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10 Questions Most Companies Never Ask About Their Merchant Statements And What the Answers Could Be Costing You
CSRSI • The Payment Advisors • (866) 462-7774 • CSRSI.com • Jensen Beach, Florida 34957 •
10 Questions Most Companies Never Ask AboutTheir Merchant Statements And What the Answers Could Be Costing You
If you are like most hotel and hospitality merchants handling credit cards, you just check your monthly merchant statement to see if the net balance matches your bank deposit. ...
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The history of self-service technology — where electronic, generally computer-dependent devices enable customers to do for themselves that which otherwise would require staff — is short but rich. By Jacob Bennett, Contributing writer, The ATM in the parking lot, with its warm screen inviting users to insert Kiosk Marketplace their cards whether the sun was bearing down on it or its light was the only illumination to be seen at 3:00 a.m. Pay-at-the-pump gas stations, where drivers learned that ...
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IEEE 802.11n is a next generation wireless technology that delivers spectacular improvements in the reliability, speed, and range of 802.11 communications. Delivering about 6 times the data rate and 2-5 times the throughput of 802.11a/g with substantial improvements in network coverage and connection quality, 802.11n is expected to replace wired Ethernet as the dominant local area network technology of the future. This white paper examines the operation of current generation wireless LANs, ...
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If a quick Google search is any indication, then security and cost are the top concerns regarding wireless LAN purchases, and reliability is an afterthought. Searching “Wireless network” and “security” garners 4,740,000 hits. “Wireless network” and “cost” – 4,150,000 hits. But Googling “wireless network” and “reliability” results in a comparatively paltry 931,000 hits – approximately 80% fewer.! This would seem to indicate that while IT managers are considering Wireless LANs as a feasible ...
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Companies that cater to the hospitality needs of businesses and individuals such as hotels, convention facilities, food services, travel services and others, have been rapidly deploying new services and applications over the Internet to provide more convenient registration, travel arrangements, high-speed Internet access to guests, facilitate the purchasing of services, and to improve many other aspects of daily operations. These businesses are realizing the many benefits of using the Internet ...
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A New Era in Designing and Managing the Wireless Network
What organizations need to know about designing, deploying, monitoring and managing high-speed wireless networks
More and more organizations today are discovering the benefits of trusted wireless communications networks, including integrated indoor/outdoor networking, greater operational agility and exceptional cost effectiveness. At the same time, they’re discovering there are major differences between wired and wireless technologies, ...
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Economies ebb and flow like the tides. Our businesses and profits bob along on those ebbs and flows. Over the past 5 years, the hotel industry has risen on this surging tide. As a result, we forgot the last ebb and the lessons learned after it. We forgot the quick race to the bottom on rates and profits. We assumed that the rising flow of profits would last and continue to grow.
Yet, here we are again, with the global economy in a free fall. One would hope that hoteliers had learned their ...
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Marketing and Sales: How toAlignTeams andAccelerateTime to Revenue
Marketing technology transforms customer-facing processes into a buyer-centric sales approach.
The Relationship Between Marketing and Sales In today’s economic crisis, business-to-business (B2B) company survival depends more than ever on the ability to generate qualified sales leads and effectively turn those leads into purchase orders. Marketing and Sales organizations are under pressure to get results, even as teams are ...
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The following scenario is a real world situation from a full service property in New England. It is not atypical and is presented to put your High Definition (HD) television and services requirements into perspective.
October 2003 - Minor upgrade to PPV system requires assessment of the television signal distribution system to accommodate additional bandwidth. Additional amplification installed to allow operation but quality suffers somewhat. Property advised to make sure this is addressed ...
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The desire to lower costs and improve communication efficiency leads many in hospitality management to consider migrating to VoIP.
However, most hotels are wired for analog telephony and have analog phones in their guest rooms and offices. Connecting hundreds of analog phones to Asterisk has been a major obstacle in the deployment of Asterisk-based solutions in hotels. Using FXS PCI cards limits the number of ports and therefore does not suit hotel requirements.
This white paper documents ...
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Innovative RFID Solutions for the Protection and Conservation of Cultural Property
ArtVaultTM – Protecting Your Most Valuable Assets
· Overhead door or floor- mounted portal containing RFID readers and antennas · Touch screen workstation · Secured Access Control utilizing magnetic door locking system · Photo eye presence detector · Light stack and/or siren alarms · 50 RFID Tags · Permanent chain of custody record data base. · Handheld RFID reader · Zonal RFID coverage within storage vault ...
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Managing Information More Intelligently through the use of Amadeus Revenue Management System
Premier Inn, the UK's largest and fastest growing hotel chain with 574 budget hotels, has recently reached a milestone of 40,000 rooms across its UK properties. Operating on a static differentiated pricing structure, Premier Inn rooms are offered at the same rate, which is adjusted to reflect demand based on day of week, seasonality and individual hotel's local events calendar.
Premier Inn operated a ...
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Andrews Distributing Delivers Flawless Customer Experience with Zebra® Printers, Motorola® Handhelds
Printers Outperform Competition in Demanding Delivery Environments About Andrews Distributing Beginning as a South Texas beverage distributor more than three decades ago, Andrews Distributing is one of the most successful beer wholesalers in the country. With seven locations, it currently serves communities throughout North and South Texas. Growth, combined with a unique company culture, earned ...
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With company valuations in the dumpster and credit markets tight, the eco- nomic crisis has forced hard looks at revenue sources and spending across the board. The economy aside, old ways of doing business are continuously chal- lenged by competitors with innovative business models enabled by the inter- net.
These and other socio-economic trends are pressuring finance teams every- where to make planning systems more immediate and responsive. The old way of thinking—you run a company through ...
