Highlighting the Hygiene Measures for Guest Safety at Your Properties

When hotels reopen after the COVID-19 crisis, guests will demand further assurances that hotel properties will have additional, verified health checks and standards in place. Health and safety will have a profound influence on the traveler psyche and is consequently what travelers will look for when booking a hotel. We know that many of our hoteliers have established new policies and procedures to reinforce their safety messaging, often partnering with trusted, outside organizations specializing in health, wellness, and cleanliness. To ensure information about these new policies and procedures is easily accessible to corporate travelers and agency partners, Sabre has introduced a “Stay Safe” indicator in the Content Services for Lodging APIs for properties that have implemented new standards based on guidelines provided by the CDC and AHLA. Fill out the excel template available here and upload it in the online form located here to have your hotels flagged as ‘Stay Safe’ properties in the Sabre GDS. (Note: The examples listed on the online form are mere recommendations; if you’ve taken hygiene measures completely different from the list you can still select ‘Yes’) In addition to the “Stay Safe” indicator, we also recommend updating the following in SynXis CR to ensure all users can access your most up-to-date policies and procedures. Making these changes in the CRS will assure information pushes to all the GDSs you connect to:

• Setup > Channels > GDS > Marketing Messages
• Setup > Data Management > Descriptions > Property Description Typical
• Room and Rate descriptions can also be updated

You should post information about your new safety policies and procedures on your website as well as in the custom content areas of your booking engine, to ensure your direct bookers that their health and safety is the top priority at your properties. Additionally, you should also update the following in the Sabre GDS to ensure all users can access your most up-to-date policies and procedures.

• DRS Pages (applicable only to private label chains) – Add a new page in the Sabre Central portal for each brand relating to hygiene and enhanced cleaning policies
• Local Landmark (known as the HOT/HOD in the eHotels GUI) – An ideal field to communicate some cleaning accreditation or information relating to additional steps taken for additional cleaning and hygiene measures.
• Property Description – Descriptive text field where you can insert a full statement about your cleaning and safety measures; start with a framed header to draw the eye to the text. Example: –Important information– the health of our guests and employees is our top priority. Our housekeeping staff will be taking all necessary precautions to fully sanitize each room between guests. To support social distancing we will be discontinuing all spa related services and limiting our dining options to room service.
• Rate Description – The rate description field can be used to communicate the additional cleaning services at the property

The COVID-19 crisis has accentuated a need for hoteliers to provide peace of mind to their guests; allowing them to sleep comfortably knowing their room has been thoroughly sanitized.  While hotels have always taken providing clean rooms seriously, the above steps to highlight the new cleanliness protocols across channels will provide hoteliers a competitive advantage as the travel and hospitality industry rebounds.