Yahoo news posted a new story about hotel security that is appearing everywhere.  You can read the entire story here.  Be sure to check out the story and train your front desk to address the concerns that guests will have.  Among the concerns in the story: hotel policies on requesting adjacent rooms, policies on security cameras in the hallways, and policies for announcing room numbers out loud and transferring telephone calls without verifying room numbers.

1. Require all employees to politely confront non-guests in hallways and ask them if they need assistance.
2. Keep room number private (the article mentions breakfast servers asking for guest’s room numbers).
3. Limiting access to guest floors to only guests.

In addition, we recommend:

1. Have a consistent policy on how GSAs handle lost or non-working guest room keys.
2. Inspect all guest room doors to make sure they automatically close and lock from a 45 degree angle.
3. Do a complete background check on every employee before you hire them.  Conduct safety and security training before new employee’s first day on the job.
4. Do a quarterly security training at your all employee meeting.  Be sure to include employees from areas that  you outsource such as parking and security.
5. Make sure guest areas such as guest room elevators and floors, swimming pools, and fitness centers can only be accessed by guest room keys.

Having stayed in many hotels, we have experienced our share of disturbances.Unfortunately, many of these disturbances have been caused by the hotel’s staff.  The most awkward and uncomfortable ones come from the knocks and entries at the guest room door.  People treat their guest rooms in a hotel like their bedrooms at home.  Unfortunately, they do not think about the fact that many employees in that hotel have a key to these bedrooms.  On the other hand, many hotel employees do not think of hotel guest rooms as being private to the hotel guests.  Three knocks and a quick key swipe and they have entered the room, too quick for the guest to object. 

Most guests like to be comfortable in their rooms and are not in their normal, public attire.  It is very embarrassing to be seen that way in an unplanned fashion.  Make sure that all employees in your hotel are properly trained in the etiquette of how to properly knock and enter a guest’s room.  Here are some the tips to remember:

1. Before knocking on a door or entering a room, know if the room is occupied.  Exercise more caution if the room is occupied as there are certain guests who may not hear a knock at the door.
2. Train all employees on your standardized knocking procedure.  A good one includes knocking three times and announcing the department loudly, waiting for 10 seconds, and repeating.  If access is required, then slowly open the guest room door while announcing the department loudly again.
3. Always have the proper uniform with a name badge on and ask for permission to enter a guest’s room, if the guest is there.
4. Whether a room is listed as occupied or not, remember to use the same knocking procedure.  There are many times where guests are in rooms that are unoccupied in the computer system due to a mix-up.
5. When entering any room, enter slowly and with caution.  Listen for clues such as the shower running or a hair dryer, as these things can prevent your knock from being heard.  If something is heard, immediately but slowly close the door and attempt knocking again, if entry must be made at that time.  If not, wait a few minutes to return.
6. Establish business hours for knocking on occupied rooms.  Determine the times of day when knocking on a guest room door are acceptable.  This may be change from weekdays to weekends.  Also, it will depend on the type of guests that normally stay in the hotel.  Normally, the safe zone is between 10:00 AM and 6:00 PM.
7. For normal housekeeping, never knock on occupied rooms unless you know that the guest has left the room.  Many good room attendants pay attention as guests leave their rooms or check out so that they can continuously clean the rooms that are unoccupied or vacant without disturbing other guests.  If the occupancy is unsure of in a departing guest room, do not knock on that room until after checkout time, they have paid for the room until then.  It is extremely bothersome for a guest that is sleeping to be disturbed at 9:00 AM by a loud housekeeping knock when checkout time is at noon.
8. Train employees to knock with their knuckles moderately, just loud enough for a guest in the room to hear.  Do not pound on doors, knock very softly, or use a room key to tap on the door.  The most pleasant way to knock is to do so in the most normal method.
9. Never knock on a guest room that has hung a privacy sign, even if a request has been made.  If a delivery must be made and there is a privacy sign at the door, call the room from the nearest house phone and announce yourself, asking for permission to knock or enter the guest room.  Do not deliver any items into the room if nobody answers.  Remember to call back to redeliver the item later.
10. Lastly, train your employees on how to react when caught in an awkward situation.  They must be able to immediately begin to remedy the situation by beginning to leave the room but also announcing why they were there in the first place.They should also report the incident so that a manager can issue an apology by phone if appropriate.

Our analysts have stayed at many hotels so far in 2008.  During those visits, the lack of general safety and security really stands out.  Though we do test for some loss prevention standards, in many instances, things just happen that make it really scary to be staying in a hotel.  Many of those things are due a lack of employee training and standards.

In one instance, one of our analysts had their car valet parked, she approached the attendant and told him that she had lost the ticket.  He simply asked for the analyst’s last name and retrieved the vehicle that matched.  He did not check ID, match the name with a room number, or anything else of the sort.  The analyst should have asked for the Lamborghini sitting in the driveway! 

During another visit, an analyst left the room to visit the restaurant.  Housekeeping cleaned the room while the analyst was gone.  Upon returning, the room door was not closed, but barely open.  The room door did not close automatically as it should have.  She was very surprised that her  laptop and personal belongings were still in the room.

At many hotels, our analyst’s usually leaves the room keys in the room on purpose to conduct our test.  We then go ask the housekeeping room attendant that is cleaning my floor to let us into our rooms.  It is scary to think about the amount of times that our analysts have been let into the room without being asked to prove ownership of the room.  In most cases, a room attendant seems to open any guest room door for any guest.

The most common surprising occurrence is the amount of out-loud guest’s room number usage.  The Guest Service Agents often announce the room number out-loud when checking in a guest or taking a guest request.  At bars, our analysts too often hear a bartender asking for a guest’s room number to close out their check.  If we wanted to target or attack that guest, it just became too easy.

Other safety and security weaknesses that we often see:

-Hotels not screening phone calls before transferring them to guest rooms. 

-Elevators that should require a key to access guest floors but the key reader is disabled.

-Exterior doors propped open, especially around outdoor swimming pools.

With all of the attention hotels pay to better and quicker service nowadays, some basic security standards seem to have been forgotten.  As you can see, there are an alarmingly high number of times where the security of our guest’s room during our hotel visits is compromised.  This can be because of a lapse in procedure or a missing standard.  Though room invasions and theft are both low chance occurrences, they are things that no hotel manager wants to spend their times dealing with.  Be sure to take some time during your next All Employee or Department Meetings to review some of your safety and security policies.  Be sure to fully train every new associate these policies before they start serving guests.