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04 February 2010 8:30 AM By Patrick Mayock Associate News Editor patrick@hotelnewsnow.com
REPORT FROM THE U.S.—As self-service technology becomes more popular in everyday life, hotel check-in kiosks increasingly are being seen as viable alternatives—but not replacements—to traditional front-desk interaction. At Hyatt Place hotels, for example, guests who use the technology often do so with the lobby associate by their side, facilitating a more personal experience that the barrier of a ...
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Software as a Service Back to Basics: What is billing?
It is a generally accepted fact that cash flow is a good thing for a business. Yet few companies truly consider the value of optimizing all business processes that get cash “in the door”.
For the purposes of this best practices examination, billing is defined as “the complete business process that manages the logical activities of payment processing while integrating key customer management activities.” This broader-than-normal definition ...
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Automating the Marketing Value Chain Why it Is Internally Critical to Companies and Externally Essential for Customers
Why it Is Internally Critical to Companies and Externally Essential for Customers
If you're living it, you know the cruel reality well: the practice of marketing has sim- ply become far too cumbersome. It is not unusual for a company's marketing efforts to require coordination among multiple internal functional areas, depart- ments and business units; across many geographies; ...
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Understanding SmartCP Autosensing Side Inputs & USB Media AutoPlay Settings
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Keeping perspective on the multitude of macroeconomic factors impacting consumers and the industry is more important than ever. The current business environment is one of the most competitive and complex in recent times — the more you know, the better prepared you will be to manage your ADR and to be smart about the best ways to maintain the long range view. By understanding supply, currency fluctuations, group and corporate travel and the airline industry we will all gain a more holistic ...
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too many needs…too few resources! the amount of information and services demanded from today’s public safety officials has increased significantly over the past few years, while operational budgets and staffing have decreased or remained flat. With more homeland Security responsibilities, a proliferation of natural disasters and an increase in crime, resources have been stretched nearly to the breaking point. as a result, public safety agencies are turning to technology to help close the ...
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For IT organizations, a solid Business Continuity plan should focus not only on data and application protection, but also on WAN and Internet resiliency that are necessary to ensure continuous access to data and applications delivered over the Internet in the event of a disruption or disaster. ISP outages are a reality today, and they will certainly continue into the future, and the integrity of a business cannot be left only in the hands of third-party ISPs.
Multi-homing, or WAN/ISP link ...
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Throughout the economic downturn of 2008 and 2009, which dramatically impacted IT service spending, the Business Intelligence (BI) market remained a bright spot. In fact, many vendors experienced double-digit or even triple-digit growth of BI-related services in 2009, while experiencing revenue declines through the remainder of their portfolios.
Challenging economic times have created the need for improved transparency across business functions, allowing vendors and end-users to identify areas ...
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In today’s economy, business intelligence should not be considered a luxury that hotels can defer when times get rough. Rather, it should be viewed as an essential tool for protecting market share, identifying unproductive rate strategies, and uncovering new revenue opportunities. Whatever your property type, if you are not leveraging these tools, it will cost you.
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This paper shows how two products, Microsoft® Office and Microsoft SharePoint®, contribute to the powerful architectural design of the Microsoft Business Productivity Infrastructure (BPI). The BPI stack approach suggests that only by thinking at a capability level (for example, “What do users want to do?‖), and then adding the right aspects of capability in each place (client, server, and services), can we create desktop applications that also deliver rich server and services capabilities to ...
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Product Used: RTSuite Allocator | Since: 2007
“The installation of RTAllocator Pro allows the hotel to update rates and inventory to all channels instantly, in one go, without the tedious manual process of having to access each individual extranet – a God send!” - David Miller, Managing Director and Owner.
Saving Valuable Time Increasing RevPar Easing Inventory Burden
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“If a hotel is serious about making the most of online sales, a piece of software such as RTChannelManager Pro is crucial to its success. As well as saving a considerable amount of time, more importantly perhaps, this software allows us to make considered decisions about our rates.” - Magda Lepak, Reservations Supervisor.
Saving Valuable Time Removing Rate Errors Easing Inventory Burden
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Catapulting Event Management into a new world…Naked Conferencing
The evolution of Event Management is growing at an inevitably rapid rate; however the industry is being left behind with insufficient innovative operating equipment to cater to its demands.
“With trends and preferences evolving we were challenged by the industry to create quality operating systems that encompass all essential aspects of durability, ease of use, Green star rating, flexibility and style.” Nick Polidoros, Director ...
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More than seven in ten NEXTgen travelers consider the ability to check the lowest available fares or rates (77%), photos of the hotel/resort (73%) and guarantees of the lowest available fares or rates (72%) influential web site features when making decisions about travel destination or services. What’s more, the majority of NEXTgen travelers check last minute air, hotel and car rental availability (55%), and schedule and confirm vacation activities in advance of arrival (54%).
Source: ...
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A Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) or Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) System is designed to manage maintenance transactions the same way an Accounting Information Management System manages financial transactions. In the case of maintenance, the transactions are work orders instead of invoices. Inventory is the maintenance work backlog and spare parts instead of the raw material used in manufacturing.
Accurate information is critical to making decisions that ensure the ...
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COLLABORATIVE DEMAND FORECASTING: A TOOL FOR SURVIVAL
One-number forecasting, coupled with performance measurement, reduces costly surprises
In a demand-driven environment where the focus is on meeting customer expectations, accurate demand forecasting is only achieved when a collaborative process integrates various forecasting systems. By adding performance analytics to measure the iterative plan and understand trends, along with exception processing to generate alerts, companies can become ...
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Across the United States, a major awakening is occurring among consumers. Millions of Americans are now discovering that their new or reissued credit and debit cards (along with other form factors like key fobs and stickers) have an innovative feature: They are contactless-enabled. Using this technology at the point of sale, consumers can pay without swiping their cards through magnetic readers, handing over their cards to the clerk, signing their names or entering their PINs. For consumers, ...
