Client Story: Hyatt Place Miami Airport
Smoking sensors dramatically upgrade busy hotel’s smoking prevention and policy enforcement
Property Type:
Airport Hotel
Location:
Miami, FL
Size:
135 Rooms
Challenges
- Difficulty collecting cleaning fees and losing chargebacks from guests who violate the no-smoking policy
- Inability to quickly identify where and when smoking violations occurred
Solution
- Monitor rooms for tobacco smoke and marijuana smoke with FreshAir’s patented sensors
- Receive immediate notification with logged scientific proof of smoking
- Archive timestamped alerts as evidence to refute chargebacks
Results
- Improved follow-up process for smoking violations
- Prevented credit card chargebacks for smoking fees
In-Depth Review
Hyatt Place Miami Airport’s management struggled to identify unauthorized smoking and enforce the hotel’s no-smoking policies when guests complained of nearby smoking. The hotel’s General Manager, Craig Haas, tapped FreshAir Sensor as a solution to these challenges. FreshAir’s immediate detection and smoking alerts have resulted in enhanced no-smoking enforcement processes, reduced smoking violations, and streamlined smoking fee collection. Achieving these improvements, Haas notes that FreshAir’s dedicated Client Experience team helped the hotel leverage the sensor technology to meet property’s smoking detection goals.
Before installing FreshAir devices, hotel managers and housekeepers spent too much time trying to find the room where a guest was smoking. Learning of violations from guest complaints was ineffective. Now, hotel staff are able to pinpoint exactly where and when smoking takes place thanks to FreshAir’s 24×7 monitoring, immediate detection, and discreet alerts. Haas is pleased that improved enforcement has caused smoking rates to go down: “There is not as much smoking in the rooms. It is much more organized. It is a process, and managers are able to respond right away.”
Because smoking is immediately detected with FreshAir’s patented sensors, the hotel is able to prevent room damages from tobacco and marjiauna smoke. Quickly stopping smoking means avoiding costly cleaning and remediation procedures. Hotel staff no longer have to take the room out of order for 24 hours and lose room revenue every time unauthorized smoking takes place. The Hyatt Place Miami Airport saves money that would have been spent on smoke-related damages and can now successfully charge the smoking fee for violations.
“FreshAir is not a plug and play – it is an organized process. We re-trained the housekeeping team as we were learning the process, and FreshAir Client Experience has been extremely helpful. We get reports from Client Experience, and they do a lot of proactive management from behind the scenes.”
Craig Haas, General Manager
FreshAir’s smoking reports and scientific proof of smoking have made charging smoking fees easy. Haas highlights, “The backup provided by FreshAir is able to settle any disputes.” Each smoking alert comes with a timestamped chart of the incident, documenting and proving when smoking occurs. These reports can be downloaded, printed, and shared with guests during check-out and with credit card companies to successfully win chargebacks in the event of fee disputes.
As Hyatt Place Miami Airport’s General Manager, Haas emphasizes how FreshAir smoking sensor technology and support staff dramatically upgraded their smoking prevention and policy enforcement. Since implementation, the hotel has been able to successfully charge smoking fees, safeguard against smoking-related cleaning costs, and ultimately meet the hotel’s no-smoking goals.