Another use for the smartphone: checking into a hotel
More and more hotels are starting to replace key cards with apps that guests download to their smartphones that offer access to other services during their stay.
Use of the mobile check-in carried at chains such as Hilton or Marriott provides an interesting perspective on how organizations incorporate a given technology into their daily operations through gradual change and monitoring its impact: the adoption of solutions based on the smartphone is mostly happening through processes that incorporate functionality to the locks of the rooms but that do not require you to dispense with key cards, which can still be used by people if they wish.
These types of solutions also allow us to reimagine interaction between a hotel and its guests: for the first time, at least in establishments where there is no legal requirement to register at reception, guests can go directly to their rooms and then at the end of their stay even check-out, all with a single app, and with virtually no interaction with a human being.
Are we turning into sociopaths? No, at least not in this case: we simply recognize in a practical way that the interaction with a reception employee to check-in or check-out is not going to prove a practical or positive experience and is in fact rather a nuisance. What’s more, on many occasions, such as…
