HITEC Taps into Leading Group Reservation System for Sixth Consecutive Year
Industry's Top Hospitality Technology Exposition and Conference Leverages Passkey to Help En
JUNE 25, 2007. Passkey, the world's leading group reservation system, today announced that for the sixth year in a row, the hospitality industry's leading technology event, HFTP's HITEC, is using Passkey, the hospitality industry's leading event housing technology, to manage its housing and hotel reservations for this annual international event, held this year in Orlando.
HITEC is the world's largest hospitality technology exposition and conference, offering a unique combination of top-notch hospitality technology education, as well as showcasing the latest in hospitality technology products and services. HITEC management worked with the Orlando/Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau, to provide housing technology and services for the event. Passkey was able to bridge the gap between the bureau, HFTP, and the multiple properties with room blocks for HITEC 2007.
With Passkey, HITEC was able to offer attendees the ability to make and manage their hotel reservations online via a dedicated hotel reservations Web site. Using Passkey's RegLink technology, attendees were able to make their hotel reservations while registering for the event, all in a seamless process. Eight Orlando-area hotels participated in the event, with many of them receiving event reservations directly using Passkey's GroupLink technology, which transfers group reservations directly to a hotel's internal PMS or CRS system. The participating hotels were:
o The Peabody Orlando
o Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress
o Loews Royal Pacific Resort at Universal
o Residence Inn SeaWorld International Center
o Rosen Centre Hotel
o Rosen Plaza
o Rosen Shingle Creek
o Hilton Grand Vacations Club SW International Center
Throughout the event booking period, HITEC and the Orlando Bureau were able to use Passkey to track and manage their event hotel blocks and reservations in a proactive and efficient manner. Using Passkey's real-time data and interactive technology, they were specifically able to manage and manipulate their event blocks effectively to maximize attendance, accelerate pick-up and minimize attrition risk, all while providing world class service to event attendees.
The results were spectacular, with over 50% of reservations being made online directly by attendees through Passkey. This capability led to an accelerated booking pace, a sharp reduction in call center fees and an 88% pick-up rate prior to cut-off.
'Every year we continue to gain more insight into the meeting planning process and the consistent product enhancements offered by Passkey contribute in a big way,' said Frank Wolfe, CEO of HFTP. 'Having more visibility into all our room blocks with scheduled event alerts reduced workloads and helped us manage attrition risk. With such impressive results we are definitely using Passkey next year in Austin for HITEC 2008."
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