Housekeeping is an operational department of the hotel. It is responsible for cleanliness, maintenance, aesthetic upkeep of rooms, public areas, back areas and surroundings.
Guest rooms are the heart of the hotel. Unless the décor is appropriate, the air odour free, furnishing and upholstery is spotlessly clean the hotel may loose a guest as a potential customer. The housekeeping department not only prepares the clean guestroom on a timely basis for the guests who are arriving but also cleans and maintains everything in the hotel so that the property is fresh and attractive as the day it opens for business. The housekeeping thus contributes in a big way towards the overall reputation of a property. It is a 24 hour and 365 day operation.
The aim of all accommodation establishments is to provide their customers with clean, attractive, comfortable and welcoming surrounding that offer value for money. Nothing sends a stronger message than cleanliness in a hospitality operation. No level of service, friendliness or glamour can equal the sensation a guest has upon entering a spotless, tidy and conveniently arranged room. Both management and guest consider the keeping of the place clean and in a good order a necessity for a hotel to command a fair price and get repeat business.
Housekeeping may be defined as the provision of a clean, comfortable and safe environment, It’s is not confined to the housekeeping department as every member of staff in the establishment should be concerned with the provision of these facilities in their own department, eg. the chef ‘housekeepers’ in the kitchen, the restaurant manager or head waiter ‘housekeepers’ in the restaurant, and the general manager has overall responsibility.
In any establishment there are three department particularly concerned with accommodation:
- The reception department, whose staff sell and allocate the rooms.
- The housekeeping department, whose staff plan, provide and service the rooms.
- The maintenance department, whose staff provide adequate hot and cold water, sanitation, heating, lighting and ventilation as well as maintaining and repairing individual articles and area within the rooms operation.
IMPORTANCE OF HOUSEKEEPING
Housekeeping is an operational department in a hotel, which is responsible for cleanliness, maintenance, aesthetic upkeep of rooms, public area, back area and surroundings. A hotel survives on the sale of room, food, beverages and other minor services such as the laundry, health club spa and so on. The sale of rooms constituter a minimum of 50 per cent of these sales. Thus, the major part of the hotel’s margin of profit comes from the room sales, because a room once made can be sold over and over again. The effort that a housekeeping department makes in giving a guest a desirable room has a direct bearing on the guest’s experience in a hotel. Guestrooms are the heart of the hotel. The housekeeping department not only prepares clean guestroom on a timely basis for arriving guest, but also cleans and maintains everything in the hotel so that the property is as fresh and attractive as the day it opened for business. Housekeeping, thus, is an ancillary department that contributes in a big way towards the overall reputation of a property.
It is rightly said that housekeeping is a 24 x 7 x 365 operation. Imagine the stacks of linen needed to make up all the beds in a hotel, the miles if carpeting, floor, walls and ceiling to be cleaned and maintained, and cleaning compounds along with special tools and equipment needed in order to clean.
Other than hotels, professional housekeeping services are very much in demand in hospitals, on cruise liners, at offices and more. Since most such organizations prefer to outsource these functions, contract housekeeping is becoming a popular in these days.
ROLE OF HOUSEKEEPING DEPARTMENT
Housekeeping plays a very important role in hospitality industry such as:-
- To achieve the maximum possible efficiency in ensuring the care and comfort of guests and in the smooth running of the department.
- To establish a welcoming atmosphere and ensure courteous, reliable service from all staff of the department.
- To ensure a high standards of cleanliness and general upkeep in all areas for which the department is responsible.
- To provide linen in rooms, restaurants, banquet hall, conference venues, health clubs, and so on, as well as maintain an inventory for the same.
- To provide uniforms for all the staff and maintain adequate inventories for the same.
- To cater to the laundering requirements of the hotel linen, staff uniforms and guest clothing.
- To Provide and maintain the floral decorations and maintain the landscaped areas of the hotel.
- To coordinate renovation and refurnishing of the property as and when, in consultation with the management and with interior designers.
- To deal with lost and found articles.
- To ensure training, control and supervision of all staff attached to the department.
- To establish a good working relationship with other department.
- To ensure that safety and security regulations are made known to all staff of the department.
IMPORTANCE OF GUEST ROOMS
It is extremely important to understand the expectations of a guest when he/she pays to stay in a room. People nowadays travel a lot more than they did earlier, and the expectations from hotels are constantly on the rise. In such a scenario, continuous analysis of guest expectations becomes necessary. Given that a hotel is often referred to as a home away from home‘, there would be similarities in a guest‘s expectations from a hotel and from a home. These similarities would dictate that the guestrooms be neat, hygienic, comfortable, private, and above all, safe.
- The most important consideration here is staff needs to understand and respect the guest‘s expectations from the guestroom and the hotel staff. Primarily, a neat room is the basic minimum expectation of any guest, and the staff needs to ensure this by laying out fresh linen and presenting a clean room on a daily basis.
- The room should not only be attractive, but also comfortable and functional. Hotel guests expect a high degree of cleanliness, leading to a hygienic environment to stay in. For instance, guest that the hotel has provided them a sanitized toilet when they see a disinfected paper strip on the toilet seat.
- The basic necessities in a guestroom are constantly varying. Nowadays these may include Internet and Wi-Fi connectivity, channel music, television, temperature control, and so on.
- Guests also expect that they will not be disturbed often and that the location of the rooms would be such that they have a good view.
- Safety, as we have already mentioned, is a key factor with regard to guestrooms – guest would like the guestroom location to be safe and not accessible to one and all.
- The doors of a guestroom should have a double locking system operable from inside, along with strict control measures in the hotel with regard to the handling of guestroom keys and master keys.
- Fire-exit layouts being placed in the rooms is a necessity as well. Irrespective of its location, a guestroom should also offer easy access to other guest service areas, such as restaurants, gymnasiums, swimming pools, and so on, with clear directions to and from the room or elevator being posted in corridors.
- The guest would also expect to be able to get in touch with ancillary departments providing other services to guests from the room itself. The various services- such as room service, restaurants, housekeeping, valet, and so on- should be clearly indicated with explanation and intercom numbers in the literature on the house rules and in the information kits placed in each guestroom.