While hotel occupancy is recovering toward pre-pandemic levels, high rates of staff turnover continue to persist for many properties.
In Flywire’s new report, The blueprint for stronger hotel performance, 73% of hotel leaders said they still find turnover of back-office staff to be a problem, with lasting effects on customer satisfaction and property performance.
The report also revealed a surprising turnover culprit: inefficient payment processes are making teams work harder. 75% of GMs surveyed said their teams run up against delays because they chase payments manually – costing them as much as 20 extra hours every week. Employees are also losing too much time to other burdensome tasks like reconciliation and chargebacks (74%), processing fee calculations (68%), and communication issues across teams (61%).
Hotel leaders know their teams – and their customers – deserve better. 94% agree they need a better way to streamline payments, noting better automation, integration, and security as key opportunities.
With simple payment processing improvements, hotel leaders can help staff feel more fulfilled and empowered to have a meaningful impact on customer experience and revenue growth.
Better payments help staff focus on high-value activities
Hotel leaders are hungry for efficiency. 69% believe there are too many steps in their current processes. So where are they looking for efficiencies?
- 67% want a faster way to capture deposits after a contract is signed, with 21% believing it takes too long to secure a deposit after signing.
- 65% have to manually input customers’ payment information across systems due to a lack of payment integration with their PMS and sales and catering systems.
With a higher risk of delays and missed steps in the payment process, payment inefficiencies take as much of a toll on revenue streams as they do employees’ time and job satisfaction. Every respondent noted revenue loss – some as much as 10% – due to payment inefficiencies. In particular, 77% of property sales teams are losing revenue due to uncollected deposits.
By automating and integrating workflows, staff can secure more revenue faster with less effort, gaining more time to focus on additional revenue-generating activities.
Better payments help staff take better care of your customers
All this manual effort doesn’t just add up for staff; it affects your customers, too. 79% of hotel leaders worry they’re losing customers because of payment inefficiencies, and 83% worry about the security of their customers’ information when they make payments.
97% agree digitizing the payment process would elevate the customer experience. Respondents noted improved user friendliness, flexibility, transparency, and security as top benefits digital payments would bring. And with an easier process, staff would not only free up time from chasing down payments but also having to manage customer inquiries and frustrations, bringing greater harmony to the workday.
89% of hotel leaders also agree that if they could reduce staff turnover, they could increase revenue by at least 5%. Whether it's inefficient payments or another painpoint, addressing any concern exacerbating staff turnover can boost revenue generation, as turnover directly impacts customer satisfaction and engagement.
- 57% cite a decreased level of service quality
- 49% cite increased delays for customers
- 41% cite decreased customer loyalty
Better payments help staff protect hard-earned revenue
With fraudsters getting smarter, chargebacks continue taking a significant toll on the health and performance of a property and its staff. 83% of hotel leaders find chargebacks to be a big problem for their property, and 58% have given up fighting chargebacks altogether because of how challenging it is.
80% of hotel leaders even say turnover would lower if they could find a better way to handle chargebacks. Every respondent across 300+ properties reported having to manage at least one chargeback per month, with 18% of properties managing 26 or more chargebacks per month, translating to thousands of dollars in revenue lost.
With secure digital payments built by payment and fraud prevention experts, hotels can benefit from built-in protections that help them reduce chargebacks and retain hard-earned revenue.
Better payments, happier staff, maximized revenue
By addressing payment inefficiencies, it’s easy for hotel leaders to better serve their staff, customers, and business. With simpler processes, staff will be happier, curbing the pain of knowledge loss and lack of resourcing that comes with higher turnover – and ultimately creating space to take better care of customers and generate more revenue.