KOLEJ YAYASAN NEGERI SEMBILAN

GENTAM, 72000 KUALA PILAH

NEGERI SEMBILAN
NO. TEL : 06-4811 225

INFORMATION SHEET

PROGRAM CODE & NAME I551-002-3:2017 FRONT OFFICE OPERATION

LEVEL L3

COMPETENCY UNIT NO.

I551-002-3:2017 C04 GUEST SERVICE OPERATION
AND TITLE

1. PREPARE VIP GUEST ARRIVAL ACTIVITIES

2. HANDLE VIP GUEST ARRIVAL ACTIVITIES

3. PERFORM GUEST RELATION ACTIVITIES

WORK ACTIVITIES NO.
AND STATEMENT 4. ASSIST FRONT DESK FOR GUEST DEPARTURE ACTIVITIES

5. ASSIST DURING EMERGENCY SITUATION

CODE NO. I551-002-3:2017 - C04/IS(3/12) Page : 1 Of 14

TITLE: ROOM ASSIGMENT

PURPOSE : The purpose for these Information Sheet is to explain about the room
assignment that have to be followed according to the establishment standard.
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INFORMATION :
1. LIASON BETWEEN OTHER DEPARTMENT
Interdepartmental communications in a hotel is very important. As front office
serves as the communication liaison in providing guest services, other
departments have a unique communication link with the front office staff. Most
of the time, the front office staff will response to guests’ requests for information
on location of hotel, special events in the community and public transportation.
Thus, in order to ensure guest stay is satisfactory or their visit is a pleasant
one, effective interdepartmental communications is vital.

a) Front Office Department

The front office is the most visible department in a hotel. Front office personnel
have more contact with guests than do staff in most other departments. The
front desk is usually the focal point of activity for the front office and is
prominently located in the hotel's lobby. Guests come to the front desk to
register; to receive room assignments; to inquire about available services,
facilities, and the city or surrounding area; and to check out.

The front desk often serves as the hotel control center for guest requests
concerning housekeeping or engineering issues. International guests use the
front desk to exchange currency, find a translator, or request other special
assistance. In addition, it may also be a base of operations during an
emergency, such as a fire or a guest injury.

Other front office functions include receiving and distributing mail, messages,
and facsimiles (faxes), as well as guest cashiering. Cashiers post charges and
payments to guest accounts, all of which are later verified during an account
auditing procedure (often called the night audit).

Front desk personnel also may verify outstanding accounts receivable, and
produce daily reports for management. Some hotels have added concierge
services to their list of front office functions. In a sense, concierge services are
simply an extension of the guest services provided by front office personnel.
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The functions of the Front Office are to:

• Sell guestrooms, register guests, and assign guestrooms.

• Process future room reservations, when there is no reservations department
or when the reservations department is closed.
• Coordinate guest services.
• Provide information about the hotel, the surrounding community, and any
attractions or events of interest to guests.
• Maintain accurate room status information.
• Maintain guest accounts and monitor credit limits.
• Produce guest account statements and complete proper financial settlement.

Figure 1 : Hotel Lobby

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b) Housekeeping
• A close liaison between the front office department and housekeeping
department is essential so that the information about the guestrooms is
kept accurately up to date.
• Housekeeping department is considered the most important support
department for the front office.
• A front desk staff cannot assign a guestroom until the room has been
cleaned, inspected and released by the housekeeping department.
• The housekeeping department and front office department must promptly
inform each other of any changes in a room’s availability or status
• In order to maximize room sales, a change in a room’s housekeeping
status should be promptly communicated to the front desk.
• When the housekeeping status information used by the housekeeping
department differs from the room status information used by the front desk
to assign rooms, a room status discrepancy occurs. This discrepancy can
tremendously affect hotel’s ability to satisfy guest needs and maximize
rooms’ revenue.
• During high occupancy (sold out) periods, a prompt relay of housekeeping
information to the front desk is needed. This will help the registration
process to run smoothly when guests check in. Failing to do so might cause
dissatisfaction among guests.

Figure 2: Housekeeping (Chambermaid)

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c) Foods And Beverage (F&B)

• Good communication between both Food & Beverage Department and Front
Office Department is important in ensuring guest stay is a pleasant one.

• When guests check-in, Front Office Department needs to give out breakfast
voucher to guests. Other than that, Food And Beverage Department needs
Front Office staff to provide information to guests about operating hours,
menu and location in the property.

• Problems such as late charges pose inconvenience to the guest. It occurs

when guest comes into the restaurant for breakfast and has already checked
out without paying. This happens when Food & Beverage Department staff
fails to post charges incurred by guests to their room account and forgets to
inform Front Office Department about them.

• The Front Office Department needs to give reports on guest methods of

payment to the food and beverage department. Normally, guests who wish to
charge privileges throughout the hotel must leave an imprint of their credit
card at front desk. Thus, when the guest charges a meal at a restaurant, bar
or calls for room service, Food And Beverage staff does not have to call the
front desk for credit information.

• Front Office Department must also work with Food & Beverage Department
in terms of credit adjustments. Restaurants and room service might wrongly
charge guests for their meals. In these cases, food and beverage
department need to issue a credit adjustment, take it to the front office desk
and have the front office staff deduct the charges from the guest’s account.

