The team confirmed to select the field of hospitality. It is because people always require travelling, eating, drinking and looking for accommodation. Hence hospitality is a very stable industry compare to others industry. Even when the world economy is down, hospitality industry can remain secure and sheltered. Thus, the team had selected Hilton Hotels & Resorts as client and decided to focus on Hilton Hotel. The team had done research on Hilton Hotels & Resorts, which found that it is global brand of full-service hotels and resorts and the flagship brand of American multinational hospitality Hilton Company. As of 2017, there were more than 570 Hilton Hotels & Resorts properties in 85 countries and territories such as Texas, Cyprus, Virginia and Malaysia.
Hilton Hotels was founded by Conrad Hilton in 1919. Now it owned by Hilton Worldwide, the company has over 5,300 properties worldwide. The line graph above is a worldwide statistic that shows the occupancy rate of Hilton Hotels from 2012 to 2017. The occupancy rate of Hilton Hotels was increasing every year and the highset is 75.5%, which is in 2017. Information Technology is now critical to an corporation’s fulfillment so it’s far critical that an business company have to makes use of the computer era in its day by day commercial company routine and the computer hardware and software program meets the wishes of the agency. Therefore, the team observed through research that realized there have many hardware, software and communication used for their Hilton Hotel’s business to perform business operations that promote company’s performance and productivity.
2.1 Hardware
2.1.1 Door Lock
In this era of technology, teenagers or even elder people will carry a smartphone in their pocket around. According to these scenario, several chains have been commenced to experiment with the aid of the use of smartphones as a key to liberate the door. The era was first followed through smaller inn businesses. Joining other major hotel chains Starwood and Marriott, Hilton also allow customers use smartphones to unlock the door. In the end, Hilton has emerged as the maximum distinguished which first started out trialling the generation, discovered that the telephone unlocking system is now in use in around 1700 of hotel (Mews System 2017).
Hilton requires customers to download an application, Hilton Honors, and then customers need to activate the virtual keys. So, customers can be go straight away to their room and pick their preferred room the usage of the utility thru smartphones. When customers approaches the door, the digital key will pop up at the screen of smartphones. Then, customers can press a virtual “Press to Unlock” button on their smartphones so they can unlock and reach into their room easily instead of using magnetic cards (Davies 2017).
2.1.2 Payment Terminal
Hilton uses payment terminal in its business. A payment terminal also called as a EFTPOS terminal, point of sale terminal and credit card terminal. According to Point of Sale Terminal (n.d.), payment terminal is a hardware which used to process card payment to make electronic funds transfer. Most of the payment terminal use standard telephone line wired or wireless internet connection to transmit data.
Payment terminal read the data which store on the magnetic stripe and microprocessor or memory chip embedded in the card which identifying the customer and the card. Then, it transfers a specific amount of money from the customer’s bank account to Hilton’s bank account. Lastly, the payment terminal records the payment and prints out a receipt to the customer (Point of Sale Terminal n.d.).
Hilton uses payment terminal in its business to prevent customer’s debt. Hilton will ask the customers check-in using their credit card to keep on file and initially authorise the card directly. Hilton will charge a certain amount of money and sits the card authorization until it completes the sale to prevent loss and debt.
2.1.3 Hospitality Phone System
Hilton uses the hospitality phone system to keep the hotel staffs and customers connected. Every hotel room is provided with a handset which enables customers to require services from the front desk staff conveniently. However, the functions of the handset is limited and it only allows internal calls within Hilton Kuching.
According to Parris (2018), hospitality industry nowadays will either choose to use Private Branch Exchange (PBX) or Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephones. A PBX phone system is trusted to be reliable, and it is considered as a more traditional telephone solution. However, the cost of the PBX phone system is higher because the maximum coverage supported by the system is only over 40 lines. A VoIP phone system is operated by using the server in cloud system, thus the hotel does not need to install the traditional phone system. VoIP phone system also offers higher phone call quality and more advanced functions.
A hospitality phone system with high efficiency can improve Hilton’s service quality by providing more extra facilities to the customers, reducing maintenance fee, and making the most of the hotel staff and resources.
