Rooms Divisions Operations

Rudy B. Necor Jr. MBA.,

Objectives
• Outline the duties and responsibilities of key executives and department
heads.
• Draw an organizational chart of the room division of a hotel and identify
the executive committee members.
• Describe the main functions of the rooms division departments.
• Describe property management system s and discussed yield
management.
• Calculate occupancy percentage, average daily rates, and actual
percentage of potential rooms revenue.
• Outline the importance of the reservations and guest services functions.
• List the complexities and challenges of the concierge, housekeeping, and
security/loss prevention department.
The Functions and Departments of a Hotel
• The primary function of a hotel is to provide lodging
accommodation. A large hotel is run by a general manager and
executive committee that consist of the key executive who
head the major department: rooms division director, food and
beverage director, marketing and sales director, human
resources director, chief accountant or controller, and chief
engineer or facility manager.
Management Structure
• Management structure differs among larger, midscale, and
smaller properties. The midscale and smaller properties are
less complex in their management structure than the larger
ones.
Role of the Hotel General Manager
• Hotel general manager have a lot of responsibilities. They must
provide owners with reasonable return of investment, keep guest
satisfied and returning, and keep employees happy.
• To be successful, GMs need to have a broad range of personal
qualities. Among those most often quoted by GMs are the following.
 Leadership
 Attention to detail
 Follow-through
 People skills
 Patience
 Ability to delegate effectively
The executive committee
• The general manager, using input from the executive committee, makes all the
major decisions affecting the hotel.
 Guest satisfaction
 Employee satisfaction
 Total quality management
 Occupancy forecasts
 Sales and marketing plans
 Training
 Major items of expenditure
 Renovations
 Owner relations
 Energy conservation
 Recycling
 New legislation
 Profitability.
Room Division
• The room division director is held responsible by the GM for the
efficient and effective leadership and operation of all the room
division departments. The include concerns such as the following:
 Financial responsibility for room division
 Employee satisfaction goals
 Guest satisfaction goals
 Guest services
 Guest relations
 Security
 Gift shops
• The room division consist of the following department: front
office, reservations, housekeeping, concierge, guest services,
security, and communications.
Front office
• The front office manager’s (FOM) main duty is to enhance
guest services by constantly developing services to meet guest
needs.
• In some hotels, the reservation manager and associates report
to the director of sales.
• The front office has been described as the hub or nerve center
of the hotel. The position description for a guest service agent
details the work performed. Position descriptions for the three
main function of the front office are as follows:
1. To sell rooms. The hotel department work like a team in a
relay race. The front desk team will try to sell out (achieve
100 percent occupancy) by selling the remaining rooms to
call-in or walk-in guest – and of course the frantic calls from
preferred guest who need a favor.
Upselling occurs when the guest service agent/front
desk clerk suggestively sells the feature of a larger room,
higher floor, or perhaps a better view.
2. To maintain balanced guest accounts. This begins with
advance deposits, opening the guest folio (account), and posting
all charges from the various department.

3. To offer services such as handling mail, faxes, messages, and

local and hotel information. People constantly approach the
front desk with questions. Front desk employees need to be
knowledgeable about the various activity in the hotel.
Night Auditor
• A hotel is one of the few businesses that balances it accounts
at the end of each business day. Because a hotel is open
twenty-four hours everyday, it is difficult to stop transactions
at any given moment. The night auditor waits until the hotel
quiets down about 1:00am., and then begins the task
balancing the guests’ accounts receivable.
 The daily report contains key operating ratio such as room occupancy
percentage (ROP), which is the number of rooms occupied divided by the
number of room available.
Room Occupied
______________
Rooms available
Thus, if a hotel has 850 rooms and 622 are occupied, the occupancy percentage
is 622/850 = 73 percent.

The average daily rate is calculated by dividing the rooms revenue by

the number of room sold.
Rooms revenue
_____________
Room sold
If the rooms revenue is $75,884 and the number of rooms sold is 622, then ADR is
$114.63. the ADR is, together with the occupancy percentage, one of the key operating
rations that indicates the hotel’s performance.
Room occupancy percentage (ROP)
If the total available rooms are 850
And the total rooms occupied are 622
Then:
Occupancy percentage = (622/850) x 100 = 73%
Average daily rate:
If the room revenue is $75,884
And a total number of room sold is 622

