GUEST CYCLE

- Is the best way to see the full

representation of
how the Front Office flows.
- The 4 Stages of GUEST
CYCLE:
a. Pre-arrival- reservation is
made. During this
pre-arrival stage that you will
be able to
personalize your new Guest’s stay
from the
information that they gave you
over the
phone.
b. Arrival- includes registration
and the
rooming functions.
c. Occupancy- when the Front
Office really gets
to shine.
-Main objectives that you will be
striving for
during the occupancy phase of
the Guest
cycle is to encourage repeat
business and
having impeccable Guest
relations is
essential to achieve this.
-Security is another important.
d. Departure- all Guest services
and accounting
aspects are completed. When a
Guest
departs your establishment, they
will leave
their room, com to the front
desk to go
through and pay their account,
ask any
additional questions, hand in their
room key
and the depart the building
GUEST CYCLE
- Is the best way to see the full
representation of
how the Front Office flows.
- The 4 Stages of GUEST
CYCLE:
a. Pre-arrival- reservation is
made. During this
pre-arrival stage that you will
be able to
personalize your new Guest’s stay
from the
information that they gave you
over the
phone.
b. Arrival- includes registration
and the
rooming functions.
c. Occupancy- when the Front
Office really gets
to shine.
-Main objectives that you will be
striving for
during the occupancy phase of
the Guest
cycle is to encourage repeat
business and
having impeccable Guest
relations is
essential to achieve this.
-Security is another important.
d. Departure- all Guest services
and accounting
aspects are completed. When a
Guest
departs your establishment, they
will leave
their room, com to the front
desk to go
through and pay their account,
ask any
additional questions, hand in their
room key
and the depart the building
GUEST CYCLE
- Is the best way to see the full
representation of
how the Front Office flows.
- The 4 Stages of GUEST
CYCLE:
a. Pre-arrival- reservation is
made. During this
pre-arrival stage that you will
be able to
personalize your new Guest’s stay
from the
information that they gave you
over the
phone.
b. Arrival- includes registration
and the
rooming functions.
c. Occupancy- when the Front
Office really gets
to shine.
-Main objectives that you will be
striving for
during the occupancy phase of
the Guest
cycle is to encourage repeat
business and
having impeccable Guest
relations is
essential to achieve this.
-Security is another important.
d. Departure- all Guest services
and accounting
aspects are completed. When a
Guest
departs your establishment, they
will leave
their room, com to the front
desk to go
through and pay their account,
ask any
additional questions, hand in their
room key
and the depart the building
Introduction
Alongside Rooms Division and Front Office, Food and Beverage (F&B) is one of the
core operational departments within a hotel. Its purpose is to professionally manage food
and drinks. From a hotel perspective, this department is responsible for satisfying the
food and beverage needs of both hotel guests and casual guests. The F&B department is
usually the largest department in a hotel, and deals with the purchasing of materials and
products, their storage, retrieval, processing and serving. Serving can occur as part of
room service, in bars and restaurants on the hotel premises, and in banquet and
conference rooms.

F&B is a complex department where many activities take place, as can be deduced from
the description provided above. Just to give an example, processing involves retrieving
items from the storage rooms, cleaning and washing them, cutting and carving them,
(pre-)cooking them, assembling them on a plate while 275 15 The Food & Beverage
Department ensuring that each order is promptly attended to. Each activity in the F&B
department presents several specific sustainability challenges. One can easily imagine
how much information needs to be conveyed in a chapter dedicated to sustainability and
F&B.

1- Why do we call the Front Office Department in a particular

hotel as an Information Hub?List and describe the Guest
Cycle.
The front office is the most important department in the hotel industry. The staff of this
department is very actively looking to the guests. In this department, the staff handles all the
transactions between the hotel and its guests.

If guests face any issues, then they would normally go to this front office department for their
solutions. This department is a major operational and revenue-producing department in the hotel.

This department is always involved in providing valuable services to the guests. For example,
Check-in, Checkout, Reservation, Registration Pre-arrival, Arrival, Occupancy, Departure, and
many other services.

It has been said that 75% of a guest’s total satisfaction with a hotel is determined during all the
front office processes. A successful hotel must do whatever it can to ensure that the guest is
satisfied with every aspect of registration.

The first hotel employees who come into contact with most guests when they arrive are members
of the uniformed services division of the front office.

The front office department is arguably the most important part of the hotel experience for a
guest. It is during this time that lasting impressions are made.

1. Pre - Arrival

can be affected by many factors, including previous experiences with the hotel, The Guest
chooses a hotel during the pre-arrival stage of the guest cycle. Choice of the guest advertisement,
word of mouth referral by friends and colleagues, location, corporate, travel agent booking, hotel
name, hotel loyalty program member etc.

The guest's decision of making the reservation can also be affected by the ease of making the
reservation and the way reservation agent interacted and described the facility of the hotel like
room type, room rate, recreational facilities and other attractions near the hotels etc. 

