Hotel Front Office Management, 3rd Edition

124 CHAPTER 4: PROPERTY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMStions for reservations, registration, room status, posting,call accounting, checkout, and night audit. Lorraineis sure the marketing and sales applications willhelp her department be more efficient.Both realize the cost involved in obtaining modulesfor a property management system. Whatwould you suggest they do prior to discussing thisissue with Margaret Chu, general manager of TheTimes Hotel?Assuming Ms. Chu is willing to consider the purchaseof a PMS, how should Ana and Lorraine proceed?Whom should they include in developing aPMS adoption plan and why? What areas shouldthey investigate?CASE STUDY 402The computer team of The Times Hotel is in the processof updating a computer needs analysis. The teamis ready to decide which new modules should beadopted. Ana Chavarria, front office manager andchairperson of the committee, is seeking some consensuson whether the team should recommend thepurchase of a point-of-sale module for the restaurantoperation or a guest history module for the marketingand sales department. Eric Jones, food and beveragemanager, says the point-of-sale module will payfor itself in six months because guests are walkingout of the hotel without having their breakfastcharges posted to their folios. Lorraine DeSantes, directorof marketing and sales, says the purchase ofthe guest history module will increase business by 25percent in the first year. The budget will allow foronly one purchase. What concepts would you recommendto the team to break the stalemate?Notes1. CARA Information Systems, Inc,; Computerized Lodging Systems, Inc.; ECI/EECO Computer,Inc.; Hotel Information Systems; and Lodgistix, Inc.2. Ibid.3. Reprinted from Hospitals 56, no. 9 (May 1, 1982), by permission. Copyright 1982 by AmericanHospital Publishing, Inc.Key Wordsaccess timeaccounts payableaccounts receivableback officebalance sheetbanquet sheetbrownoutscall accountingcomputer suppliesCPS (characters per second)creditcursordebit balancedirect-mail lettersdisk drivedot-matrixTLFeBOOK