Average daily rate = $75,884/662 = $114.63

Revenue Management
• Revenue Management is used to maximize room revenue at a
hotel. It is based on the economics of supply and demand,
which means that process rise when demand is strong and
drop when demand is weak.
Call Accounting Systems
• Call accounting Systems (CAS) track guest room charges.
Software packages can be used to monitor where calls are
being made from which phones on the property.
Guest Reservation system
• Before hotels started using the internet to book reservations,
they received reservation by letters, telegrams, faxes, and
phone calls. Airlines were the first to start using global
distribution systems (GDS). Global distribution systems are
electronic market for travel, hotel, car rental, and attraction
bookings.
Billing Guest
• Hospitality business today seek to obtain the most high-speed
and reliable computer systems they can afford that they can
use to bill their guest without delay.
Security
• Each business in the hospitality industry offers some sort of
security for their guest and employees. Peace of mind that the
hotel or restaurant is secure is a key factor in increasing guest
satisfaction.
Guest Comfort and Convenience
• Hotels provide guest comfort and convenience to maintain a
home-away-from-home feeling for their guest. Hotels receive
recognition when they provide many additional in-room
services and amenities for their guests, such as dining,
television, telephones, internet connections, minibars, and
hygiene products.
Reservation
• The reservations department is headed by the reservations
manager who, in many hotels today, is on the same level as
the front office manager and reports directly to the director of
rooms division or the director of sales.
Guest Services/Uniformed Services
• Because first impression are very important to the guest, the
guest service or uniformed staff has a special responsibility.
The guest service department or uniformed staff is headed by
a guest services manager who may also happen to be the bell
captain.
Concierge
• The concierge is a uniformed employee of a hotel who has her
or his own separate desk in the lobby or on special concierge
floors. The concierge is a separate department from the front
office room clerks and cashiers.
• Greeting guests/customers.
• Manage guest/customer complaints.
• Taking messages.
• Managing mail, luggage and deliveries
Housekeeping
• The largest department in terms of the number of people
employed is house keeping. Up to 50 percent of the hotel
employees may work in the department. Because of the hard
work and comparatively low pay, employee turnover is very
high in this essential department.
Laundry
Increasingly, hotel are operating their laundries. This
subdepartment generally reports to the executive housekeeper.
The modern laundry operates computerized washing/drying
machines and large presses.
 Sustainable Lodging
Green Hotel Initiatives
• The environmentally conscious companies are not only helping
to avoid further environmental degradation but are also saving
themselves money while being good corporate citizens.
Security/Loss Prevention
Security Officers
• These officers makes regular rounds of the hotel premises.
• Duties involve observing suspicious behavior and taking appropriate
action, investigating incidents, and cooperating with local law
enforcement agencies.
Equipment
• Two-way radios between security staff are common.
• Closed-circuit television cameras are used in out-of-the-way
corridors and doorways, as well as in food, liquor, and storage areas.
• Smoke detectors and fire alarms.
• Electronic key cards offer superior room security.
Safety procedures
• Front desk agents help maintain security by not allowing guest to reenter
their rooms once they checked out.
• Security officer should be able to gain access to guest rooms, store
rooms, and offices at all times.
• Security staff develop catastrophe plans to ensure staff and guest safety
and to minimize direct and indirect costs from disaster.
Identification procedures
• Identification cards with photographs should be issued to all employees.
• Name tags for employees who are likely to have contact with guests not
only project a friendly image for the property, but are also useful for
security reasons.
Trends in Hotel and Rooms Division Operations
• Diversity of work force. All the pundits are projecting a substantial increase
in the number of woman and minorities who will not only be taking hourly
paid positions, but also supervising and management position as well.
• Increase in use of technology. Reservation are being made by individual
over the internet.
• Continued quest for increases in productivity. As pressure mounts from
owners and management companies, hotel managers are looking for
innovative ways to increase productivity and to measure productivity by
sales per employee.
• Increasing use of revenue management. The techniques of revenue
management will increasingly be used to increase profit by effective
pricing of room inventory.
• Security. Guest continue to be concerned about personal security.
• Diversity of the guest. More women travelers are occupying hotel
rooms.
• Compliance with the ADA. As a result of the Americans with
disabilities act (ADA), all hotels must modify existing facilities and
incorporate design features into new constructions that make
areas accessible to person with disabilities.
• Use of hotels web sites. Hotel companies will continue to try to
persuade guest to book rooms using the hotel company web site
rather than via internet site such as hotels.
• In-room technology. Hotels are upgrading in-room technology.