Managing Accommodation Services: Operations and Challenges

This report discusses the different types of accommodation services, including hotels, motels, hostels, guest houses, chalets, and cottages. It provides an overview of the front office and housekeeping departments, including their operations and challenges. The report also covers facilities management and security in accommodation services.

Managing accommodation
services

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Overview of the accommodation services...................................................................................3
Operations of the Front office department and Challenges faced by the Front office department
.....................................................................................................................................................5
4. Operations and challenges within the housekeeping department-...........................................6
5.Facilities management and security in accommodation services.............................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................1

INTRODUCTION
Accommodation services are the services which are provided by any hotel, guest house,
inn or club to an individual for a specific period, generally less than 3 months, are termed as
accommodation services (Della Volpi and Paulino, 2018). Typically, these are weekly based or
short period staycations of the tourists which are managed by different hotel services. The
management of the accommodation also differs accordingly, as some establishments offer
breakfast and bed services, some offer motel services, some are hostels and some are private
accommodations. The management of accommodation is concerned with taking care of quality
standards, managing the budget, managing the staff and making future business plans. There are
various other responsibilities of the accommodation management such as meeting the needs of
the customers related to the meals and overnight stay, recruiting the staff, providing regular
trainings and resolving the complaints of the customers. The following report will comprise the
overview of the accommodation services and its scale, the explanation of the front office
department, housekeeping department and facilities of security and management.
MAIN BODY
Overview of the accommodation services
Accommodation services can be described as the facility that is provided to the customers
for the purpose staying in different types of establishments. The different types of
accommodation facilities include hotels, motels, hostels, guest houses, chalets and many more of
such establishments. Also, there are mainly two types of accommodations, namely, serviced
accommodation and non-serviced accommodation. A serviced accommodation is a place where
the staff of the hotel caters to the needs and wants of the guests till the time of the completion of
stay of an individual. In a serviced accommodation, an individual has the facility to receives
housekeeping and other catering services (Septariani, and et.al 2020). On the other hand, a non-
serviced accommodation can be described as a facility provided to tourists in which they do not
get the services like housekeeping and catering. However, if the tourists want to receive these
benefits, they will have to incur extra cost for the same.

The different kinds of accommodation facilities which are available for the tourists within
the market includes hotels, motels, hostels, guest houses, boutique hotels, chalets, and cottages.
Hotels are considered as the most popular kind of accommodation service that can be accessed
by anyone who pays the price in exchange of the same within the market. The higher the quality
of services provided by the hotels the better will be quality of customers that the hotel will
attract. In order to enhance the customer base of the hotels, the hoteliers offer a range of services
to customers which includes catering services, housekeeping services, spa facilities and many
more. The main objective behind offering these services within the market is to attract a range of
customers towards the hotels within the market.
Similarly, another kind of accommodation services is guest houses. In the guest houses,
the tourists or other people can stay for as long as they want (Pebriyanti, 2022). In the guest
houses, the individuals are provided with the facilities such as catered meals, access to Wi-Fi,
facilities from the professional staff of the guest house, ordering food whenever they want. All of
these services can be easily received by the people staying within the guest house in exchange of
a particular sum of money within the market.
The customers or tourist also have the option to receive the accommodation facilities in
the form of hostels if they are travelling on a budget and there is a need for them to stay at a
particular place. Hostels are much cheaper as compared to hotels or any other kind of
accommodation facilities. However, it has been noticed that a majority of students prefers
staying in hostels when they are travelling because it is comparatively cheaper and they get the
opportunity to share the amenities provided by the staff of the hostels.
If a tourist or any other individual wants to stay in a place that is surrounded by nature,
adventure and bonding, they should stay in a chalet. A chalet is a kind of accommodation service
which is kind of similar to the hotels. However, the chalets provide the customers and the tourists
to stay in a place that provides the customers with feel like they are close to nature. A chalet
offers its customers with private hot pot facilities, self-catering options, shared catering
accommodations and individual chalet accommodations and also offers the tourists with hot
swimming pools within the chalets. This helps the chalets in enhancing the level of customer
satisfaction and thus helps them in increasing the level of customer engagement.
Cottages are another kind of accommodation facility that is preferred by a range of
customers within the market (Soelton, 2018). The cottages offer the customers with a cosy,

