Critique in Systems & Technology

Mainland-Safari Tours

Abstract
Business deals with a various piece of information. Business must organize the
information efficiently and enhance the overall performance. Performance of the
business is always related to the business processes. The main purpose of this paper is
to represent the business process for two companies that are merging together to
provide better services for their customers. The merging of two companies will help to
get a competitive advantage because of merge in customers, difficult for other rivalries
to compete with them, strength the business with their policies and improvement in the
information system and technology. This paper is about the two company i.e. Outback
Safari Tours and Mainland Express two coach tour companies that are merging their
business. They have highlighted the business process for the company. Nowadays,
people are attracted towards online support system so the main focus of the company is
on online booking where there will be 24 hours, 7 days telephone and web support
services. This paper outline the management of information system and information
technology that helps to boost the business operation.

Introduction
A business process is a set of steps or tasks performed by a group of stakeholder to
achieve a business goal. The systematic approach to achieve those processes within
the allocated time and resources is known as business process management. For every
company, the business process is the key factor to know the business requirement. To
remain successful and competitive, businesses must continuously improve their
processes (Ray & Muhanna, 2004). While the business process is essential, the
outback safari tours and mainland express has outlined the business process that
needs to be achieved. Outback Safari will be merged into the Mainland Express and the
new name of the company will be Mainland-Safari tours. The booking services provided
by the company will be completely online. Company has several branches located at a
different location. The company will continue all the existing staff, coaches, tours and
destinations. The current schedule of the tours will not be affected. Along with this, they
also decided to begin premium based low-cost carrier services. In the premium based
services, the passengers will pay for everything else: Wi-Fi on the road, drinks, meals,
baggage, seating and even carry-on luggage to first to board privilege. The booking
service will be available 24 hours, 7 days by telephone and web. People can use a
website or mobile application to book the coach. The customer has the option of
selecting the coach preferred seat, add services like food, drinks, Wi-Fi on the roads,
provide special assistance for a customer traveling with a medical condition, carer and
vision or hearing impaired travelers. The customer who needs assistance may contact
the booking office or use a website to get detail travel plan. The 15% service charge will
be applied if a booking is done through an agent or travel. This will drag the customer to
visit Mainland-safari tours rather than a travel operator or agent.

The merge of the two companies stakeholder have to define rules, policies,
management processes which are also known as corporate governance. Corporate
governance is a process where companies are directed and controlled (Rodriguez-
Dominguez, Gallego-Alvarez & Garcia-Sanchez, 2009). It defines the set of policies,
rules, processes and balances the interest of a company stakeholder. It is essential
especially to control the internal and external performance of the company. This will
bind both companies together and guide them to get targeted objectives.

Information system (IS) and information technology (IT) are often considered
synonymous. Information technology is a subset of information systems, the perception
that these terms can be used interchangeably can cause confusion for individuals,
although both these fields deal with computers, they have distinct characteristics and
require different education and training.

Information systems are a combination of people, information technology, and business

processes to accomplish a business objective. An information system can be
represented as a blend of people, processes and information technology. On the other
hand, information technology refers to the integration of various types of
telecommunication equipment for storing, manipulating and retrieving of data. In other
words, information technology can be defined as the study, design, implementation,
support or management of computer-based information systems. IT includes hardware,
software, databases and network (Gebauer & Schober, 2006).

As the company rely on the information system to carry out and manage their
operations, interact with their customer 24/7 through phone and web services. The
company uses an information system to manage the customer service staff located at
different places, financial accounts, managing destination details, managing drives
information and reaching their potential customers with online promotions. The
information system provides support in each level of a business i.e. strategic level,
management level and operational level. Mainland-Safari Tours has used the following
data for managing information system.

Transaction Processing System (TPS): TPS are used to record day to day business
transactions of the company. The Mainland-Safari tours can use TPS to record daily
sales of the ticket, processing of staff salary and coach booking management.

Management Information System (MIS): MIS are used by tactical managers to

monitor the organization's current performance status. The Mainland-Safari tours can
use MIS to overview the money spent on the short and long term, the overall welfare of
the staff and predict the sales of the ticket by analyzing point of sale system.

Decision Support System (DSS): DSS are used by senior management to make non-
routine decisions. The objective of DSS is to evaluate alternative ways of achieving
goals.

Online Analytical Processing (OLAP): OLAP is used to query and analyze multi-
dimensional data and produce information that can be viewed in different ways using
multiple dimensions. The company view the total sales of destination in all region offices
and compares the actual sales with the projected sales.
As the company is merging together and the new upgrade must be done in the system.
The should manage all the existing customers, staff, coach drivers, updated services,
update in the price of the booking, adding a destination and providing existing
destination services that were served by both companies. Currently, the company may
face various types of issues during the changes in the system and end users while
using information technology and information systems. These issues include information
security, network security, data backup and recovery, poor audit trail, poor data backup
strategies, server downtime, etc.

Network Security/Data Security

The information and data is a valuable asset for a business. It is key to the growth and
success of a business. Data security must be a priority in terms of Mainland-Safari
tours. Mainland-Safari needs to protect data from the unauthorized access to prevent it
from being tampered with, destroyed or disclosed to others. The security can be
breached in a numerous way by a system failure, theft, inappropriate usage,
unauthorized access or computer viruses. Mainland-Safari tours hold a range of data
from customer insight to employee data which can easily put a company at risk. The
mainland-safari tours can ensure their data from any leaks by limiting the amount of
personal information available in the public domain. The other way that mainland-safari
can use to secure data is firewalls, routers, cable or DSL modems, smartphones and
voice over internal protocol (VoIP).