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Enterprising companies around the world are increasingly developing and implementing customer-centric growth strategies, based on deepening relationships with their customers to emphasize long-term satisfaction over short-term sales conversions. With these strategies, the key indicator of success is customer lifetime value, a measurement of the customer’s value over the life of the relationship. Other key metrics include share of wallet, products per customer, average revenue per user (ARPU), ...
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More than 280 million payment card records were breached in 2008 alone,1 and a large percentage of those stolen records were used fraudulently. In fact, the underground economy is teeming with stolen payment card data. Some controls are in place to help card payment processors prevent credit card fraud through increased controls around data and by limiting potential exposure to compromised information records. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS), for example, are widely ...
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WHITE PAPER: DIRECTV® STANDALONE OPERATION IN COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS
The delivery of high-quality digital signals to bars, restaurants, hotel rooms and arenas is a high growth area that many companies are entering. Delivery of digital signals is more complex than the delivery of analog signals. Digital rights management including “authorizations” and license agreements are as important to your success as supplying power or mounting brackets.
The teams at LG Electronics and its U.S. R&D ...
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As part of our mission to increase our customer’s awareness and understanding of emerging issues, opportunities and trends we are offering a Knowledge Series on Distribution. In the first of a three part series, we will identify what distribution is and how it looks in today’s electronic landscape. In the later series, we will focus on ways to effectively manage your distribution channels and maximize profitability.
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When it comes to a data breach, the question is not “if” you will become a target, the question is “when.” Operational preplanning and readiness can control costs, improve customer loyalty and preserve your reputation.
By: By Krista Tedder Product Owner, Risk Management and Fraud Solutions First Data
© 2010 First Data Corporation. All rights reserved. All trademarks, service marks and trade names referenced in this material are the property of their respective owners.
Don’t Wait for a Data ...
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Line managers and finance staffs are frustrated by the inadequacies of spread- sheet based planning systems for delivering useful budgets and rolling fore- casts. A major problem is the disconnect between the operational elements of a business and financial plans. In particular, managers have difficulty forecast- ing headcount and expenses because spreadsheet templates do not contain models that allow them to relate their spending to marketing forecasts or other operating activities. Finance ...
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e-com is an industry leader in delivering enterprise-class WAN data stream management to small, mid- sized, and distributed organizations. Its all-in-one smart gateway appliances and technology solve the problems created when users, applications and threats battle for network resources. By integrating and correlating critical security and application performance functions, our eIDSC products (Internet Data Stream Controller) maximize WAN data flow while reducing network complexity and ...
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Eliminating Paper Paychecks: Best Practices for Rolling Out Electronic Pay Distribution
While many employers are embracing electronic pay distribution systems (EPDS), a poor implementation strategy can threaten the successful migration to electronic payroll. With good planning and adherence to best practices, you can ensure success in your move to paperless payroll.
By: Mark Smith Vice President, Client Services
© 2009 First Data Corporation. All trademarks, service marks and trade names ...
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Watkins Glen Harbor Hotel Watkins Glen, NY The Watkins Glen Harbor Hotel is situated on the south end of Seneca Lake and is fast becoming Watkins Glen’s first choice for upscale accommodations in the heart of the Finger Lakes Wine Region.
EscapeWire Solutions delivered a customized, multi-faceted installation that included:
Digital signage solution including system, installation and template design
• Satellite TV with HD televisions in a variety of locations: – HD programming in ...
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Like any other commercial enterprise, the hospitality industry is largely driven by operating margins. While hotels can be largely categorized as a function of the services (and levels of services) they provide to their guests, the fact remains that the successful hotelier is focused on achieving the critical balance between guest comfort, offered services, operating margins, and brand awareness, and on maintaining this balance in the long-term.
In fact, according to the Environmental ...
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The Trusted Technology Provider for Your Business
Energy Management in the Hospitality Industry
Introduction The hospitality industry, like any other commercial enterprise, is largely driven by operating margins. While hotels can be largely categorized as a function of the services (and levels of services) they provide to their guests, the fact remains that the successful hotelier is focused on achieving the critical balance between guest comfort, offered services, operating margins, and ...
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Hotel Management companies that want to focus on their core business, rather than technologies, come to EscapeWire Solutions. Nationwide, EscapeWire takes the complexity out of technology providing end-to-end IT and Multimedia solutions.
The management company for this Candlewood Suites required diverse technologies to be implemented in a short window of time, and felt confident turning to EscapeWire, an experienced, efficient solution provider.
Candlewood needed overall Technology ...
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More than 70% of companies use Excel® as their principal interface for budgets and forecasting. Many of these companies are in “Excel Hell”, a continuing state of inefficiency and disruption related to using Excel for collaborative planning. The spreadsheet symptoms of Excel Hell are broken formulas, con- solidations that choke, and wrong numbers. The organizational symptoms are inefficiency, frustration and decisions based on bad information.
For the strategic CFO who needs better answers and ...
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Exploding the Myth that Unlicensed Spectrum Means Unreliable Service
An examination of how a growing number of operators are designing reliability into broadband networks using unlicensed frequencies.
For many wireless broadband network operators, the term “unlicensed reliability” is seen as an oxymoron. For many, the idea of building a high-speed network in the unlicensed band isn’t a good one. A great deal has been said about crowded frequencies, self-interference and costly network rips. ...
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Eyes on the Street: How Wireless Video Solutions are Transforming Public Safety.
More and more government and public safety agencies the world-over are using high-speed wireless video networks to enhance officer safety, save lives, increase effectiveness and solve budget dilemmas.
Veteran police officers will tell you there’s nothing quite like feet or tires on the street for increasing public safety. Patrolling, whether by foot or car, allows officers to see exactly what’s happening in an ...