comfortable and homely feel and environment in an unknown location. Therefore, it can be
stated that the cottages are also a kind of accommodation facility that is preferred by visitors who
wants to enjoy a new place if a cosy, comfortable and homely environment.
Operations of the Front office department and Challenges faced by the Front office department
Operations of the Front office department
There are several functions of the front office department in different hotels. The front
office department of a hotel are responsible for registering the guests that visits the hotel. The
front office department makes sure that the visiting our checking the hotels on time or not, the
guests have been welcomed by the staff on time or not, which room will be allotted to each and
every individual within the hotel. The front office department also makes sure whether the needs
and wants of each and every tourist or visitor are being met or not. The front office department
also maintains accurate records of the visitor’s as well as the customers of the hotels. They keep
a record in which they record each and every movements of the customers within the hotel that
involves check in and check out time of the customers, they also record the time when the guests
are leaving the hotel for the purpose of visiting any other place.
They also note the note timings, and details of visitors who specially comes to meet a
particular person staying within their hotel. These records are helpful in the times of the needs
and emergencies within the hotel (Laudry, 2020). There are times when the guests are staying
within the hotels for a long period of time, in such cases the tourists sometimes order food online
and sometimes also order other things inside the hotel. At this point of time, it is the
responsibility of the front office department of the hotel to check whose parcel has arrived and
then call the guests for the purpose of informing them within the hotel to come to the reception
and collect their parcel. The Front office department of the hotel also provides foreign exchange
and financial services within the hotel. This means that all the money that has been received by
the guests are first collected by the front office department and then transferred to the finance
department of the hotels.
Challenges faced by the Front office department
However, it has been identified that the front office department of the hotel have to face a
number of challenges in operating and functioning. It has been determined that the front office
department of the hotel has to face difficulties in managing the calls as there is an increased
number of calls within the hotel. Since, the receptions have to manage a number of calls within

the hotels daily, the level of complexity increases in order to manage the staff, guests and visitors
within the hotels (rawan, 2019). Here, the front office not only have to attend the calls of the
enquirer but there is a need to understand the issues faced by the guest or determine the needs of
a prospect that wants to plan his stay within the hotel. Here, the responsibility of the receptionist
increases as they have to influence the customers so that they could their stay at the hotel.
Another challenge that the receptionists have to face within during their course of actions
is ensuring the multi-channel inquiries within the hotel. Here, the front office department of the
hotel not only has to face the inquires that are made through the calls but it has been determined
that the customers can contact the hotel using any platforms such as emails, messages on the
social media platforms. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the front office department to answer
all the queries that has been received by them on each and every platform within the hotels. This
makes it a little difficult for them to manage a huge number of enquiries within the hotel and
makes it challenging for them to cope up with the same.
Moreover, it has been identified that the front office of the hotel also faces challenges in
scheduling meetings within the hotel. When a customer contacts the hotel in order to plan and
schedule their meetings within a hotel, it gets difficult for the front office to check the
availability of the halls or meeting rooms within the hotels on the specified date. For the same,
the front office department needs to revisit all the schedules, meetings and bookings made in a
specified period of time and then identify whether they can provide the meeting room or the
conference hall on the specified date to customer not.
Moreover, the outbreak of Covid 19 has also led to the development of several challenges
for the front office of a hotel. Due to the outbreak of corona virus, the concept of working from
home has been introduced within the industry (Rachmawati, and Wardana, 2022). In such cases,
there are times when a number of employees working within the hotel are currently working
from home. In such times, it gets difficult for the front office management to instantly determine
which employee is working from home and which ones are present in the office. Therefore, it
can be stated that there are several challenges that the front office department of the hotels have
to face on a regular basis.
4. Operations and challenges within the housekeeping department-
Housekeeping is the term which can be defined as the operational department in the hotel
and it is highly responsible for the cleanliness, maintenance, keeping the rooms aesthetic, public

