Your people skills could be needed even less frequently as hotels adopt keyless entry for rooms through a smartphone app.
The first hotel chain to implement the technology, Starwood Hotels and Resorts has installed the feature at 10 Aloft, Element and W hotels with plans to make smartphone-enabled entry available at 140 more locations next year, according to Mashable.
Customers can make reservations, check in and open their rooms all through the hotel app, which uses Bluetooth to communicate with the door's smart lock.
"Guests want this because it makes their lives simpler," said Starwood's Mark Vondrasek, as quoted by Mashable. "The ability to go right to your room, gives them back time."
Gizmodo reported that the process "is as simple as a few taps on your smartphone screen and touching your phone to the custom made smart locks on the room door."
The keyless entry system is available starting Wednesday at 10 Starwood locations: Aloft Harlem, Aloft Cupertino, Aloft Beijing, Aloft Cancun, W New York - Downtown, W Hollywood, W Singapore, W Hong Kong, W Doha and Element Times Square.
"We are excited to be the first in our industry to debut this new technology allowing us to further deliver on the wants and needs of our early adopter, hyper-mobile guests who use their smartphones for just about every aspect of their lives," Frits van Paasschen, CEO of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, said in a statement quoted by PCMag.com.
Through the system, guests receive their room number and Bluetooth key about 24 hours before they arrive. To keep everything secure, keyless entry is only available through one phone at a time, and the guest's phone must be actually touching the pad on the door to open it.
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