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Federal Payroll Information effective January 1st, 2008
This information was pulled from the Federal Government's Circular E, Employer's Tax Guide. Please set this up in your Payroll Executive Menu before you run your first payroll for 2008 (assuming you have closed the 2007 payroll year).
Under Payroll Utilities Menu in the Special Company Maintenance
Change Employee Social Security Wage Limit to: $ 102,000.00 6.20% Change Employer Social Security Wage Limit to: $ 102,000.00 6.20%
Change ...
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Federal Payroll Information effective January 1st, 2009
This information was pulled from the Federal Government's Circular E, Employer's Tax Guide. Please set this up in your Payroll Executive Menu before you run your first payroll for 2009 (assuming you have closed the 2008 payroll year).
Under Payroll Utilities Menu in the Special Company Maintenance
Change Employee Social Security Wage Limit to: $ 106,800.00 6.20% Change Employer Social Security Wage Limit to: $ 106,800.00 6.20%
Change ...
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Why should you consider Med-Alert International (MIC) for your OSHA Compliance and Safety Training?
MIC has made available to the hospitality industry the most potent, cost effective, liability free solution to providing an effective “First Person Response” by employees to a victim of a medical emergency, while waiting for advanced personnel to arrive on the scene. We are a turnkey operation for OSHA Compliance / Safety Training and we are the only company in the USA offering its clients three ...
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Five Tips to Better Digital Customer Conversations
Use tips in Behavior-based Brand Interactions for True 1-to-1 Marketing
Today’s changing marketplace increasingly gives consumers control over their brand relationships, including the terms of engagement. Emboldened and empowered by technology, consumers voice their preferences to you, the marketer. They tell you – implicitly and explicitly -- where, when, what, and how often they are willing to engage with your brand. Perceptive marketers ...
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Full-Pattern Length of Stay (FPLOS) pricing is the new buzz word for the hotel industry. FPLOS presents a unique price point based on the arrival date and length of stay of the query, uniformly assigned to each date of the query. Some brands have wholly embraced the concept and believe FPLOS is the way to run a hotel. Yet at closer examination, does FPLOS actually deliver on its promise—or is it the equivalent of Wall Street risk management models (great in the good times) and an unmitigated ...
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GEAR UP FOR THE TRANSITION TO ALL-DIGITAL TELEVISION
The transition of the U.S. television broadcast system from analog to digital is rapidly approaching. All full-power TV stations will be required to transmit digital signals exclusively after February 17, 2009. On the surface, this government mandate to eliminate analog television broadcasting sounds like a scary proposition that could require massive changes. However, when you review the requirements on a case-by-case basis you find that, ...
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Understanding Guest menu item controls
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An increasingly common technical strategy used in the commercial and industrial sectors to provide enhanced dehumidification is an air-to-air heat exchanger wrapped around a cooling coil. The cooling coil may be DX, chilled water, or brine. Because it's exposed to a higher dry bulb temperature, the upstream heat exchanger will absorb BTU's off the downstream heat exchanger into the lower temperature air. Because these systems reduce the Sensible Heat Ratio (SHR) of the equipment to more closely ...
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Hosted VoIP PBX Solution Presents Compelling VocalocityPBX Communications Option for Micro Enterprise Market
No fuss, affordable approach delivers value, big company image
1. Market Overview and Outlook 2. Making the Switch to VoIP 3. Struggles of a Small Business Road Warrior 4. Plug & Play IP PBX 5. The Multilocational Micro Enterprise 6. Peace of Mind 7. The Bottom Line
At one time, safety features such as anti-lock brakes, air bags, traction and vehicle stability control were reserved ...
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Hotel Concepts' IDPMS Increases Revenue and Promotes Growth for Coast Hotels & Resorts
In today’s hospitality industry, technology is as much a part of the guest experience as a mint on the pillow. So, when the management team at Coast Hotels & Resorts, a Vancouver-based boutique chain, decided to enhance the guest experience, they identified having a uniform technology platform throughout their corporate-owned and franchised properties as a critical component in their long-term strategic ...
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A well established fact is that improved forecast accuracy leads to many downstream improvements not only in operations, but in a variety of business areas such as customer service and asset management. This white paper concerns itself with the improvement of forecasts that support the management of a company's supply chain. Inevitability, this leads to a focus on improving the product stocking levels or SKU forecast which drives procurement and manufacturing planning. These effects can even be ...
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by Dr. Suhas Patil Chairman & CEO, Cradle Technologies
The internet and wireless broadband infrastructure is becoming robust enough to permit excellent remote video surveillance. Stage is set for evolution of the next generation of video surveillance system in the form of Networked Video Surveillance System (NVSS). The ability to remotely monitor facilities and business operations at any time and from any location would not only give enhanced ability to improve security, but will also allow ...
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Over the past decade, hospitality and food service companies have spent millions of dollars on technology systems to optimize business processes. These systems generate enormous amounts of transactional data and provide detailed information for historical reporting and daily audit procedures. However, senior executives and operational managers are now asking for enterprise reports that correlate data from distributed systems across multiple periods .
From conversations with customers, ...
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ImprovIng Agent effIcIency And effectIveness Leveraging today’s technology to bring out the highest levels of agent productivity
CONTENTS ExEcutivE Summary ........................................ ........................................ ............ 3 introduction: What’S Wrong With today’S contact cEntEr?.................... 3 gEt ProductivE QuickEr ........................................ ........................................ ..... 4 - it all StartS With thE ...
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If you do not currently offer dynamic currency conversion (DCC) to your international customers, you may be missing an opportunity to improve customer satisfaction and earn extra income.