areas as well as the overall background and the surroundings of the hotels. There are basically
two types of the housekeeping such as institutional as well as the domestic housekeeping.
Housekeeping is mainly performing all of the duties for cleaning, maintaining as well as running
the house and the business property (Ramu, 2021). The operational areas of the housekeeping
department are such as-
 Office of Executive housekeeper
 Housekeeping control desk
 Laundry area
 Linen Rooms
 Uniform Room
 Tailor Room
 Housekeeping Stores
 Flower Room
 Lost and Found room
The general structure which is used for the housekeeping department and their staff is as follows:
1. Executive Housekeeper
2. Deputy Housekeeper
3. Assistant Housekeeper
4. Supervisors of different rooms such as uniform supervisor, linen supervisor and many
more.
5. Attendants such as guest room attendant, night shift attendant, public area attendant, store
attendant and other rooms attendant.
Executive Housekeeper or Manager of housekeeping department: This is the top level of the
overall housekeeping department and is considered as the chief of the housekeeping department.
The Deputy housekeeper and the assistant manager reports to him so the key responsibilities
which are followed by the manager are-
 Ensuring the overall cleanliness of the business property or the hotel.
 Maintaining the overall sanitation, ambience as well as the comfort of the hotel.
 Providing training to the new employees as well as motivating the existing employees of
the business.
 Keeping the eye on regular inventories of guest supplies as well as the linen.

 Monitoring the equipments of the housekeeping as well as hotel property.
 Evaluation of the performance of the overall staff as well as handling the trainings,
promotions and transfers of the employees.
 Presentation of the estimated of the budges that will be required to the General Manager
of the hotel (Verma, Singh and Aggarwal, 2021).
Supervisors of Housekeeping: These have to report to the assistant housekeeper. There
responsibilities are-
 Floor Supervisors
 Public Area Supervisor
 Uniform Room Supervisor
 Linen Room supervisor
Operating staff or attendants: These are-
 Uniform Room Attendants
 Linen Room attendants
 Storekeeper
 Public area Attendants
 Night shift attendants
The challenges which are faced by the housekeeping department are such as-
Stringent cleaning and documentation: Due to the awareness among the visitors for the
cleanliness and hygiene, it became very difficult for the hotels to use those resources which will
keep the place clean and hygienic. The requirements are increasing day by day and they have to
use the brand mandated products and has to document all the requirements which are required at
the business property.
Increasing expectations of the guests: This is the biggest challenges which the housekeeping
department are facing in the present time. The expectations of the consumers has increased much
which has created the challenge for them as they expect that the rooms must be properly cleaned
and hygiene by applying the sanitizers, the common areas must be pristine and many more. And
due to this reason, the housekeeping department is becoming much critical and crucial
department for practising all the responsibilities.
Operational challenges: Due to the illness, many of the employees or the staff members are
keeping leaves and holidays which is growing the absenteeism in the department. It became very

important for the hotels to make vaccinated the staff members as this will reduce the absenteeism
in the department (Kumar).
New technology: The emergence of the advanced technology has created much difficulty for the
department to adopt and use them. As this requires the lot of the skilled and the talented
employees in the organisation. It has become very important for the department to use the
commercial cleaning robots which will help them in cleaning the areas of the rooms and the
overall hotels. They can use the cleaning robot vacuums and many more so choosing this will
create the huge amount of the cost for the department.
5.Facilities management and security in accommodation services
Facilities management basically refers to the services and the tools that are required or
needed to support or help the functionality, sustainability and the safety of the buildings,
infrastructure, real estate and the grounds in particular (Nielsen. Sarasoja. and Galamba., 2016).
Facilities management is a wide and broad field which includes sectors or segments such as the
lease administration, lease accounting, etc. which mainly come under the lease management
which overall falls under the aspect of facilities management only. In the current times one of the
most important and essential requirement of the customers or the overall society is to move
towards sustainable growth and also take care of the environmental demands.
In the function or the aspect of facilities management, the major focus is upon the
accommodation of the principles that are sustainable for the designing of the buildings and
incorporating the solutions that are retrofit in the life cycle of the building in particular
(Bröchner., 2017). Fixation with the technological remedies in particular can generally lead to
overlooking the major and actual role of facilities management. The perspective regarding the
sustainable buildings should not precisely be product based rather it should be process based,
which will support continuous and consistent improvement and development throughout the
lifetime of the building in particular. Hence, facility management in particular refers to a sector
which is growing with a fast pace and also expanding the areas of its interests in construction as
well as the real estate industry. As facilities management has grown and evolved a lot in the last
few decades the sector has been the new discipline of management, this requires
experimentations and studying in certain areas, such as the organizational models, management

