Dispatches: the blessings of clueless tech companies, foreign labour shortage forces hotels to transform and how not to handle late check-out requests

Get Luckey

Out all night : Palmer Luckey

One of my favourite recent stories in the department of "wacky names" is how yet another 21-year old whiz kid called Palmer Luckey sold his virtual reality business Oculus to Facebook for a handsome US$2bn. Even if it's only a fraction of the $19bn Facebook paid not so long ago for Whats App, it seems like a lucky palm-off indeed. But funny names and big money aside, what was really interesting about this transaction was the discussion it triggered about what the 'next big thing' in tech innovation would be and the dominant tech companies' ability - or rather inability - to predict it.

As Google dabbles in self-driven cars and Glass headsets, Amazon plans to use drones as next generation delivery mechanisms and Facebook now clearly bets on virtual reality transforming our future lives, I tend to agree with GigaOm's Om Malik, who called the current attempt to define the next big thing as "billion dollar dart throwing". "Are the smartest minds of our time as clueless as we are?", he cheekily asks. For hotel IT managers who have been fretting over what the next 'big thing' in hotel technology will be and whether it is just around the corner, this should come as a relief. If the bleeding edge doesn't know which way the cookie will crumble, we shouldn't guess it either. There are plenty of enabling technologies out there now that have the capability to deliver a lot of innovation within the hotel. The key is to find the right application to fit each hotel's personality and to integrate it fully to facilitate smooth operation.

Hotel Industry's Labour Shortage in Singapore is here to stay

STB CEO Lionel Yeo

Meanwhile, at last week's Food & Hotel Expo in Singapore, the CEO of the Singapore Tourism Board Lionel Yeo delivered the news no one in the industry wanted to hear: manpower challenges, triggered by a tightening of foreign labour laws, are here to stay. And Yeo put the responsibility to deal with the chronic shortage of front and back of house staff in hotels across the city state squarely at the feet of the industry itself: "With even more hotel rooms coming onstream in the next few years, this situation will get worse if our industry does not transform. Based on our rough estimates, an additional shortfall of about 3,000 workers by 2017 is looming if we don't make adjustments," he said. While that is sobering news to many hotels struggling to fill positions, many hotels are taking the situation in their stride and are indeed looking at ways to transform their operations. The hotels we have been dealing with are increasingly interested in using the in-room IPTV system to streamline operations and offer self-serve ordering options for the most requested items from housekeeping to in-room dining. Flexibility and customisation are key here as of course no two hotels are alike, but to really benefit from these automated services it is imperative that they are integrated into the hotel's overall ecosystem.

How to not handle late check-out requests

During a short break on Okinawa recently we stayed at a new and comfortable hotel that was at the right location for the activities we had planned and didn't break the bank. All good reasons to recommend it and mark it as a place to return to, and it would be, if it wasn't for one thing: the late check-out charges. We should have had an inkling of what was to come when we were told of the rather early check-out time of 11am, but as we naively asked for a check out at 1pm (to match with our late afternoon flight departure), we were presented with the charges: 1,000 yen every hour, maximum three hours.

Not happy Jan...

While this was delivered with the same unfailing smile we received by staff throughout our stay, it smacked of mercenarianism that leaves a rather sour taste. I have come across fixed late check-out charges and worse behaviour by hotels wanting to make a quick buck by exploiting travelers' skewed flight times before - the worst was in the US where conference delegates who flew in on red-eye flights and wanted to check in earlier than the "3pm standard check-in time" were told their room would be ready for a US$25 fee. But this is not something you usually come across in Asia, and rightly so. Late check-out is not a given and should always be at the discretion of the hotel pending on availability. But even if it's not possible to extend a late check-out for these reasons, the fact that I can ask for it and the staff make an effort to accommodate my request, rather than slap a table of charges in front of me, will make me feel that the hotel values my custom. Not so difficult one would think...