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Integrating actuals into the planning cycle is usually a zoo. Financial and operating results are spread across multiple databases. Actual results and plan detail are at different levels. Lack of underlying volumes and rates make meaningful causal analysis difficult. You want apples to apples. Too often you get fruit salad.
With today's more intensive focus on driver based planning and key performance indicators, this timely white paper will help management and FP&A staff think through the ...
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The hospitality industry has never been a static business environment. Over the last 18 months, it has seen unprecedented change.
But the turbulent economic conditions of the last 18 months have simply brought into focus the fundamental changes the industry has experienced throughout the last decade. Satisfying guests, property owners, property developers, shareholders and staff has become steadily more complex. So too, has selling and delivering services in emerging markets, adapting swiftly ...
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A unified communications profile and portal, wherever you go
The ability to transfer registration of an IP phone extension among local and remote devices—with portability of all associated features, preferences and privileges—can redefine the economics and productivity benefits of your business communications system.
By Ericson Abing Senior Project Manager, IP Telephony Solutions Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc. Telecommunication Systems Division
IP User Mobility— A unified ...
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Everyone has heard the saying that men are from Mars and women are from Venus. When it comes to implementing a global human re- source management system (HRMS), the same could be said for an organization’s in- formation technology and human resource departments.
IT and HR professionals should heed the advice of Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus author John Gray and learn how to communicate more effective- ly to ensure the needs of each are taken into consideration and that an ...
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It's common knowledge that a computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) is helpful for organizing and tracking maintenance activities and expenses, and almost essential for gathering the data needed to advance to reliability-centered maintenance. Virtually all but the smallest of facilities are using some form of software-based maintenance recordkeeping.
But systems range widely in cost, capabilities and level of integration with business systems. Does your system do what it should to ...
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Over the past few decades, bar code scanning has become the data capture technology of choice, enhancing processes in virtually every industry and market. Low-cost scanning solutions improve performance and reliability in a wide range of enterprise activities, and reap tremendous business benets, including increased worker productivity, improved task efciency, and reduced operational costs.
As scanning technology evolves and new bar code symbologies appear, industries have more choices in data ...
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Internet uptime for organizations has become critical in the past decade, and failures and saturation are the two key issues that must be dealt with in this context. Solutions have evolved over the years to provide the ability to manage multiple ISPs concurrently in many forms, delivering mixed results depending on the approach. This document outlines Elfiq’s innovative Layer-2 integration model that meets and exceeds organizational requirements for maximum uptime and complements the “Building ...
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About humidity, what is it exactly? Humidity refers to the amount of water vapor (moisture) suspended in air. It is measured as Percent Relative Humidity (%RH) or the percentage of water vapor that can possibly be contained in air, at its present temperature. Air at 0%RH is completely dry and free of moisture; air at 100%RH contains all the moisture it can possibly hold at its present temperature and will be exhibited as condensation, fog or rain. The amount or volume of water vapor that can be ...
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The ubiquitous card swipe has been a familiar feature of commerce for decades. For consumers, it’s a daily activity that’s become part of our modern culture and shopping routine. According to a 2008 study by Hitachi Consulting and BAI, payment card transactions now comprise over 63 percent of in-store purchases—a figure that has risen steadily over the past decade and is expected to continue to increase.1 Whether we are swiping our card at a gas station, grocery store or specialty retailer, we ...
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WHITE PaPEr Wi4 Fixed: Point-to-Point Wireless Broadband Solutions
ConTEnTS Pg Section 3 Introduction 4 a License Protects Me from Interference 5 Licensed-band systems deliver better performance 5 Licensed vendors provide better customer service 5 Conclusion
Introduction although licensed- and unlicensed-band equipment can operate cooperatively to serve the wide variety of applications for wireless communications, there has been a long-standing debate over which is the better technology. Now ...
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The term Web 2.0 is commonly used to describe the changing trends in the use of the Internet. Web 2.0 innovations have resulted in adoption of the internet “as a platform that is spanning all connected devices; Web 2.0 applications are those that make the most of the intrinsic advantages of the platform: particularly delivering software as a continually‐updated service that gets better the more people who use it” (http://radar.oreilly.com by Tim O'Reilly, 2005) and
“going beyond the page ...
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It seems like every hotel company today promises excellent customer service, but travelers know that real customer service means attentive hotel staff who understand each guest’s personalized wants and needs. True customization is what sets excellent hotels apart from those that merely claim excellence.
Denver-based Magnolia Hotels understands that the best way for a small chain to stand out from the crowd is to offer an exceptional level of guest attentiveness—the kind that can only be ...
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By: Shafiq Lokhandwala CEO- NuView Systems
The statistics are staggering. Total U.S. job losses of 600,000 in January, followed by 651,000 jobs lost in February. As the economy continues its downward spiral, the employment market still hasn't seen the end to job shedding yet. Unemployment peaks after the economy has reached its bottom - not before. Unfortunately, companies will need to continue to downsize and the unemployment rate is predicted to rise close to 9 percent by August of 2009 or ...
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This threat of malware is very real. Private information at financial institutions is at risk without the proper network security measures. Unfortunately, a majority of anti-virus programs and network firewalls cannot protect against intrusion risks beyond viruses and Trojan worms. Organizations have to be smarter than the criminals they’re up against.
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Manage Contractual Obligations The Right Way
Most businesses today view contracts and contract management as a file storage of paper documents, from file cabinets, to expensive document management systems. Their contracts and their contractual obligations are not necessarily integrated into business operations. At best, most have manual procedures and document stores to track expirations dates with maybe some technology-assisted alert mechanisms. But, expiration dates or renewal dates are only ...
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One of the essential features in a hotel environment is the "message waiting" light. Hotel telephone sets are often provided with such a light indicating that a message is waiting in the guest’s mailbox. Astribank is the only Asterisk FXS solution that supports this feature.
This white paper describes how to activate the function in your telephony system.
