Discovering the Details, Step by Step
In response to COVID-19, a hotel hired your company to develop a mobile app. The hotel’s goals are to create a touchless guest check-in experience and to have the guest’s room available upon arrival. Guests would only have contact with hotel staff in extraordinary situations. The hotel proposes the following check-in process:
The guest launches the hotel’s app when s/he arrives at the hotel property.
The app assigns a room to the guest upon arrival.
The app shows the room to the guest with the check-in and check-out dates.
The guest confirms the room and dates.
The guest goes directly to the room.
The app unlocks the room.
The hotel wants the app to handle other front desk tasks, starting with guests extending their stay. You start with a basic case, where the guest's room is available and s/he is willing to pay for the extra nights. In that situation, everyone from the hotel agrees it’s a simple date change on the reservation.
The hotel reservations manager stops the conversation and asks, “What happens if the assigned room does not have the additional nights available? What if no other rooms of the same type are available for the guest’s entire stay? What happens if a room is available at the same rate, but it does not match the guest’s preferences? I want to accommodate the guest, if possible.” However, no one wants to complicate the guest experience.
After giving it some thought, you break the extended-stay process into simple steps. If the guest’s room is unavailable for the additional nights, the app would offer these alternatives:
If another room of the same type is available that meets the guest’s preferences for the entire stay, offer the room on the app.
If another room of the same type is available that meets most of the guest’s preferences, offer the room, showing the variance from the preference(s).
If the guest does not want the room, and an upgraded room is available for the entire stay, the app offers the upgraded room, showing the total cost difference.
If the guest refuses the upgraded room offer, offer the option to stay in the current room through the original check-in date, then move to the upgraded room for the extended stay.
The hotel stakeholders appreciate the clarity of the steps. It enables them to focus on the guest experience of extending the stay. They all agree on the first step.
The hotel vice president looks askance at the second step. She asks what preferences a guest can have for a room. Their information technology director chimes in with the preferences: smoking/non-smoking, number of beds and proximity to the elevator. The vice president does not want to offer a smoking room to a guest with a non-smoking room preference. You capture that constraint.
The hotel stakeholders agree on the third step, to offer an upgraded room if one is available for the entire guest stay, and the guest is willing to pay the difference. They decide to drop the fourth step from the app. If the guest does not accept a room in three steps, they want the guest to contact their reservations center.
You suggest that the app offers the option to call the reservation center at each step of the process, including check-in. They like your way of thinking, focusing on the guest experience as well as the app.
While acknowledging their appreciation, another case occurs to you. If the guest’s phone does not unlock the room, the app should call maintenance, or anyone who can open the door. You clarify how to handle it with these steps:
The guest indicates on the app s/he is unable to unlock the room door.
The app sends out an alert to all hotel employees on duty who can open the door for the guest.
An employee indicates that s/he will handle the alert.
The employee opens the door and checks the room lock.
If the lock is OK, the employee checks the app on the guest’s phone. If it has a problem that the employee cannot fix, s/he can quickly enable the app on a different phone, if the guest or a companion has one available.
The hotel stakeholders thank you for bringing up the case of a guest lockout. They will look into alternatives for making sure that the guest can enter the room as quickly as possible. They appreciate how you broke down complex problems into steps, making it easier for them to make decisions.
Breaking a complex process into steps clarifies the process, making sure that you cover all the needs for the solution.
This is the fourth in a series of posts about unknowns in the discovery process.