Enhancing Key Security: Five Reasons for Luxury Hotels To Prioritise Key Management
Today hotel guests have higher expectations, including personalised experiences and the opportunity to create memories, even if it’s just an overnight stay. With more focus on guest experience than ever before, luxury hoteliers must evolve their offerings to meet this demand.
To do this, back-end hotel operations must be carried out seamlessly and efficiently. Having the required access and permissions in place is essential and intelligent key management systems can play a critical role. These systems not only enhance security but also streamline access for staff ensuring they can perform their duties behind the scenes promptly and effectively to deliver service excellence.
Here are five reasons why Traka’s intelligent management systems support the overall security of a luxury hotel experience.
- Auditing and Accountability: Regular auditing of keys is essential for ensuring accountability and monitoring key usage. Luxury hotels experience a high volume of guest turnover, making it challenging to manually track key movements. This is in addition to several levels of staff-authorised access across the hotel facilities. Implementing Traka’s intelligent key management systems allows hotels to efficiently audit key usage, track authorised staff key holders, and instantly identify any discrepancies or security breaches.
- Efficient Running of the Hotel: Efficient key management is essential for the smooth operation of a luxury hotel. With a large number of staff members, keeping track of keys manually can be time-consuming and prone to errors. Implementing an automated key management system streamlines key distribution, reduces administrative burden, and ensures that keys are always accounted for, contributing to the overall efficiency of the hotel’s daily operations.
- Enhanced Guest Safety: Key security directly correlates with guest safety. In luxury hotels, where guests expect a high level of service and security, ensuring that keys are properly managed and controlled is essential. Unauthorised access to guest rooms can compromise safety and privacy, and without audit control capabilities as intelligent key management systems can provide, lead to potential security incidents and a negative guest experience impacting a lasting review.
- Maintaining Brand Reputation: A luxury hotel’s brand reputation is built on trust, reliability, and excellence. Any security lapse, including a key-related incident, can tarnish this reputation and erode guests’ trust. By prioritising complete back-end key security, luxury hotels uphold their brand image as a safe and secure destination with staff accountable for their activity.
- Compliance with Industry Standards: The hospitality industry is subject to various regulations and standards related to guest safety and security. Audited key management is often a requirement for compliance with industry standards and regulations, such as those set forth by hotel associations and the government. By enhancing key security, luxury hotels ensure compliance and avoid potential fines or penalties.
Five-Star Key Management
Demonstrating this in effect, Traka has been installed at London’s five-star deluxe hotel, The Berkeley, to ensure “lightning speed operations” can be maintained with accountability of all keys for the benefit of staff and guests.
Security teams at The Berkeley upgraded the systems in place to Traka’s intelligent key management systems, not only to expand capacity as the hotel evolves but also to enhance security with biometric technology to add protection against well-known threats such as ‘shoulder surfing.’
Craden Moulds, Director of Security at The Berkeley commented: “As with all the Maybourne Hotels, stellar service from the moment our guests arrive, is at the forefront of everything The Berkeley has to offer. To ensure this impeccable level is maintained, security measures must be integrated successfully into everyday operations and fully understood by all staff.
“Traka has always supported this goal, offering authorised staff access to keys and maintaining an audit trail for assets to be instantly located. When the time had come to enhance our systems, to benefit from independently operated management solutions that could allow for visual scanning and present specialist fingerprint authorisation to ensure we stay at the forefront of hotel security.”
The result is a system that operates at a five-star level with the self-described running of a “ruthlessly efficient team,” that guests at The Berkeley have come to love and expect.
The same is true at 5-star The Ned. Following a site visit to Claridge’s, where Traka is already installed, The Ned implemented an automated key management system initially for up to 300 keys, including for bedroom master keys.
The Safety and Security at The Ned Hotel noted: “Hotel key management is of critical importance for the smooth running and also safety and security of all who stay and work here. Completing manual audits is not only time-consuming but relies on neat handwriting to ensure awareness of key allocations and traceability.
“The implementation of Traka’s system has automated the complete process. Not only does it remove the margin for human error, but it also means we can make huge labour savings and redirect resources. So impressed, we are already looking to expand our use of Traka for other parts of the Hotel, including management of the Gym and exclusive ‘The Vault’ members’ keys.”
Just these two examples show how key management is a critical aspect of maintaining the safety, privacy, and reputation of luxury hotels. By investing in intelligent key management solutions, luxury hotels can ensure a seamless back-end experience with secure staff operations. These efforts contribute to creating an exceptional guest experience and establishing a hotel as a trusted and preferred destination.