Call Accounting Featured Article

Why Hotels Should Invest in Call Accounting

  By Alicia Young, Web Editor

The hospitality industry is interesting in that it caters to countless types of people. No customer is the same as the next because everyone is from different areas of the world. Hotels have to work with people from the U.S. as well as visitors from other countries. And, even within the U.S., there are various cultural differences hotels need to cater to.

With so many different personalities being housed under one roof, it’s to be expected that everyone will have different wants and expectations from the same hotel. Some of these special services and amenities may include long-distance telephone service, high-speed Internet, television, game consoles, wake-up calls, in-room breakfasts as well as various other options.  

However, all of those services cost money and need to be checked on a regular basis, which is where call accounting systems come into play. Call accounting services can be used to keep tabs on costs and ensure that bills are being sent to the correct customers.

According to TEL electronics, call accounting software can also be used to facilitate internal processes. It can be used for:

• Offering VIP rates for special guests, conferences, families or groups
• Assuring that special phone or Internet needs are
• Charging for all appropriate phone calls and Internet use to assure that costs and overhead will be covered
• Allocating costs to various hotel departments – admin, engineering, service, sales, front-desk, parking, etc.
• Auditing telephone and Internet suppliers to assure that their rates are fair
• Tracking calls and Internet use for profiling and training employees.

Like in all areas, the hospitality industry is always changing. It’s very competitive, with hotels constantly trying to think of ways to outdo their competitors. By using call accounting, hotels can gain an advantage over others by offering the best prices for their services. Call accounting would allow hotels to keep tabs on popular services and generate a cost to reflect that popularity. For instance, if long-distance calling is especially popular at one resort, then it can likely afford to lower the cost of those calls. That will cause people to use that long-distance calling feature even more often, and appeal to potential vacationers.