We can certainly call the reservation area as the sales office for non-corporate or group bookings.
Its employees should be sales orientated and present positive, strong image of the hotel.

If a reservation can be accepted, the reservation agent creates a reservation on the hotel
management software. The creation of this reservation record starts the hotel guest cycle. This
reservation contains details of the guest specific request which will help the hotel to provide the
guest with personalized service during his stay.

The details which are collected during the reservation also helps the hotel to complete pre-
registration activities like assign room according to guest request, room rate to be charged to the
guest folio during the course of stay etc.
Although the reservation details help in providing guests with anticipatory service the primary
objective of making the reservation is to make sure that room will be available when he arrives at
the hotel. 

2. Arrival

The arrival stage of the guest cycle includes registration and room assignment process. After the
guest arrives, he or she establishes a business relationship with the hotel through the front office.
It is the front office staff responsibility to clarify any query of the guest especially the details of
room rate of packages he/she is booked on.

Front office staff should determine the guest's reservation status before beginning the check-
in/registration process. Guest with reservation and guest without reservation commonly known
as walk-ins also provides an opportunity for business for front desk staff.

A Registration card or Reg. card is printed and completed at the time of check-in, which will
help the front desk to collect essential information. The reg. card should contain details like
billing instructions, reservation details, number of adults and children occupying, address,
passport and visa for foreign nationals, full address, personal details and credit card
details. Because the guest and hotel gain certain legal benefits it is mandatory to get guest
signature on the registration card.

The registration process is complete once a method of payment and the guest's departure date
have been confirmed and duly signed by the guest. The guest may be given a room key and
direction to the room or escorted by the guest service associate or guest service manager. 

When the guest checks-in to the room the occupancy stage of the guest cycle begins.

3. Occupancy

The manner in which the front office staff represents the hotel is important during the occupancy
stage.

As the main contact centre for hotel activity, the front office is responsible for coordinating guest
requests. Among those providing information and supplies to the guests.

Front desk should take extra care to respond to the guest in a timely and accurate manner. The
main focus of the front desk staff is to provide anticipatory service and to meet or exceed the
guest's expectations. This will encourage the guest to repeat to the hotel.

Security is also a main important concern during occupancy of the guest. Issues like protection of
funds and valuables are among those. The front desk should also follow the hotel standard
operating procedure for handling the hotel and guest keys, property surveillance, safe deposit
boxes, guests personal property, and emergencies are also important.
A variety of charges restaurant charges, telephone, internet, travel desk etc. during the occupancy
stage affect guest and hotel account. Most of these charges will be posted to the guest account
according to front office posting procedures. And also in most cases, the Room charges are
the single largest charge on the guest folio.

Other front office financial tasks during the occupancy stage are to verify the charges posted to
the guest account and checking guest accounts against the credit limit.

4. Departure

Guest services and guest accounting aspects of the guest cycle are completed during the cycle's
fourth and final phase is departure.

At Departure, the guest vacates the room, receives the accurate statement of the settled accounts,
returns the room keys and leaves the hotel. Once the guest has checked out, front office updates
the rooms availability status and notifies the housekeeping department. ( For hotels using
Property management software the status of the room is updated automatically ).

At this stage front office also collect the feedback of the guest experience in the hotels by
handing over the guest feedback form.

2- What are the major function of the Food &Beverage Department

in a hotel?

FRONT OFFICE
ACCOUNTING
BASICS
FRONT OFFICE ACCOUNTING
FUNDAMENTALS
FRONT OFFICE ACCOUNTING
SYSTEM- follows the Guest
through each stage of the Guest
cycle; pre-arrival, arrival,
occupancy and departure.
- It is the system that documents
transactions off
the in-house guests, and the non
in-house
Guests using your establishment’s
facilities and
services.
- Performing accounting tasks
accurately ensures
that you collect the correct
amount of money
owed from the Guests.
Fundamentals of the Front Office
accounting System:
1. Guest account- a form on
which financial data is
accumulated and summarized.
-during your Guest’s stays their
account will
increase and this increasing
amount is called the
account balance.
2. A folio- a statement that
records the Guest
charges and payments that affect
the balance of
the Guest’s account.
-when an account is first created, it
is allocated a
folio that has a starting balance of
zero.
- every transaction that increases
and decreases
the balance of the account are
recorded on the
folio.
3.
A food and beverage department is responsible for supplying food and drink to the

members of an organization and its guests. Food and beverage departments have employees

with multiple dining-related roles, including bartender, barista, server, cook, chef, hostess, dining

room server, food service attendant and dishwasher.

In general, a food and beverage department is an umbrella group overseeing employees who

work in multiple restaurants and shops that are united in providing a single, consistent dining

experience within an organization. Food and beverage departments may also be either a single,

cohesive business unit with one management team or a group of smaller divisions with

individual management teams reporting to higher-level managers and executives.