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Mitigate Business Risks Via Tighter Contract Management Controls
With the typical Fortune 1000 company maintaining an estimated 20,000 to 40,000 active contracts at any given time, it’s virtually impossible to get an accurate assessment of risk exposure without an enterprise-wide system to manage an active contract portfolio. Contracts typically contain multiple terms and conditions that trigger cost penalties and potential liabilities, while Sarbanes-Oxley and other compliance initiatives ...
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How Mobile Printers Drive Efficiency Throughout the Supply Chain
Copyrights ©2009 ZIH Corp. All product names and numbers are Zebra trademarks, and Zebra and the Zebra head graphic are registered trademarks of ZIH Corp. All rights reserved. Bluetooth is a registered trademark of Bluetooth SIG, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Unauthorized reproduction of this document or the software in the label printer may result in imprisonment of up to one year and ...
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performance level for other applications because of variability in application design, data and computing environment.
ote: While the performance results described are representative of a large, complex model running on relatively low-spec hardware, we cannot guarantee a particula
en ec Ses application will provide a realistic view of what customers can expect as they consider distributed computing alternativ
e myriad factors that may influence how an application performs, it is felt that a ...
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The first indoor golf entertainment center of its kind. The facility offers four public and four private golf simulators, high end food and beverage service, multiple high definition TVs of all sizes and fully equipped private conference facilities.
EscapeWire Solutions delivered a customized, multi-faceted installation that included:
• Facility-wide sound system with multiple speakers
• Satellite TV with over 20 HD televisions in a variety of sizes: – HD projector with 133” screen – ...
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As organizations better refine their product and service development processes, they increasingly turn their attention to what occurs at the front end. The old adage “garbage in, garbage out” is so true in product development. Getting better ideas and then taking them through an efficient and effective process can only improve the outputs and outcomes of the entire product or service development effort.
What are best-practice organizations doing to enhance their performance in the early stages ...
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No Umbrella Required - Efficient Contract Lifecycle Management
Contract Lifecycle Management is a lot like a rainstorm. When it’s just a sprinkle, it’s easy enough to keep track of each individual contract. But what happens when the drizzle becomes a deluge, and contracts begin falling into different departments and different locations simultaneously?
Contract lifecycle management brings order to the chaos by standardizing your current process and better organizing your contract information. ...
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Six Easy Guidelines On How To Make Your Own Extremely Professional Digital Video
With video and social media sites like Triporia, TravelTribe and Facebook springing up everywhere, more and more of people are making web videos. This is an ideal opportunity to showcase your lodge, boutique hotel, Inn, Villa or B&B. You can host them on your own website, download them online or distribute them as DVDs. An amateur or poorly produced video is likely to do you more damage than good. You want to ...
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With today’s higher ventilation requirements and more efecient buildings, moisture becomes a higher percentage of the total load that a mixed air handling unit must handle. What happens? Both the supply air dry bulb temperature and sup- ply air dewpoint rise, reducing the supply air’s sensible cooling capacity and resulting in a higher indoor relative humidity. Plus, cooling must be provided at all times so wet untreated air won’t be introduced into the space. The solution is to have dedicated ...
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Wrap around heat pipes are air-to-air heat exchangers that are installed in the airstream upstream and downstream of a cooling coil to deliberately reduce the Sensible Heat Ratio (SHR) below a standard air conditioning system’s .75. Depend- ing on the application, they’re also used to replace all or part of the necessary reheat in a system to minimize energy usage. The energy ramications are especially powerful because the energy savings occur not just on the reheating side but also the cooling ...
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A Whitepaper for Independent Software Vendors (ISVs)
Overcoming the Transaction Management Challenges in the On-Demand Services Market
Overcoming the Transaction Management White Paper Challenges in the On-Demand Services Market
Executive Overview For many years, economists have been suggesting that the world is moving from a manufacturing to a services economy. In recent years, it would be more accurate to say that we have been moving from a product-centric to an on-demand services economy. ...
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In 1999, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued a landmark report entitled “To Err is Human,” that described the prevalence of widespread and often preventable medical errors throughout the U.S. healthcare industry. The IOM report stated that preventable medical errors cause up to 98,000 deaths and 770,000 adverse events in the U.S. each year. Since the IOM Report was published, subsequent industry evidence has revealed that the problem not only persists—it appears to be getting worse. In fact, ...
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Address supplier payment errors and attain real dollar savings
Business Case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Is it a significant issue? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Sources of Lost Profits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...
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BPM (business performance management) systems are gaining traction in Fortune 1000 companies. BPM integrates actuals, plan and business intelli- gence information from multiple users and data sources, helping C level ex- ecutives better understand operations and anticipate problems and opportuni- ties. Such systems, however, do very little for business units at lower levels whose requirements for planning, reporting and analysis are typically at dif- ferent levels and have modeling requirements ...
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Revenue and Productivity Management Solution for Hotel- and Restaurant Operation
- innovation » experience » value » results
”Our mission is to increase customers' bottom-line by simplifying their daily revenue and productivity management process.
Give us 45 minutes of your time and we will reveal to you how.
” We have reduced the labour costs by 95.000 Euros since …
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Adding mobility to enterprise voice communications can be the key to unlocking business productivity and responsiveness. Whether addressing production problems, planning promotions or responding to customer requests, enterprises require that associates be able to move about freely and still be accessible at a moment’s notice. Those communications links must extend from the office to the shop floor and out to the loading dock.
The Webtorials 2008 State of the WLAN Report indicates that 36% of ...
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In today’s tempestuous economy, with demand and hotel occupancies declining, hoteliers are looking for strategies to drive demand for their hotel. Many use discounting as their sole strategy for maintaining occupancy. What they find, however, is that cutting prices alone does not drive new demand; it only diminishes the return on existing demand. What they should be focused on is capturing more of the demand that is already there—that is, gaining market share from the competition. Price is ...
