Auto Wakeup: automatically alerts guest room stations at a pre-designated wakeup time; the wakeup alert can be ringing of the phone and providing either silence, a tone, music, or a recorded message on going off-hook; the number of attempts that the system will make to place the wakeup call in the event that the initial attempt(s) are not answered may vary; additional options may include whether or not an alert will be provided to the attendant or front desk personnel if a wakeup call is not answered after the maximum number of attempts, which could be in the form of an alarm lamp or buzzer, display, or printout; the maximum number of wakeup requests that can be entered in the system, either in total or the total for a specified time interval; the method by which wakeup requests are entered in the system, which could be by the attendant, front desk staff, or from the guest room telephone; and whether or not a printout or display is offered to show those rooms that have wakeup requests entered in the system, where the printout would also generally provide a log of wakeup requests, wakeup attempts, and no answer alert conditions. Call Accounting: an integrated or external based Call Accounting package or system to provide a detailed printout of long distance and/or local calls along with cost of call information; more sophisticated systems also allow the hotel administrative staff to assign certain minimal costs to local calls as well as special billing tariffs for long distance calls; the most advanced systems can also provide the hotel administrative staff with reports on telephone call profits, to include the amounts charged for telephone calls versus the actual costs incurred for those calls. CAS: allows the system to operate as part of a Centralized Attendant System network, which may have some specialized applications for administrative purposes, although this feature is not primarily designed for the hotel market. Do Not Disturb: allows guest room telephones to be blocked from receiving normal incoming calls; additional options may include: whether this feature can be implemented on a per phone or system wide (for all guest rooms) basis; the method by which do not disturb requests are entered in the system, which could be by the attendant, front desk staff, or from the guest room telephone; the type of calls which can override the do not disturb condition, which could either be calls from the attendant or front desk staff for emergency conditions, or auto wakeup calls to ensure that the guest is provided with this service; and whether or not a printout or display is offered to show those rooms that have do not disturb registered in the system. Emergency (off-hook) Alert to Attendant or Front Desk: provides the attendant or front desk staff with an audible or visual indication when a guest room phone has been left off-hook. Check In/Check Out: allows an automatic check in/check out capability, which typically turns on the room telephone at check in, turns off the room phone or activates vacant room restriction at check out, and deactivates any auto wakeup, do not disturb, or message waiting conditions at check out. Name Registration: allows the guest's name can be entered at registration, which in turn may be related to additional services, such as guest directory displays and guest name display to administrative stations equipped with display model telephones. Directory Listing: provides an electronic directory listing for the names of guests registered in the hotel, which may include special information in the electronic guest directory for the number of guests registered to a room, the names of multiple guests registered to a room, the guest's affiliation or company name, the deposit prepaid by the guest at registration, any credit card limitations imposed on the guest. Guest Information Printout or Display: supports a display or hardcopy printout of the information contained in the electronic guest directory, which typically would also be associated with some sort of search capability, such as to identify guests by name or affiliation. Guest Name Display on Administrative Phones: allows the primary guest name registered to be displayed on administrative telephones equipped for this purpose, such as at the front desk, room service, and special service locations. Guest Voice Mail Box Service: allows the capability to assign a voice mail box to hotel guests to utilize during their stay; this allows guest to record their own personal greetings and to have messages left for them while they are away from their room; this feature is especially helpful to foreign language speaking guests and is also beneficial to the hotel staff, since they do not have to take handwritten messages for the guest. House Phones or Courtesy Phones: the capability to allow special phones to be placed in the hotel so that when the user goes off-hook, he or she will automatically be connected to the hotel attendant, front desk staff, or some other special service facility. Message Registration: a feature which keeps track of local calls or local message units for special billing purposes; may also allow these special charges can be stored and printed via the system's main Station Detail Message Recording/Call Accounting system or if a separate printer is available for local call charges only. Message Waiting: a feature to alert guests when a message has been received for them, either while they were away from their room or while their room phone was in a do not disturb condition; message waiting notification is provided to the guest (either by a special periodic ringing indication or via a message waiting lamp on the guest phone, or in some cases via a special broken dial tone when the guest return and goes off-hook), the feature may include various options by which message waiting indications are entered into the system (either by the attendant, front desk staff, or a designated message center station), whether or not a hardcopy printout of the message text can be made available to the guest, and whether or not a printout or display of rooms with message waiting active is available to administrative personnel. Recorded Message Service: allows the hotel to offer special dial up information services to the guests on hotel activities, special tourist information, etc.; additionally, some packages support multi-language message services. Room Number Correlation: allows the guest room telephone extension numbers to be assigned to match their room number or the room number with a prefix digit; additional information is also provided as to the maximum number of digits available for room extension number assignments. Room Phone Anti-Theft Alarm: provides the attendant or other administrative personnel with an audible or visual indication in the event that a guest unplugs the room telephone from its line cord or wall jack. Room Phone Restriction Levels: allows for various classes of service or restriction levels to be assigned to different guest room telephones; for example, some guests may be denied access to make international calls or any long distance calls, while other guests may be given full access to make any type of call. Room-to-Room Blocking: a feature used during late night hours to block all room-to-room calling for guests, to avoid nuisance calls; typically, if this condition were invoked, a guest could still contact another guest by placing the call through the system attendant or front desk staff. Room Status: a feature that provides room status capabilities and provides further information which would typically be for clean, needs cleaning, vacant, and occupied; additional status levels may also be provided for maid in room, needs repair, repair completed, needs supervisor check and approval, etc.; the feature may also include status indication for rooms which have been specially reserved by guests who have not yet checked in; without this capability, customers would typically only have an indication of rooms that are either occupied or unoccupied, and they would then have to refer to a separate manual list to determine which unoccupied rooms were already reserved. Room Type Status Indicator: the type of indication, which provides a description of the room, such as single, double, suite, poolside, ocean view, etc.; typically, the packages that supports this capability also supports user-definable status indicators, so that customers can enter those room type descriptions that are appropriate to their particular hotel property. Printout or Display of Rooms with Status: the ability to obtain a display or a hardcopy printout showing the status of all rooms in the hotel; some more sophisticated packages further support the ability to generate special displays or printouts based on a search for rooms with a selected criteria (for example, all available double rooms or all available poolside rooms). Status Controlled by: the method of entering and controlling changes in room status on the package, such as via the maid from the guest room phone, via the system attendant, or via a front desk station or terminal; the other possibilities are to allow entry of room status change information from specially designated administrative stations (such as a central phone on each floor of the hotel) or via the Property Management System terminal, if equipped. Maid ID Codes: the capability to allow each maid to enter a personal identification code upon entering a room to be cleaned or when entering a change in room status. Maid Activity/Performance Information: the ability to provide a printout or a display to indicate the activity and/or performance level of the maids or cleaning staff; typically, this would provide information on the number of rooms cleaned per day and the average time to clean each room; on those systems that also support Maid Identification Codes, this type of report would provide information on the number of rooms cleaned by each maid, the amount of time each maid spent cleaning each room, etc. Room Change/Room Swap: facilitates the changing of information for a guest in the event that a guest changes rooms or swaps rooms with another guest; on systems that do not support this feature, the attendant or front desk staff would have to manually re-enter all of the guest data to move a guest to a new room or to allow two guests to change rooms. Security/Alarm Sensor Interface to Telephone System: allows external security alarms or alarm sensor devices to be interfaced to the telephone system; some sample applications of this would be to provide a visual or audible alert to the attendant or front desk staff from room smoke detectors, kitchen freezer temperature monitors, or other general security alarm units. Single-Digit Dialing for Services: allows a guest to access special hotel service by dialing only a single digit rather than a full extension number; such hotel services as the bell captain, room service, and front desk staff would typically be accessed via single-digit dialing. Tenant Services (for in-hotel shops, etc.): allows the stations and trunk groups to be split into multiple groups, such that individual shops and restaurants in a hotel could have their own trunks or trunk group assigned which could not be accessed by other tenant groups or the general hotel staff, and such that individual telephone billing statements would be available for each of the tenant's telephone costs. Vacant Room Restriction: blocks all outside calling from unoccupied guest room phones; this restriction is automatically invoked when a guest checks out, or by administrative control, or the restriction condition may be automatically invoked if Room Needs Cleaning or Room Needs Repair status has been activated. Back to Top | 
