| A Business Center in your Hotel:
Curse or Blessing?
Your customers asked for it, modern
hospitality philosophy required it and now you have one
in your Hotel: A Business Center.
Your Guest now has access to the Internet to read and write
e-mails, surf the Web for the latest news and they can work
in Word, Power Point and Excel. For your Guest’s convenience
(and maybe according to company standards) you have also
added a printer, fax and copier.
You are now ready for the 21st Century traveler. Or are
you?
Philipsburg, Pa, Thursday, March 18, 2004
Satisfied with your latest implementation
one day, on one of your daily rounds, you notice that the
Computer has a white piece of paper stuck to the monitor.
Curious, you walk up and read: “Computer Out of Order”.
Checking into it, you find out that this is not the first
time the computer has been down, and furthermore, there
have been a number of alarming complaints from Guests:
“Computer froze in the middle
of my work”
“I walked up to check my e-mail and suddenly looked
at obscene pictures on the computer screen”
“I noticed stuff from one of your previous Guests
on the computer? Will my info remain on the computer too?”
“I think you have a virus on your computer because
this window kept popping up, saying,…”
And the list goes on.
You also find out that your very dedicated
manager spends (a very valuable) hour each day trying to
fix and clean the computer. And, a couple of times, a computer
technician had to solve a problem for $80 / hour.
"It is a mistake to underestimate
the process of making computer and internet access available
to your Guests ", states Ron Koning, Vice President
of SurferQuest, a supplier of Public Internet Computers
and Software. "The Hospitality industry is forced to
offer this amenity, so they put a computer in their Business
Center, without thinking a lot about it. Reality hits when
the complaints start piling up, managers get frustrated
and the maintenance cost doubles or triples the budget.
And that is just the visible problem."
"Running a Business Center Computer
is a risk the Hotelier really does not want to take without
proper precautions," Mr. Koning continues, "The
amount of work involved to keep it up and running is just
part of the problem, the liability is the true risk each
Hotelier is subject to."
The general opinion is that as long as the Windows System,
Virus scanner and Cleaning software is updated, nothing
bad can happen. However, these tools do not prevent disk
clutter, hacks, identity theft, new viruses or objectionable
content showing on your computer. One by one, very serious
matters when you consider them, with the definite possibility
of a law-suit.
SurferQuest software is developed to take a lot of these
risks away. It prevents hacks, disk-clutter, it erases all
left-over user content, it is foolproof and is even immune
to viruses not yet invented. "And a nice bonus is,"
continues Mr. Koning, "it reduces normal maintenance
by about 97%."
SurferQuest systems are not limited to
Internet applications. They also contain Microsoft applications
and the Hotelier can add additional software or hardware
to the PC at any time (as long as it is Windows XP compatible).
SurferQuest leaves it up to the Hotelier
whether to charge for usage or not. "Each system has
the capability to accept Credit Card payments," states
Mr. Koning, "The advantage of using this feature is
that usage is regulated. Nobody can occupy the computer
too long, preventing other Guests from using it, unless
he pays for it of course".
SurferQuest ‘s clients include the
US Military, The Westin on Times Square, Starbucks Providence
Biltmore, The Radisson in Boston, Seven Springs Mountain
Resort, Teton Mountain Resort and all the Emerald Suites.
"Full listing available on request"
SurferQuest Philipsburg, PA
For more information:
www.surferquest.com
Toll free 1-888-733-4365
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