Laptop security fuels use of in-room safes

Hotel & Motel Management, August, 2004 by Bruce Adams

Guestroom safes are becoming more mainstream in the hotel industry because of an overall increased emphasis on security and to offer business travelers protection for their laptop computers.

"Since 9/11, guests and hotels are more security conscious on all levels, and that includes protecting valuables in guestrooms," said Glenn Peacock, director of marketing for Saflok.

"Safes are on the uptick and have been for some time," said Adam Yapkowitz, director of marketing for Onity. "They are more and more mandated by business travelers who want to put their laptops in the safes and by leisure travelers who want them for their wallet and jewelry."

The mandate for in-room safes might come from a hotel company.

"More brands require it as a standard, such as Ritz-Carlton," said Walt Strasser, senior v.p. of sales and marketing for Minibar Systems, which offers the Safe Place brand.

The loss of a business traveler's laptop because of theft could have a devastating effect on the traveler's business.

"The average value claim for a missing laptop is $47,000," said George Oelschig, president of Safemark Systems. "Travelers are carrying items of significant value--the value of information and data on the laptop--that they didn't carry before. Small businesses may lose business and have to lay off employees if they lose their data. Corporate espionage and identity theft also can occur through laptop theft."

More leisure travelers are taking their laptops on vacations to keep up with e-mail and business, said Bob Eamer, regional sales manager for Assa Abloy Hospitality, which manufactures and sells Elsafe safes.

"The traditional safe market--four- and five-star hotels and large resorts--has spread into the midmarket level, and even a few economy hotels are putting in safes," he said.

Bernard Lefebvre, director of lodging sales for North America for Kaba Ilco, said Kaba gets more orders now from midscale and economy properties.

"The price of guestroom safes has come down, making them more affordable to the economy segment, which often is more vulnerable to guestroom theft," Lefebvre said.

Less-expensive safes can be purchased for $125 to $175 per unit, he said.

"Hotel safes are a tough sell because hoteliers want amenities but don't want to pay for them," Strasser said. "Their price sensitivity on safes is high. Sometimes they just want the cheapest safe they can get. They can buy a simple steel box for $100."

Audit trails

Another trend is that most hotel safes sold now have audit-trail capabilities, which allow hotel operators to audit the safe to see when and how it was accessed. This protects the hotel and its employees from false claims, and also can be used to identify internal theft.

"In 1997, about half of the safes we sold were sold with audit trails, but today 98 percent of our safes are sold with audit trails," Eamer said.

Safe companies offer a variety of audit trail information on their digital safes.

"We provide a lot of information to cover any foreseeable circumstance to determine who opened the safe and if it is being operated properly," Eamer said. "We identify by name any staff member who opened a guestroom safe with an electronic handheld unit. There can never be to much information provided by the safe because you never know what the guest will claim."

Some companies offer safes without audit trails.

"A guestroom safe has no value without the audit trail," Lefebvre said. "With a safe controlled by a hard key, guests can argue that something disappeared from their safe and you can't disprove their claim."

He said Kaba Ilco only sells electronic safes with audit trails to hotels.

Minibar Systems offers a design that incorporates a minibar and a safe in a cabinet. The online safe communicates through the minibar channel, Strasser said.

"With the online safe, if somebody checks out and leaves the safe locked, we can notify the hotel ahead of time so they can be sure the safe is unlocked before the next guest checks in," he said.

Saflok's radio-frequency technology allows hotels to put a fee-for-service model back into play.

"The safe transmits a message to a host personal computer when the safe is used and a charge gets posted to the guest's room," said Ernie Mitchell, director of engineering for Saflok. "It is all automated and there is no manual accounting."

The radio-frequency technology is more expensive, but also offers a potential payback.

"When the door locks are networked by an RF solution, we will be able to add the safes and other nodes--such as minibars and thermostats--to that and create a smart room," Mitchell said.

New models

Several manufacturers recently introduced new safes to the hotel industry.

Elsafe introduced its Xtra series, which offers a choice of two models at more affordable prices, during the Hospitality Industry Technology Exhibition & Conference in Dallas in June.

"The travel patterns of the corporate traveler have shifted over the past few years, with a majority now staying in three-star properties," said Christian Wee, Elsafe's area sales manager for Europe, Middle East and Africa. "As the profile of a property's average guest changes, their in-room safe needs change.