HITEC NEWS: Hoteliers Leverage BYOD with the Power of Mobile Master Key
OpenWays is enabling hoteliers to enhance their BYOD strategies by equipping the mobile hotel workforce — primarily the engineering, housekeeping and security departments — with a Mobile Master Key for secure and efficient access to guestrooms and the general property.
In the hospitality industry, operating in a BYOD environment means saving time and money, and keeping employees engaged with the technology they prefer to use the most. Housekeepers can use their mobile phones to report on plumbing issues in a guestroom, engineers to advise on equipment failures or potential slip-and-fall areas, and security officers to call local authorities.
With Mobile Master Key, security is heightened, since there is no physical master keycard for staff to lose. If an employee's phone that contains an assigned Mobile Master Key is lost or stolen and is required to be replaced, management can cancel the prior digital master key credential and simply issue a new one in real time, sending the new secure key in seconds to the authorized users cell phone. With security of personal devices an issue, OpenWays Mobile Master Key can be set to only access the rooms that requires the specific staff’s interaction and service. A hotel's bottom line also is positively impacted with a Mobile Master Key program. Equipment such as two-way radios can easily be replaced with employees' mobile phones for back-of-the-house communications, and so can the need to lease smartphones and tablets for inventory and other transactions.
Operating with a Mobile Master Key rather than a plastic master key also means less keycard replacement. It is essential to audit all plastic master keys for safety and security reasons. The intensive use of each traditional master key subjects them to damage or demagnetization. If this happens, the hotel employee must stop what he or she is doing, secure any property in their possession (for instance housekeeping/linen carts) and obtain a fresh master key. A Mobile Master Key removes this scenario from the equation, and leads to more operational efficiency, more productive, happier staff, and a stronger bottom line.
Consider this:
Forrester reports 200 million employees will bring their smartphones to work by 2016.
Gartner predicts that 90% of companies will support corporate applications on personal mobile devices by 2014.
Today, 50% of all enterprises already have a BYOD approach (without any IT control of devices and mobile apps), and an additional 25% have adopted BYOD with some level of IT control.
In the hospitality industry, operating in a BYOD environment means saving time and money, and keeping employees engaged with the technology they prefer to use the most. Housekeepers can use their mobile phones to report on plumbing issues in a guestroom, engineers to advise on equipment failures or potential slip-and-fall areas, and security officers to call local authorities.
With Mobile Master Key, security is heightened, since there is no physical master keycard for staff to lose. If an employee's phone that contains an assigned Mobile Master Key is lost or stolen and is required to be replaced, management can cancel the prior digital master key credential and simply issue a new one in real time, sending the new secure key in seconds to the authorized users cell phone. With security of personal devices an issue, OpenWays Mobile Master Key can be set to only access the rooms that requires the specific staff’s interaction and service. A hotel's bottom line also is positively impacted with a Mobile Master Key program. Equipment such as two-way radios can easily be replaced with employees' mobile phones for back-of-the-house communications, and so can the need to lease smartphones and tablets for inventory and other transactions.
Operating with a Mobile Master Key rather than a plastic master key also means less keycard replacement. It is essential to audit all plastic master keys for safety and security reasons. The intensive use of each traditional master key subjects them to damage or demagnetization. If this happens, the hotel employee must stop what he or she is doing, secure any property in their possession (for instance housekeeping/linen carts) and obtain a fresh master key. A Mobile Master Key removes this scenario from the equation, and leads to more operational efficiency, more productive, happier staff, and a stronger bottom line.
Consider this:
Forrester reports 200 million employees will bring their smartphones to work by 2016.
Gartner predicts that 90% of companies will support corporate applications on personal mobile devices by 2014.
Today, 50% of all enterprises already have a BYOD approach (without any IT control of devices and mobile apps), and an additional 25% have adopted BYOD with some level of IT control.