Every hotelier is looking for new ways to improve the hotel guest experience and guest satisfaction levels. After all, those are the two crucial factors on which brand loyalty and returning customers depend. From hyper-personalization to superior in-room entertainment, hotels are excellently fighting off the competition and gaining a competitive edge.
However, overreaching to achieve remarkable guest services often can result in overlooking the fundamentals of the hospitality industry business. One of the foundations of good accommodation is supreme cleaning standards and hygiene levels. While you certainly want to make your guests’ stay memorable, ensuring it is positive is essential.
Digital technologies play a huge role in improving the customer experience and providing personalized guest services, but they can also help hotels raise their hygiene standards to new levels. In today’s article, we will discuss ways to protect your guests from the germiest parts of a hotel room by utilizing modern hotel technology.
Travel can be a dirty business
Traveling is a fantastic experience for everyone, even if it’s to conduct business. Meeting intriguing people, visiting beautiful places, gaining new experiences and exploring fascinating cultures can be life-changing for some. But there’s one side to travel that nobody seems to talk about.
The guest journey and expectations
Travel can be a dirty business, and many people don’t seem to acknowledge this fact. Leisure and business travelers constantly encounter busy airports, unclean waiting seats, random fast food places, publicly used toilet facilities, taxis, buses and whatever else they need to go through to get to their final destination.
It’s no surprise that when they arrive at the hotel, they just want to refresh and unwind by taking a long shower and enjoying a clean guest room without constantly holding onto their disinfectant wipes.
Covid-19
Disinfection and proper sanitation became common topics, especially during and after the Covid-19 worldwide pandemic. Since the tourism and hotel industry is associated with common meeting spaces, international guests and almost impossible social distancing, the virus directly affected it.
Proper sanitation of hotel rooms became critical for health safety and governmental regulations since various surfaces are known to harbor germs for up to four days.
How to sanitize a hotel room ?
You’re probably following the best practices in room sanitation, and you’ve provided your housekeeping team with the best training possible. You already know that the soft surfaces of bed linen, towels and bathrobes are in closest contact with guests and must be washed in a high-temperature laundry setting.
The hotel’s housekeepers thoroughly ventilate and disinfect all surfaces inside the guest rooms and in common areas. You’ve invested in the best cleaning solutions and products.
But a few things inside a hotel room deserve closer attention as they’re categorized as the germiest parts of a room. And digital technologies are here to help create a safe environment and a positive guest experience.
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TV remote control
Studies consistently show that the TV remote control is one of the germiest parts of a hotel room. All the tiny buttons on the surface make it difficult to disinfect even with the best equipment.
Given that often your housekeeping department will have limited time to clean a hotel room before greeting arriving guests, it’s almost impossible for them to sanitize all TV remotes that everybody use.
Antibacterial remote control for hotels
InnSpire’s solution is an antibacterial remote control for hotels. This remote control has a smooth surface without any buttons, which might make cleaning it more complicated than it needs to be.
Housekeeping staff can now easily wipe the surface, and you and your guests can rest assured that they will be in no contact with viruses or bacteria.
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The bathroom
The bathroom is another commonly discussed issue when it comes to hotel cleanliness. It’s beyond question that a toilet seat and a bathtub must be scrubbed clean without any trace of previous use. But if you want to provide additional safety, it’s necessary to think outside the box.
Touchless points
What are the most commonly touched places inside a bathroom? The water faucet handles, and the toilet handles or push buttons. Investing in touchless solutions such as sensory or automatic sink handles and toilet buttons will improve health safety on your property.
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Light switches and door handles/door keys
Main light switches, door handles and keys are the other most frequently touched surfaces in a hotel room and breeding grounds for germs. While routine disinfection remains a necessity, some of the best hotel mobile apps and technologies help you reduce the touch points to a minimum and simultaneously improve hotel guest satisfaction.
Mobile apps for hotels
Implementing in-room control systems (GRMS) that your guests can manage through their own mobile devices will help reduce contact with physical light switches. How? Your guests will control the in-room lighting inside the app at their fingertips.
Mobile keys for hotels
While your housekeeping department undoubtedly has to continue disinfecting the door handles, you can minimize the spread of bacteria and viruses by investing in keyless entry technology (or mobile keys for hotels).
Transfering keys from leaving guests to a front desk employee and back to arriving guests won’t be necessary anymore. Your customers can unlock their door by placing their smartphones in front of the device attached to the room door.
Carpets and hotel furniture
Other common touch points between guests and hotel rooms are the carpets and furniture such as the bedside lamp, beds, couches and chairs. Guests like to make themselves comfortable and walk barefoot inside their rooms or read a book on a cozy sofa.
Commercial robot vacuum cleaners can help for more thorough vacuuming and significantly reduce the carpet’s allergens, pollen, and dust. More advanced robotic solutions employ UV light-emitting robots to kill viruses and bacteria inside enclosed areas.
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FAQs
What are the dirtiest places in a hotel room?
According to studies, some of the dirtiest places in a hotel room include :
- the TV remote control
- the bathroom
- the light switches
- the door handles
- carpets and hotel furniture
How do hotels stay sanitary?
Hotels stay sanitary by following the best practices and guidelines for hygiene standards. They also started utilizing digital technologies to help reduce touch points, improve health safety and reduce the spread of bacteria and viruses.
How do I make sure a hotel room is clean?
Hoteliers can ensure rooms are clean by the following steps :
- providing appropriate training for the housekeeping and cleaning staff
- planning a schedule with enough cleaning time
- investing in cleaning supplies, equipment and technology