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PRO:IDIOM® DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT SYSTEM Copy-Protection Technology Assures Rapid Commercial HDTV Deployment
The “Pro:Idiom” digital technology platform was developed to provide hospitality and healthcare markets with a robust, highly secure Digital Rights Management (DRM) system. DRM ensures rapid, broad deployment of high-definition television (HDTV) and other high-value digital content to hotels and health care facilities. The development effort began four years ago when LG Electronics, ...
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Protecting Credit Card Data: How to Achieve PCI Compliance
These days, anyone who owns a credit card is familiar with the problem of identity theft, in which technology-savvy thieves extract customer credit and debit card information from unsecured databases. It’s a problem that affects everyone in the retail supply chain — the payment card companies, the banks, the retailers, and the individual customers whose identities are compromised. And while there are many ways to implement network ...
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Rate Optimization: Enhancing Your Hotel’s Pricing Strategy
For many hotels, developing effective pricing strategies remains a complex issue for revenue managers. Their goal, ultimately, is to maximize company- wide revenue and profits while building strong hotel partner relationships within their marketplace. The emergence of rate optimization has made strides to demystify pricing practices and help revenue managers understand the demand characteristics of their products, understand the price ...
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Estimates on counterfeit trade exceed two hundred billion dollars (US). And inspections across the world cost billions, yet only a very few shipments are actually inspected. This issue has particularly impacted the vital Life Sciences Supply Chain. This article discusses some solutions that are at hand to reduce illicit trade and ensure a safe and secure supply of pharmaceuticals.
The past decade has seen an increase in the level of global trade, and along with it, the unintended consequences ...
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Although the hotel industry has been strong in recent years, it is not immune to a soft economy. Today’s declining occupancies reflect declining demand. In response, some hotels are panicking and slashing rates in the belief that deep discounts are needed to defend market share. But a recession is no grounds for panic pricing. Instead, hotels should use a strategy of “responsible dis- counting,” avoiding price wars with competitors, seeking smart ways to maintain rate value, and striving to ...
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Many companies are facing the toughest economic landscape in generations . Driven by the housing market landslide and seizure of the global credit markets, economies the world over have slipped into retrenchment and recession . Even the most positive economic forecasts predict continued retraction through 2009, with best-case scenarios describing a slow-but-steady recovery for 2010 and beyond .
In the face of those realities, organizations are seeking the proactive measures needed to navigate ...
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Creating the end-to-end, top-to-bottom supply chain is a vision in implementation for many supply chain managers. It requires responsive real-time visual smart solutions. Business capabilities in customer service, supply chain, merchandising and logistics are but a few processes that will be enabled by RFID. But if you limit your definition of RFID to compliance— tags only—and don't use it to improve your business processes, your enterprise will not gain tangible benefits, beyond ...
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Efficiency improvements remain an important focus for many retailers and suppliers. However, once efficiency improvements have been made, these will inevitably become industry norms and hence not an opportunity for continually creating competitive advantage in the marketplace. Category Management, on the other hand, is directed at the more consumer-oriented strategies. Certainly the most compelling argument for Category Management is that while efficiencies in the supply chain are likely to go ...
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IN THE FAST LANE: Sales & Operations Planning
Sales and operations planning is essential for strategy execution, especially for organizations with large numbers of SKUs or unique items. Trends in the competitive landscape such as the rapid evolution of products, decreasing average product lifecycle times, product manufacturing agility, increasing lead-time for critical components, customer centric product specifications and increasing product configurations are forcing organizations to plan at ...
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Copyrights ©2008 ZIH Corp. ZebraLink, ZebraDesigner and ZebraNet are Zebra trademarks, and Zebra, the Zebra head graphic and ZPL are registered trademarks of ZIH Corp. All rights reserved. Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its affiliates. Windows is a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
Assessing the Impact of Inefficient ...
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The Industry's Best Retail Kiosk Application of 2003
The Problem The Colorado ski industry presented an interesting challenge and opportunity to improve the distribution of lift tickets to skiers and snowboarders. The `pain' was evident:
To the resort… Ski resorts offer discounted lift tickets to their customers at retail locations throughout the Denver Front-Range area and I-70 corridor leading from Denver to the resorts' Rocky Mountain locations. Previously, resorts would pre-print ...
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Understanding SmartGuide feature on Philips commercial televisions.
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Understanding SmartPower3 with AutoSense, ESP & Low Power Standby Settings
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Understanding SmartWindow feature on Philips commercial televisions.
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SpectrumNG has many unique and innovative ideas behind its conception and implementation. It combines decades of experience in the industry with the latest technology to produce a software suite that is paralleled by none.
SpectrumNG can run as easily on one desktop machine as it can run in an enterprise-wide configuration. It employs a flexible configuration paradigm and state of the art remoting technology that allows it to stretch as little or as far as necessary.
In a multi-user ...
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The statistics are clear that within the US customers want convenience and reflect that in their dining habits. USA Today found that the average American ate 81 meals inside restaurants, but ordered 127 as to-go or carry-out meals. The National Restaurant Association (NRA) stated that 78% of US households purchased at least one carryout or delivered meal per month. The NRA also stated that 64% of patrons say they would utilize online ordering if it were available. As for restaurants, over 90% ...
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Contact Centers want to provide the highest level of customer service at the lowest possible cost to its organization. Making sure your team is well equipped and informed is an important part of achieving that goal. The key to performance optimization is turning meaningful information into an actionable data item for the Contact Center/NOC. This results in a reduction of operating costs, revenue increases and higher levels of service to the customer.
The purpose of this document is to provide ...
