Self-Service Sleeping & Eating

Airline customers love to check themselves in at the airport. According to FastCompany, more than 75% of them do, which is probably more a function of the quality of the airline check-in being far from warm and cuddly. In contrast, only 10 - 25% of guests in hotels that have kiosks use it to check in or out. Is that because hotel guests expect more of a personal touch from their lodging experience?

Those numbers are quite high considering the technology has only recently been introduced in hotels. For example, NCR just announced a hotel kiosk for medium to small size hotel chains in June. Habits take time to change.

The question hoteliers are now asking to save themselves operating costs and expedite their guests entry and departure is can their guests ever feel the same way about using hotel self-kiosks? Hoping to shorten lines at the front desk, hotels have now arranged to have their lobby kiosks print airline boarding passes.

"The more features and functionality we add to the kiosks, the greater the reason for the customer to try [them]," says Thomas Spitler, a vice president with Hilton Hotels Corp., which has added flight check-in to kiosks in about 40 hotels so far. "[But] we don't intend to follow the airline model, where the kiosk really replaces customer-service agents."

Customer habits can be a difficult thing to change.

"Our research shows that more than 7 out of 10 hotel guests prefer to interact with a person when they check in," says Henry Harteveldt, an analyst with Forrester Research in San Francisco. "A hospitality business runs the risk of being overly automated." News worth sleeping on.

For similar reasons, since experimenting a few months ago, fast-food chains have been reluctant to go to with kiosks. The Baltimore Sun observes :

While major restaurant chains such as McDonald's Corp., Taco Bell, Burger King and Dairy Queen have considered the idea, none has taken the step to order a rollout of the technology.

"The country is not quite ready for self-serve," said Devin Green, chief executive of ESP Systems LLC, which is deploying a system for alerting a restaurant's staff that a patron needs service. "This is a people business. People go to a restaurant to be served."

It's a little early to write off fast-food chains. And in regards to hotel guests, liking a warm greeting from a human being may be needed by some but there are some tired frequent travelers prefer little or no line to a smile, apparently there's enough grumpy travelers from the get-go to want machines.

Personally, I'd take a nice mint chocolate on my bed to a front desk anyday. Even better if the kiosk could remember my lodging preferences -- e.g. no smoking, king size bed, big television screen and a broadband connection. And for those of us who want the smile? Maybe hoteliers can make the kiosk smile nicely with a warm "have a nice day" to attract those who need it.