of the supply chains, new skills, multidisciplinary training, shared references and procedures and
maintenance of relations among the key or major stakeholders of the company in particular.
The facilities management aspect is very important as well as powerful process in the
accommodation service industry (Baaki. Baharum. and Ali., 2016). This procedure in particular
supports the working to be more correct and efficient. It also helps in management of proper
exponential growth in relation to facilities within a business in particular. if the management of
the facilities is done in an efficient as well as effective manner within an organization or
company then the workload on the employees of the company is also reduced which further
supports in smooth working and running of the business or the organization in particular. this
also makes processes less time- consuming and more cost- efficient. Hence, it plays a very
essential role in the growth of the business which is majorly in the sector of providing
accommodation services.
The major function of the facilities management in the sector or industry of
accommodation services is that a right and correct plan can lead to proper coordination and also
estimation of the budget for the purpose of providing facilities and hiring of professionals and
mainly for the purpose of growth of the overall business. It also supports establishment and
administration of the right formulas as well as policies for its implementation according to the
event in particular.
There are many types or categories of facilities management in particular some of them
are, the real estate management, business continuity and emergency management, occupant and
employee, space and occupancy management, energy management, operations and management,
capital project planning, lease management, lease administration management, management of
lease accounting, life cycle planning and asset management, health and wellness, satisfaction of
the employees and workplace strategy and leadership.
Facilities managers in particular are often called or are needed when there is a requirement
of new space creation, additionally to the ongoing roles that they are already carrying out in
operations and management within the existing space.
Security on the other hand also plays a very essential role in the industry of
accommodation services (Höykinpuro., 2018). The presence of efficient and proficient security
officers helps and supports in determination of crimes in the company or the hotels in particular.
security officers that are particularly or specifically stationed at the entrance of the hotel in

particular and also on the exits support the process of monitoring the steady and continuous
stream of the people or customers visiting the hotel in particular. these officers are present and
help the monitoring procedures at all hours of the day. Security officers are also able to identify
the individuals or the activities that feel, sound or look suspicious and prevent the situations from
escalation.
The meaning of hotel or accommodation safety and security basically refers to the
management of the security of the hotels, entertainment facilities, and lodging (Ghaderi. Saboori.
and Khoshkam., 2017). This type of security precisely and specifically includes using the proven
as well as the methods that are relevant and also are valid in the hotels or the hospitality and
accommodation industry overall. There are many different types of securities that are used in the
hotels or the accommodation industry in particular, some of them are, video surveillance
systems, alarm systems, carbon monoxide detectors and the sprinkler systems are some of the
major examples of the security within the accommodation services or the hotels in particular.
Each room of the hotel in particular needs to be protected and also be safe for the visitors
that are visiting the hotel or the accommodation sector or segment. Each hotel within the industry
should have precise and specific security systems within the hotels for the purpose of enhancing
the goodwill and the reputation of the hotel in the market or within the industry in particular and
in front of the customers.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been concluded that the accommodation services differs
according to the establishments. The front office department and the housekeeping department

plays an important role in the functioning of the accommodation organization. Later, the report
also suggests that there is a mandatory requirement of the cooperation between all the present
departments, which is demanded by the accommodation centres in order to satisfy the needs of
the customers visiting the place. Further, the report also discuss the importance of the security
management in the accommodation service centres as, all the rights and privacy of the customers
must be respected and is one of the important factor which each and every individual looks for
while selecting the accommodation organization. Thus, the management and security is the top
most priority of the accommodation centres.

REFERENCES
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materiality of accommodation services from the concept of life cycle thinking. Journal
of Cleaner Production. 192. pp.327-334.
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demand?. Current Issues in Tourism. 20(6). pp.552-565.
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