at
de ¼ nable property groups; and the Budget
When the technical or ½ re system detects their table to summon a waiter. Message
module, which provides an easy method
an event, it is sent via a serial link or using the master enterprise alert is integrated with the
to assess the hotel’s performance against
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) server hotel’s internal SMTP server and forwards an
¼ nancial goals.
to message master enterprise alert. The SMS message to a waiter’s mobile indicating
“Having recently expanded our
software analyses the content of the message which table requires assistance. The software
business, the installation of this solution
from IDeaS guarantees a more scienti ¼ c
to determine if it has been triggered by a is also used to communicate meeting
approach to our revenue management
½ re or technical alarm. Depending on the noti ½ cations to internal staff.
process which, in turn, allows us to deploy
noti ½ cation work ¾ ows, the software transmits “We have successfully replaced a costly
in a much more centralised environment,”
the alarm via SMS to a predetermined group legacy pager system with a ¾ exible, future
said Paul Dooner, director of revenue for
of users using up to four GSM modems to proof noti ½ cation work ¾ ow solution that
Menzies Hotels. “The key for us was the
ensure suf ½ cient capacity. can integrate with any of our monitoring
ability of the V5i On-demand Revenue
Technical alerts by SMS are typically sent to systems,” concluded Uytterhoeven.
Management Solution to operate within
our centralised framework and provide
central business intelligence to all of our
different properties and estates in the UK.”
“IDeaS has already proven a great
help in maximising bene ¼ ts during the
integration and refurbishment process of
seven hotels we recently acquired,” added
Dooner.
“We believe that the deployment of
IDeaS V5i, along with modules that are key
to our business, will enable us to improve
the management of our distribution
channels and to provide a quicker and
better response to the demand of the
market, thus allowing us to become more
competitive.”
RETAIL TECHNOLOGY NOVEMBER 2008
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