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Three important trends in travel which are being accelerated by the recession
In the summer of 2007, as the first cracks in Wall Street’s mighty financial edifice began to appear, a natural disaster was already well under way on the other side of the United States. Millions of acres of the American West were ablaze in what would turn out to be the second most destructive summer of forest fires since records began in 1960 1. On the other side of the Atlantic, the European Forest Fire ...
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In 2009, executives expect to make fewer, shorter and cheaper trips, and switch from luxury extras in favour of basic efficiency and good service. This is according to a global survey of business travellers commissioned by Amadeus from the Economist Intelligence Unit.
47% of executives surveyed said they will be taking fewer trips in the next twelve months, and over a quarter (28%) expect to be downgraded from 4- and 5-star hotels. 63% of respondents expect their companies to use the ...
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CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP ANALYTICS WHITE PAPER
THE BOTTOM LINE OF CRM: KNOW YOUR CUSTOMER
Customer relationship management (CRM) has become a top priority for companies seeking to gain competitive advantage. However, confusion reigns about exactly what CRM is, how to best implement it, or even what role it should play in enhancing customer interaction. Worse yet, even after investing hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars in CRM systems, most companies are no closer to understanding ...
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The Boutique & Lifestyle segment has emerged through a maze of big brands and frequent guest programs to become
a prominent lodging category, highly sought after by consumers and investors alike. We recently met with FRANCES
KIRADJIAN, Founder & Chair of the BOUTIQUE & LIFESTYLE LODGING ASSOCIATION, who answers some basic
questions and then takes us on an extended tour of the segment.
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BROADMOOR Saves Greenbacks by Going Green with Pillow-Vac Renovation - The Broadmoor, with its initial roots formed in 1918 at the base of the magnificent Rockies in Colorado Springs, Colo., has an aggressive green policy designed to help preserve the environment. One of the many expansive green programs initiated to minimize the effects of its 700- room hotel focuses on pillow renovation.
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In the beginning, there were wires. The traditional wired local area network included a separate voice and data wire for each user, and lots of switches all over the place.
Next came wireless LANs, along with the wireless networking technology known as Wi-Fi. Initially, WLANs were comprised of “thick,” individually managed access points, providing limited coverage areas within the enterprise.
Then came WLAN switches, which simplified network management by enabling centralized control. This ...
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You’re what we would call a Micro Business – under 20 employees, probably not using a PBX telephony system (Private Branch Exchange), and you may have multiple locations. If you do, it’s likely that you have different phone systems at each location and there is no integration across them.
You’ve probably started hearing about VoIP – Voice over Internet Protocol - and are wondering if this might be right for your business. If you lack dedicated IT resources, you may be concerned about not being ...
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In the next decade, trillions of devices will be networked, doing far more than enabling simple communications – they’ll connect industries and enable our lives. This new connected world presents enormous opportunity for service providers. New business models will usher in new ways of reaching new customers and driving new revenue streams that are well beyond the communications, media and entertainment industry. But there are significant changes that must happen, philosophically and ...
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Customer-facing technologies from digital signage to interactive kiosks give businesses the power to pinpoint messages, deepen customer relationships, and deliver more efficient services. Leading brands and innovative retailers are taking advantage of these technologies to enhance the in-store customer experience to drive sales and fuel prots. Done right these technologies help businesses stand out and deliver more. Done wrong these technologies can sap resources, blow budgets, and bury a brand.
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WINTER2009 MARYLAND/DC CONSTRUCTION JOURNAL
The Future Looks Bright for Triple Crown Design & Construction:
Firm Experiences Enormous Growth as Father Begins to Pass Reigns to Son
Triple Crown Design & Construction offers proof that always doing the right thing for your customers can lead to vast rewards. While many of the debt-free firm's prices remain the same as they were more than five years ago, Triple Crown is experiencing exponential growth, doubling its revenue over the last four ...
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We are all used to the finding the right balance concept. Perhaps the time has come to bring the idea of “the right balance” to the forefront when discussing or considering the best approach to deploying HCM / HRMS solutions.
Every day, organizations around the globe respond to the pressing need to effectively manage and support their workforce by trying to implement robust HCM / HRMS solutions at the speed of business. However, the wide range of positive business outcomes expected from ...
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The Vanishing Checkout Lane: Will Today’s Point of Sale Satisfy Tomorrow’s Retail Customers?
The retail point of sale is fundamentally changing. It is moving from traditional checkout lines to wherever the customer may be: shopping on the Internet, walking a store’s aisles, traveling or lounging on the beach. Are you prepared for what this means to capturing and retaining customers?
By: Barry McCarthy General Manager, Mobile Commerce and Point of Sale First Data
© 2009 First Data ...
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August 27th, 2010 10a.m.– 7 p.m. Rio Hotel ‐ Las Vegas www.theledshow.com
Exhibitors at the show are: Color Kinetics, Juno, GE, Lutron, LSI, Cree, LedTronics, Amerlux, Chloride, Hubbell, Cooper, Digital Light, DAK Lighting, Techni‐Lux, Liteco, Iluminarc, Grace LED Lights, Jesco, Intense, US LED, Justice Design Group, Tivoli, Bruck Lighting, J & J , Aleddra LED Lighting, Moonlight USA, ERCO, Beacon LED, FC Lighting, Dynamic, Rotoluxe, The Light Edge, Fiber Stars, Lumascape, Sternberg Lighting, ...
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February 12, 2007 Telecom White Paper Presented By: Toshiba Telecommunications Systems Division www.telecom.toshiba.com
Call Centers in the Small-to-Medium Business
Overview: The technology that has enabled large call centers for airlines, banks and governmental agencies is rapidly becoming available to the Small-to-Medium Business (SMB). Prices have dropped dramatically. The skills needed to operate a call center have become simplified and no longer require full-time specialists.
This paper ...
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