The guests' requirements for the level of equipment of the hotel's communication infrastructure are approximately the same all over the world. Whether it is a businessman on a business trip or at an off-site conference, or an advanced teenager vacationing with his parents outside the city, their standard service package is unthinkable without telephone communication and high-speed Internet access. And not in a specially designated place, at certain hours and only with a pre-paid deposit, but throughout the hotel or hotel complex, with or without wires, working around the clock and without fail.
How can a hotel owner find a reasonable compromise between providing a set of communication services generally accepted in the world for clients and their own benefit — after all, in current practice there are few examples where communication services for hotels bring additional income to its owner or management company? There is a way out: using the expert knowledge of providers, the telecommunications infrastructure can be planned in such a way as to provide guests with convenient and necessary services, while simultaneously solving internal problems.
Traditionally, hotel owners solve the problem of organizing communications in the following way: they engage a large operator to create a wired infrastructure with a solid channel capacity, a large number of numbers and an internal PBX. But even with such a serious approach, the issues of organizing internal communications between employees remain unresolved — for operational communication, you have to use mobile phones, which is quite expensive, or walkie-talkies, which is not always convenient.
Here, modern technologies come to the aid of hoteliers. COMSTAR-OTS offers hotel owners whose staff needs mobile internal communications a service for organizing internal wireless Wi-Fi networks. This solution, both effective and economical, satisfies the internal needs of hotel managers or operating companies, providing employees with internal and external telephone communications, and guests with mobile Internet access.
High-end hotels (4-5 stars) have long been familiar with wireless Internet access using Wi-Fi technology. Having such a network to organize Internet access for guests is already a common practice. This not only increases the attractiveness of the hotel in the eyes of potential clients, but has become a necessary attribute of status hotels. COMSTAR-OTS offers to use such wireless networks to organize permanent mobile internal communication with maids, concierges, and other service personnel. This is two to three times cheaper than using mobile phones to connect to city phone numbers, and internal calls (employee-employee) in the corporate Wi-Fi network are not charged at all.
In those hotels where there is no wireless infrastructure yet, COMSTAR-OTS organizes a Wi-Fi network from scratch, carrying out a full range of works, including a pre-project survey taking into account the architectural features of the building, coverage area and planned network load. Organization of an intra-corporate Wi-Fi network from COMSTAR-OTS for the hotel owner is the most painless and minimally expensive process.
At the design stage, COMSTAR-OTS specialists carefully calculate the upcoming network loads, since the intra-corporate network has one limitation — the number of calls made simultaneously to one access point. If the wireless network is used both for Internet access (50% of the communication channel capacity is reserved for this) and for intra-corporate telephone communication, then one access point will account for no more than five simultaneous conversations. Accordingly, if the channel capacity is used only for telephone communication, then — no more than ten. In the example of the Izmailovo Hotel, where the network covers 25 floors, about 100 access points are installed, which provides the possibility of internal telephone communication for about 250 employees and simultaneous Internet access for hotel guests. In cases where communication is organized for a large number of personnel and a large load on the internal network is expected, COMSTAR-OTS installs special equipment that leaves the «hotel — COMSTAR» channel always free. Thus, hotel guests are insured against Internet failures — external communication channels are not used for internal calls. Even the minimum speed (256 Kbps) channel creates a significant free resource of the internal network, and given that modern hotel complexes are usually connected via high-speed channels (10 Mbps), then discussions about potential problems associated with intensive network loading are more likely to move into the realm of theory.
As a result, the hotel owner receives a ready-made network with the ability to provide wireless Internet access services for guests (and perhaps for their own needs) and use internal corporate telephony, which means a source of additional income from the sale of prepaid cards and savings on internal communications.
Large facilities with a developed wired infrastructure often already have office PBXs installed. In order for hotel employees to be able to make external calls from a Wi-Fi phone, the Wi-Fi network must be connected to the office telephone exchange. COMSTAR-OTS specialists have extensive experience in solving such problems and knowledge of the specifics of equipment from various manufacturers (this is the main difficulty — too much diverse equipment is used), which helps to solve the integration problem in the shortest possible time and with minimal costs. Project execution times may vary depending on the complexity of the building topology.
A special place in the structure of the owners' demand is occupied by the «Local Billing» service, which allows to prevent attempts to access the Internet by unauthorized users on the territory of hotels with unlimited Internet access for guests. When checking into a hotel, a guest receives a login and password for access, using which he can use the Internet on the territory of the hotel without restrictions during the entire stay. A person not registered at the hotel will have to purchase a prepaid card to access the Internet in the Wi-Fi network coverage area. Such a service helps hotel owners reduce losses from unauthorized use of their infrastructure.
As for the cost of organizing a wireless Wi-Fi network, the owner's expenses are limited to the purchase of subscriber terminals — Wi-Fi phones, approximately the same size as mobile devices and necessary for the staff to communicate. Everything else: network construction, equipment, its installation and connection — are the costs of COMSTAR-OTS. The owner's operating expenses are reduced to a subscription fee for assigning numbers and a fee for external calls made, if any. In cases where the hotel provides its guests with free Internet access (Wi-Fi), the owner pays a fixed fee for unlimited Internet traffic. In the event that guests pay for wireless access services using COMSTAR-OTS prepaid cards, the hotel's management company simply purchases these cards and receives part of the deductions from their sale.
Why do hotels need Wi-Fi telephony? Does image imply functionality? Everyone answers this question based on objective and subjective factors, but the need to have constant communication with service personnel moving around the hotel is the daily reality of managers. And the savings that the use of Wi-Fi networks for organizing internal communications provides significantly increases the profitability of the hotel business.
About the company
JSC COMSTAR — United TeleSystems is the largest Russian private telecommunications company. The COMSTAR — United TeleSystems group of companies includes
OJSC Moscow City Telephone Network, the leader of the Moscow fixed-line communications market, and Comstar-Direct, the largest provider of broadband Internet access services in the capital. The main shareholder of OJSC COMSTAR-UTS is Joint-Stock Financial Corporation (AFK) Sistema. Since February 2006, 35% of COMSTAR-UTS shares have been in circulation on the RTS, MSE and London Stock Exchanges.
The combination of MGTS and Comstar-Direct's capabilities allows the group to work effectively with a wide range of consumer categories — from private users to large multi-branch corporations and to implement projects for office telephony, the creation of full-scale corporate communications networks, comprehensive telecommunications equipment for residential and commercial real estate, and to offer a whole range of products for home use. The company's consolidated revenue in 2006 amounted to $1.12 billion. Additional information on the Internet: http://comstar-uts.ru |
