If you're staying at the Aloft Hotel in New York City
or Silicon Valley, you'll soon be able to use your Smartphone as your room key. Starwood Hotels & Resorts
Worldwide is adding a
"virtual room key" to its Starwood app in hopes that it can help make
the check in process less of a hassle. Rather than waiting on a long
line to get your key from the front desk at the hotel, users can check in and
set their payment method on the app.
The app then becomes your room key. Starwood's CEO Frits van Paasschen told The Wall Street Journal that he believes this new feature will "become the new standard for how people will want to enter a hotel."
He concedes that the idea might "be a novelty at first" but said he thinks "it will become table stakes for managing a hotel."
The app then becomes your room key. Starwood's CEO Frits van Paasschen told The Wall Street Journal that he believes this new feature will "become the new standard for how people will want to enter a hotel."
He concedes that the idea might "be a novelty at first" but said he thinks "it will become table stakes for managing a hotel."
The
technology works using Bluetooth and will work with any iPhone 4S or higher,
and Android phones running Android 4.3 or newer. Bluetooth connection in the phone connects to a sensor on the door that
activates the lock. The locks are battery-powered, meaning they will work even
if a hotel's computer system goes down.
This
isn't the first time using a Smartphone as a room key has been discussed. As
far back at 2010, Apple filed patents for using the iPhone in various
travel and retail scenarios.
Starwood is
going to pilot the program in its Aloft hotels in Cupertino, Calif., and
Harlem, N.Y., hotels in 2014, but hopes to roll the feature out to all of its
Aloft and W hotels by the end of 2015.
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