2.1.4 CCTV ( Closed Circuit Television)
According to Avtrontech (2017), every hotel industry must install CCTV as it is essential. CCTV stands for Closed Circuit Television. Hilton installed CCTV to ensure security and safety of its customers and staffs. The CCTV will transmit signals from video camera to identified monitors which is located at specific locations. It allows Hilton to monitor and record 24 hours live videos to ensure security, surveillance and safety of its customers and staffs.
2.2 Software
2.2.1 Hilton Honors
Hilton Honors is a application that can download at IOS and Android. It can be a system which can help customers booking rooms easily without registered at counter, replacing magnetic card or keys by unlocking the room using smartphones. It gives visitors with specified maps and wayfinding competencies, facts approximately on-property occasions and notifies customers of special offers and inn features proper to their particular options.
Hilton Honors app may be taps into Google Maps to help clients to choose the first-class room. It help customers to book their ideal room that they want on Google Maps by seen the details about the room’s surrounding as well as the view outside the room that customers want to book. Customers will obtain and receive the notifications as soon as the room they’ve picked is prepared. Upon arrival, customers can head clear-cut to their rooms (Edmonds 2016).
Hilton Honors app can becomes the remote which can control in-room for television and lighting. Hilton Honors app in smartphones can connect with room technology to improve the provider request, in particular Hilton Honors’ loyalty application members. This technique is a good method that may interact with loyalty visitors to raise their experience and relationship once they live in inns (Williams 2018).
With Hilton Honors app, customers can request services such as housekeeping visits or a late check-out by way of simply sending a chat message as early as a day earlier before check-in and up to a week after for any follow-up needs. “Pin My Room” will invite visitors to mark their favored room in a lodge for you to select the same room on destiny visits(Hospitality Technology 2016).
Hilton Honor app, which can use for digital key, digital check-in, room selection and in-app real-time chat are all benefits that are given for Hilton Honors members.
2.2.2 IP Camera Viewer
According to CCTV System for Hotels (2018), each year there are more than 50,000 crimes happen inside the hotel due to lack of security measures. That’s why Hilton installing CCTV as it top priority. Hilton uses IP Camera Viewer to connect the CCTV that it installed around the hotel to the computer. IP Camera Viewer is an effective video monitoring software. Through this software, Hilton able to view live video from CCTV on the computer. IP Camera Viewer can support more than 2,000 different CCTV models such as Panasonic, Toshiba, Canon and many more (IP Camera Viewer 2018).
IP Camera Viewer allows Hilton to view and control up to 4 cameras concurrently. Hilton is able to view the CCTV from various remote locations on a single screen by using IP Camera Viewer’s centralized camera and layout management (IP Camera Viewer 2018).
By modifying camera image and video properties on IP Camera Viewer, it can make the live video clearer. Hilton is able to set the video properties such as contrast, brightness and saturation for the CCTV. IP Camera Viewer also provides function such as adjusting the orientation of the CCTV and digital zoom for zoom in or out of the video (IP Camera Viewer 2018). IP Camera Viewer allows Hilton to set up a system to ensure the security of the hotel.
2.2.3 Hilton OnQ System
In 2004, Matt Hart, the president and chief operations officer from Hilton Hotels Corporation had introduced the OnQ system, the first online customer information system in the hospitality field. Hilton OnQ system is a web-based check-in software invented by Hilton’s technology experts. This system is proved to be successful as it assisted Hilton to increase and maintain their customer loyalty (Red Dot Digital 2010).
According to Hotel Online (2004), the benefits of OnQ system are:-
Customer who registered an account with password protection can acquire the electronic portfolios of all Hilton hotels and enables them to track their expenses from the expense report provided.
The system allow hotel members with Gold or Diamond status to check into their rooms before they arrive at the hotel. The web-based check-in function helps to save the customers’ time.
OnQ system enables the kiosk check-in and check-out function which then simplifies the hotel procedures for the customers, it also helps customers to acquire other additional services such as visual room selection.
OnQ system helps the service staff to recognize their customers more. Thus, they can provide more customized services to the customers.