Data backup and recovery

Data backup and data recovery are important parts of running a business. A data
backup is a result of copying or archiving files and folders for the purpose of being able
to restore them in case of data loss. Business realizes the three things quickly:
computer crash, human error and disaster that happen at least expected or least
prepared time (Tammineedi, 2010). Mainland-Safari tours must be prepared with having
data backup systems in place. Mainland-Safari tours involve a critical financial data,
customer, company data and all of its assets. As the company has to deal with the
increasing amount of data, there may cause a hardware failure or system crash. So, the
company must backup data. These data must be back up either by using an offsite
server or using separate drives to store massive amounts of information or backup to a
cloud service. Without these data backup systems in place, data recovery becomes a
perilous situation. Mainland-Safari tours can use the following backup strategies to
protect data.

 Cloud Backups: Cloud backups are an essential part of a smart backup

strategy. Cloud backups help to restore data off-site and ensure that the
company will not suffer from any type of failure.

 Encryption of Data In-Transit: Backup data should be encrypted when in

transit, otherwise hackers can snoop on data. A smart encryption plan is a key to
overall data protection across a network.

 The 3-2-1 Strategy: There are different backup strategies. However, the 3-2-1
strategy for backups is highly effective. It involves three backups located in two
locations, such as on-premise and cloud storage locations. The company should
produce these backups at least once a day for maximum protection.

 24/7 Support: Whenever a network goes down or suffers data loss, 24/7 support
can quickly restore system backup no matter what day or time it is.

Server Downtime

Server downtime refers to periods of time when a computer or any vital part of an IT
system is unavailable. It can occur as a result of a power outage, human-made
error, equipment or hardware failure, software failure, etc. Mainland-Safari tours
completely rely on information technology. They are providing online booking
 services to their client. If there occurs any server downtime, the company will have a
negative effect instantly as well as in the long run. The company has to face the loss
of data, loss of application service, impact on reputation, negative impact on the
customer and financial loss. These are the major losses that the company have to
face at the time of server downtime. Mainland-Safari tours can avoid server
downtime by applying the following measures:-

 Backup data- Many downtimes happen because the setup is only accounted
for one way to complete tasks and failed to store mission-critical data
elsewhere.  Backing up helps to avoid data loss as well as redundancies in
server-client process can keep the user interface functional even if the
backend is experiencing problems.  One way to facilitate this is virtualization.
 Frequently update software and hardware- Frequent update in software
and hardware is important to ensure operating system and software is
running on the latest versions to avoid conflicts with the client. Similarly,
hardware components must be standardized so that hardware failure can be
avoided.
 Have strong policies- One of the reasons to server downtime is human
error.  Administrators and others with the power to manipulate the server
should be aware of prohibitions, and policies should be made clear before an
operation begins.

Impact of IS and IT issues on customer choice, continued patronage and brand

loyalty.
Customer can make or break a business. The information technology and Information
system related issues have a negative impact on customer choice, continued patronage
and brand loyalty. If Mainland-Safari tours fail to manage the security of their customer’s
details, future plans, unique product designs, etc. then, it might affect their brand value.
The information security cannot be ignored while dealing with information system and
information technology. Issues in information system and information technology may
lead to an ineffective sales call and lost opportunities will ultimately lead to the customer
dissatisfaction. Furthermore, the customer may be stolen by other competitors. The
Mainland-Safari tours have to take a mitigating technique that may arise during data
migration. The company should maintain a good relationship with the customer by
offering rewards, improving services, continuous email strategies and social networking
promotions.

Recommendation to attract new customers and manage existing customers

Mainland-Safari tours have the challenges to attract new customers, motivating an existing
customer to purchase again and bringing attention to new destinations.

Loyalty rewards
Modern customers are attracted by value, meaning and the feeling of gratitude. According to
the study done by Nielsen, it was found that 60% of consumers consider loyalty programs an
important factor in their buying decisions. Furthermore, consumers are likely to spend 46%
more with businesses that have established loyalty programs. So bringing a high-grade
loyalty program with long-term benefits will be the competitive advantage for Mainland-Safari
tours. With the customer previous trips preferences, Mainland-Safari tours can create new
offers and promotions. These types of offers will bring the customer to repeat purchase. This
will help Mainland-Safari tours to increase both the value of customer relationships and
revenue (Yoo & Bai, 2013).

Automatic Emails
Email marketing automation is a powerful customer retention tool. Email continues to
provide a high-leverage way to encourage repeat purchases. Mainland-Safari tours can
use automated emails to build a brand and get a better customer who spends more
money. Mainland-Safari tours can give a reminder email to a customer who has
abandoned the cart by booking a ticket. They can send an email 3 times. At the first
time, they can email for the simple reminder that is left during the booking. In second
email they can send an email describing the places and different location they can visit.
At last email, they can offer a discount and incentives. In this way, they can attract
customers. The other way Mainland-Safari tours can attract customer is welcome to
email and give the user an incentive to purchase a ticket. They can promote
destinations by sending emails and repeat customer email series.

Conclusion
Every business needs to follow business processes to achieve a targeted goal. Here
Mainland-Safari Tours has the main challenge to maintain the information system. Any
problem that arises in the system affect the customer and has several impacts on the
business. To maintain customer choice and the brand loyal company should focus on
the maintenance of an information system. This paper explains all the business
process that Mainland-Safari tours should apply for the company efficient and effective
flow. The Mainland-Safari tours must be prepared for the issues that may arise in
information system and technologies. So, the company should focus on the issues
related to the information system and use different methods to maintain new customers
and existing customers.

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