For customer-facing hotel staff with the right personality traits (friendly and outgoing, positive attitude) it is a waste of their talents (empathy, communication skills, problem-solving abilities, adaptability) if they are spending hours on tedious admin every day.

The concierge role is a good example. Typically, one third of the requests that a concierge receives are for restaurant bookings, and most do not require special intervention to get that table with a view. This is where API integrations with table management systems can automate bookings in real time, the same applies to requests for transport.

In a luxury setting especially, such technology is not replacing the concierge role but complementing it. There are plenty of high-touch miracles that concierges perform (private museum tours; tickets to sold-out concerts ) that are only possible because of the human contacts the concierge has built up in his little black book over the years.

With this system, which can be applied to many more hotel functions, a hotel might only need to employ two concierges instead of four or five. The technology and human are running in parallel, with automation freeing up employees to only perform those tasks that give them the greatest job satisfaction and add true value to the business.