“Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. is placing a $550 million bet that hotel guests increasingly will use smartphones to choose rooms, check in and even unlock doors,” Craig Karmin reports for The Wall Street Journal. “The company plans to announce this week new technology intended for its 4,200 properties world-wide.”
“Guests already can check in and check out with a few punches on a smartphone or tablet-computer screen at all of Hilton’s hotels in the U.S., the company said. By the end of summer, travelers will be able to see the location of and select their own rooms by mobile phone at six brands, from the midscale Hilton Garden Inn to the luxury Waldorf Astoria,” Karmin reports. “Next year, Hilton says, arriving guests can begin using their smartphones to unlock the doors to their rooms, rather than waiting on any lines clogging the front desk to pick up a key. That feature will be available at most of the company’s hotels world-wide by the end of 2016.”
“Hilton isn’t the first to offer at least some of these customized features. Starwood, for instance, is already testing mobile-phone room keys at two of its Aloft brand hotels and plans to offer the option at roughly 150 Aloft and W hotels by the end of 2015,” Karmin reports. “Marriott says that 967 of its hotels offer mobile check-in and check-out, and more than 4,000 hotels globally will offer those services by year-end.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “Arline M.” for the heads up.]
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Hilton to lure Apple iPhone, iPod touch users with seven new apps – November 9, 2009
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I dislike Hiltons. Stayed in the Hilton Dusseldorf back in the 80s and had camera gear ripped off from what was supposed to be secure storage. They also screwed up our booking claiming we checked our after the first night despite us waving a telex in their faces confirming a two-day booking.
Two days later we were in Abano Terme in Italy. the hotel was a quarter of the price, bar and food tabs were a fraction of the Hilton (the food was fantastic) and the concierge couldn’t do enough for us.
=:~)
Your comment is irrelevant to this article. Besides that was in the 80’s, long long time ago.
Who the fsck died and left you in charge? The point, in case it escaped your minuscule brain, was that the Hilton Group are overpriced and, in my experience, provide poor service. Slapping a technological sticker over their “Services” won’t improve the poor reputation they have, as evinced by my many friends who choose to avoid them like the plague.
Thanks for playing and for your hubris.
=:~)
Just remember the old adage, “You can draw any trend line you want through a single data point.” You have one data point.
I have had both mediocre experiences at Hiltons as well as excellent experiences. I’ve had many stays with Hilton affiliated hotels over the years (most likely *well* over 100 stays totaling well over 500 nights) from east to west coast U.S. and from Norway through Australia and the middle east. I can probably draw a more accurate trend line of the over all “Hilton Experience” than you can with your single data point.
To be 100% up front, Hilton is NOT my favorite hotel chain, but it is nowhere near the bottom of the list.
Hilton is not a lower priced hotel. It never was and never will be. You had a horrible experience. Did you contact Hilton senior staff (not the staff at that hotel, but corporate staff)? If not, you gave *Hilton* (not the specific hotel) no chance to correct the issue. Next time you have a truly bad experience, climb the food chain and get proper relief.
I cited ONE example from more than a few experiences of staying at Hiltons. Perhaps it was remiss of me not to indicate that.
@Shadowself – it took four months of wrangling for the Hilton to acknowledge their cockup.
YMMV – mine didn’t!
=:~)
@Chas, while you’re still entitled to your opinions (and preferences), the fact remains that you’re still ticked off at one bad customer occurrence from ~30 years ago .. that’s hardly topical, let alone relevant.
FWIW, I’ve stayed in Hilton properties – – as well as many others – – and IMO, their greatest asset is that they’re sort of like McDonald’s in that you’re paying for consistency regardless of location/etc- but this is no more unique or newsworthy than similarly realizing that prices are proportional to demand (location).
@-hh I refer you to the comment I made above.
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@Chas, its fair to say that it wasn’t an isolated incident, but ‘cmon … a bitch from a quarter century ago? At least my own ‘Big Hilton Screw-Up’ occurred in 2008.
In any case, my point holds: no brand is going to be utterly flawless 100.00% of the time, and invariably, we still choose to give our business to them for what are self-serving reasons.
For example, I’ve never had any room at a Hilton (or similar major chain) where I didn’t have something as basic as hot water…but I can’t say that this is true for every hotel room that I’ve paid for…even if I revise that to say “paid more than $100/night for”.
And it was his opinion they suck he has a right to his opinion who the hell are you? Everyone not the select few have a right to an opinion. Dip Shit
@rob … just as he has a right to his opinion, so too do I.
YMMV, but some of us have spent hundreds/thousands of nights on the road away from home, and while a bad experience or two can certainly turn one off from a particular brand, the reality is that we also generally recognize that comments that are a couple of decades out of date aren’t particularly relevant today. Sure, Chas might have had more recent examples which would have made his initial comment more germane, but he didn’t make that clear when he made his initial comment, so our critique of his first comment understandably didn’t give him that benefit of the doubt.
I am a Hilton Diamond member with about a million points; I stay in Hilton properties around the world about 30 times a year. There are some stinkers but overall the experience is pretty good. The airport Hiltons in particular can be gruesome. The service at some of the Marriotts is better than Hilton, but I can find some variant of the Hilton brand almost everywhere I go.
As long as we’re reviewing Hilton…
My experience with them has been mostly negative. I’d much rather stay at a Marriott and save some money or pay more and stay at the Four Seasons depending on the location. Pretty much any where you go there is a better value or better quality option.
My biggest complaint with Hilton is that they’re old. Many of the locations were built or renovated in what was high fashion at the time 60s, 70s, 80s, and haven’t changed since, so they seem incredibly dated.
Their brand is also diluted by having so many “Airport Hiltons” and so many targeted for conventions.
On the plus side, maybe this iPhone initiative will be part of an overall make-over and updating of the chain.
Your Galaxy S5 running Android, on the other hand, will give you exclusive access to the mop room and HVAC units, roofing, generators, and more!
Actually, Hannah, I was thinking a hacked Galaxy S5 with Android OS, will give *others* access to your room, your mini bar, your TV account in the room, etc.
Galaxy S5 user at the Hilton front desk upon checkout: “Sir, I did *NOT* eat and drink $547 of candy, snacks and alcohol, and I most definitely did *NOT* stay up all night watching $125 worth of pornographic movies!”
Person at the front desk: “Sure, sure, let me call the manager ((and hotel security)).”
I thought Android phones such as the Galaxy S5 would be put to better use as room ‘door knockers’!
Door stops
I stayed at the Hilton Toronto 2 weeks ago, and couldn’t believe they were still charging $10 a night for in room internet access! Not sure how they will incorpoate that archaic policy into this new initiative.
Hello there
Welcome to Hilton powered by Microsoft technology.
Regards, Stephen
This is so much not a story, it makes me weep at your incompetence. Eventually, every hotel chain will do this, on all platforms. Why alienate a potential customer based on their smartphone tech? Bookings are bookings; money is money.
The investment amount is a pittance. They would need to spend $500 million on new room security anyway. Do you think card reader installations across a world wide chain of hotels would cost less?
Interesting. What could possibly ever go wrong?