Date: March 2013
Nature of
encounter: Staying at the hotel
Level
of satisfaction: Satisfied
People
experiencing encounter: My mother, sister and myself
My mother and
sister came to New York to shop for a wedding dress because my sister was
getting married that summer. We arrived to the room in the hotel to find a
six-pack of beer, a bottle of wine and an assortment of candy and snacks. There
was a note with the gift that said “ Killer presentation today. Enjoy the
city”. This clearly was not left for us. We called the front desk staff and
told them that they made a mistake by placing this amenity in the room. One of
the staff members came to our room immediately and he apologized as soon as we
opened our door. He said that for our troubles we could keep the amenities but
he would just remove the note that came with it. We were very happy. My mother
and sister had just gotten off of a four-hour flight and were starving.
The specific actions that the hotel took
were that they were so courteous and apologetic. They apologized profusely for
the inconvenience as well as left the goodies behind for us to enjoy even
though they didn’t have to. They were also prompt in response to the situation.
I once worked for an affiliate of this
chain. I believe they have similar practices in place. Most hotel when you make
a reservation you fill out your preferences i.e. Allergies and any other
arrangements (activities & excursions) that you would like the hotel to
make. All of this information is stored in one of two systems; there is a
system for room reservations and another system for any activities that are
booked with the concierge before or during your stay. This information can be accessed
for future visits to the property. They also store amenity requests that people
have sent to guests at the hotel. This amenity was probably placed in our room
by accident, possibly the employee reversed the numbers and wrote 609 instead
of 906.
I think training
had a lot to do with this encounter. I believe that being courteous and urgency
were stressed in training sessions with staff. OSA should stress these customer
service essentials to employees in their training sessions. There is no perfect
product however excellent service can be provided to make the situation better.
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