Hotel chains have made progress with integrating their systems since I first wrote about my frquent guest experience in Net Attitude — but they have a long way to go. Today I called Hilton Hotels to reserve a room for an upcoming wedding in the mid-west. I called rather than using the web site because the wedding party had blocked some rooms at the hotel and I wanted to make sure I used a room from their block. The web site does not have the ability to specify that. No criticism on that point — that is a fringe feature and there are obvius security issues in doing it. I can envision how this could be done securely with authentication provided by the wedding planners and it would be nice, but there are so many basic things to be done first. Hilton has made great progress since the last time I looked and their commitment to an efficient and responsive e-business is evident. However, they have much to do.
After my room was confirmed I asked if it would be possible to pay for the room with my frequent guest points. “I’ll transfer you to that department”, I was told. “Isn’t this Hilton”, I asked. “Oh, yes, it is but we don’t have access to that information”. The irony is that all of my frequent guest information is on the Hilton web site. I was transferred to another person who asked my name, address, phone number, account number — all the same information that is on the web site too and which I had already just given to another Hilton representative. The person was very helpful. He confirmed my points balance and confirmed that I could use my points to pay for the room. He also pointed out that it would “be possible to have the same room that I had already confirmed”. You can just feel the lack of integration and that the employees (and customers) are dealing with multiple incompatible systems. After getting a confirmation # for the frequent guest coupon I was asked whether I wanted to receive it by mail or by fax. The mail would take five to seven days and the fax would take 24-48 hours. I use eFax and I don’t think it has ever taken longer than a couple of minutes to send a fax to someone — and that includes scanning a document. Here we are talking about information that is their system. Ten minutes later I received a four page fax in my email inbox. Why would customers be told it may take 24-28 hours?
The more relevant point is why do I need a fax or a postal mailing at all. The only data on the four pages was the certificate #, account #, dates, etc. Information which both Hilton and I already have. Why do I have to take a coupon into the hotel. If the system knows I have chosen to pay with my points, couldn’t the hotel see that on the system too? Probably not. The hotel itself is yet another part of the enterprise that does not have access to integrated applications and data. The reward process is a retrofit of a manual physical coupon process. Hilton has actually done a much better job of meeting consumer e-business expectations than most of their competitors . If I had not had to call because of the room block, I could have reserved the room and gotten the fax certificate online. Hilton is is not alone in having to deal with the lack of integration. All of us see examples every day. That is why I say we are only two percent of the way into what the Internet has to offer.
The following is an excerpt from a chapter in Net Attitude by John R. Patrick
Cambridge: Perseus Publishing, 2001
Systems that don’t talk to each other
There are several categories where web sites let people down. One of them has to do with integration of systems. Some recent personal experiences may serve to illustrate what this is about and why people are frustrated as a result. It was a Friday night when my wife and I decided to go to New York the following weekend for an impromptu opportunity that arose. I went to the web site of a major hotel chain and checked my frequent guest points balance and looked for an award for a one-night stay. I have plenty of points and, sure enough, I found an award code for a one-night stay at a very nice property in New York City. I could have made an online reservation but a prior experience convinced me that they didn’t’t have the process streamlined yet so I called the 800 number and asked the person if a room was available for that following Friday night. “Yes sir”, she said, “I can confirm that for you”. “Great” I said. “Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Patrick?” “Yes, I would like to pay for the room using Award code XYZ”.
“ Oh”, she said, “I can’t do that”. I asked if I was talking to an answering service or the hotel chain itself. “This is the hotel chain”, she said, “but this is the reservations department and I don’t have access to any frequent guest data”. I explained that I was looking at the coupon in my browser and asked if there wasn’t some way she could help me use it. “Oh, no problem, Mr. Patrick”, she said. “Just call us back on Monday morning”. She went on to explain that I would need to call them by long distance, no 800 number, and that I could call anytime during their normal business hours of nine to five Monday through Friday. She said that when I called I could just simply give them my credit card number and for just $35 they would send me the coupon (which I was looking at in the browser!) via overnight express mail. Now is that a “stick in the eye” or what? The problem is lack of application integration. The frequent guest system and the reservations system don’t talk to each other. They are applications that were likely built in different decades and which operate on different and incompatible computer systems. The examples abound.
The preceding two paragraphs were an excerpt from a chapter in Net Attitude by John R. Patrick