• Thus, it cannot be denied that both Front Office Department and Food And
Beverage Department need to work together hand in hand to give excellent
service to guests.
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Figure 3: Food and Beverage (Waiters)

d) Accounts Department

• Collaboration between the front office and accounting department is

necessary so that the information about guest accounts maintains accurately
and updated constantly.
• Accounts department is important support departments for the front office
since a large number of transactions with guests happen at the front desk
every day.
• During the guest stay, they use hotel facilities such as bedrooms, restaurant,
laundry and room service. Charges will be made for the services and
facilities that the guest uses. All transactions will be recorded by the cashier
at the front desk.
• The cashier is also part of the account department. Hence, effective
teamwork among accounts and front office department contribute to guest
satisfaction while staying in the hotel.
• At the end of the business various auditing activities will be performed by the
night auditor (also part of the accounts department staff).
• Auditing is important to determine that all guest bills are properly settled.
This is very important to ensure guest satisfaction when they pay all the bills
during check-out.
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• The night auditor will also produce reports regarding all the transactions
including front office arrival guest for the next day.

e) SALES AND MARKETING DEPARTMENT

• In order for the front office department to generate sales, it requires the
coordination between front office department and sales and marketing.
• This interaction can influence the hotel’s revenue by proper planning,
implementing promotions, advertising and a good marketing technique using
various holiday packages and group tours through the use of marketing and
public relations skills.
• Public relations are important in order to make good business deals with the
various travel agency and Airline Company. Hotel can benefit from the good
image of public relation as a whole by building good rapport with the public.
• Front office can benefit from all the activities carried by sales and marketing
and public relation because it can increase their room sales.
• Front office department provides important information on room availability
so that sales and marketing department can make reservations for groups,
tours and corporate bookings.
• Marketing strategies made by the sales and marketing department depend
on the guest history record by the front office. This history record of frequent
and corporate guest is needed so as to create an effective promotion
approach to past and potential guest.
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f) Maintenance

• Front office department will handle various complaints from the guest and
staff of the hotel. Thus, front office department and maintenance
communicate on requests for maintenance service and room status.
• Most complaints are related with problems regarding poor heating or cooling,
faulty plumbing, noisy equipment and broken furniture. All reports will be
recorded at the front desk log book for repair work order.
• Maintenance is responsible for maintaining the appearance of the exterior
and interior of the hotel and also responsible for swimming pool sanitation.
• Front desk staffs are responsible to monitor the log book so that the
problems will be taken care by the maintenance personnel. Failing to do so
will make the room unsalable and also make the guest dissatisfied with the
hotel services. This will cause lost of revenue. Maintenance help to minimize
this loses through repairing all rooms that need fixing.

Figure 4 : Maintenance staff

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g) Security

• Front office handles large amount of cash and guest assets. Security
department provides protection for guests, hotel staff and properties.
• The security department provides surveillance and access control for the
public area such as the lobby area located near the front desk and guest
rooms.
• Surveillance is normally done through hidden circuit camera and positioning
security guards at various hotel entrances.
• Securing access to guestrooms using electronic door locking system
operates through a master control console at the front desk which is wired to
every guest room door.

2. ROOM INSPECTION
Every guest room must be checked on daily basis by housekeeping supervisor, this will
help the hotel to attain high guest satisfaction in terms of room comfort and also for
safety reasons.

If the floor supervisor is not been able to check the room by the end of shift, the Asst.
Executive housekeeper must do it before releasing the room for guest occupancy.

Use of a pre-printed room inspection check-list form will prove effective for the hotel
management. It will establish a set procedure ensuring that will remind both
Housekeeping Supervisor / Executive and Room maids of any defects and missing
amenities for the guest.

The following attachments will offer a sample and guide to check each aspect of getting
a room ready for guest.
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Figure 5 : Room Inspection Checklist

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3. ROOM KEY CARD ENCORDING PROCESS

This function is used when a new guest is to be checked into a room. When the new
card is used in the lock, the card of the previous guest will automatically be canceled in
the lock. Since this function is the most frequently used, the steps used during key card
encording are differs based on the operating system being used in hotel’s. Below arre
the steps for HT22 operating system.

3.1 Steps To check in a new guest :

a) Enter your password.

b) Press the ENTER key. If a back-up needs to be made or updated, the screen will
prompt you to take action. Once this process is complete, the screen will display
"New Guest Check-in”

NEW GUEST CHECK IN

Room: _

3.2 A guest loses a keycard

If a guest keycard is lost, a new guest card must be Made for each guest in the
room who has a key. By Encoding a new guest key, the code of the room Lock will
be changed which will disable the lost Keycard. If the guest had two or more
keycards and Only one is lost, it is imperative that the remaining Keycards be
retrieved and re-encoded, or they will not Work in the lock once the new card is
used.
.
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3.3 A guest wants an additional keycard

To make an additional keycard, use the copy guest Function. This will not cancel
the existing keycard for The room. This is also the function to be used if the Guest
has left his or her keycard in the room. As long as The key is not lost, it is okay to
make a copy.
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SECTION A : SHORT ANSWER

Fill in the answer in the space provided.

1. What are the two (2) front of the house department?

_____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

(2 marks)
2. What are the two (2) back of the house department?
_____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

(2 marks)
3. What are the most important things before releasing room to sale?
_____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

(2 marks)
4. What are the most liason department to Front Office Department?
_____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

(2 marks)
5. What are the thing need to be done incase guest lost his keycards?
_____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

(3 marks)
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REFERENCE :

1. Stutts A.T,Wortman J.F (2006), Hotel & Lodging Management: an Introduction,2 nd

ed,John Wily And Sons, New Jersey.ISBN : 0-471-47447-9
2. Lynn Van Der Wagen (2002),Professional Hospitality Core Competencies, Global
Books & Subscription Services, New Delhi. ISBN: 81-7512 028-2