Despite the efficiency of digital card payments, hoteliers face challenges. Serious security and reconciliation risks exist when using traditional systems with a wide range of channels and payment methods, especially with the common methods of hotels.
A guest-centric hotel system can improve operations and ensure delighted guests regardless of payment method. This article explores the challenges and shows how tokenisation can secure payments to bank-level security while removing the need for manual reconciliation.
Risky hotel payment handling
Hotel bookings come from channels including phone calls, emails, or online travel agency (OTA) extranets. To process booking fees and enforce guarantee policies within specific timeframes, hotels must collect and store credit card information for future use.
When their traditional hotel systems don’t allow secure handling of credit card details, it puts hotels at significant risk – potentially exposing guest information that could lead to financial loss, legal issues, and severe damage to the hotel's reputation.
Lacking a secure way to handle credit card details, staff saves card numbers on post‑it notes or in unsecured fields in their traditional hotel system to manually process card details in physical point of sale (POS) terminals.
Hotel payment solutions that tokenise credit cards and allow the processing of payments based on those tokens stop these unsafe practices and are essential to protect guest data and keep trust.
Let’s see how a guest-centric hotel solution with in-platform payments like Clock can address these issues and improve your hotel operations.
Secure payments with tokenisation
Tokenization is a process where visible credit card details (number, date, name, CVV code) are converted into a unique token, which cannot be used to retrieve the actual card information. The actual card details are securely stored with the payment processor, not the hotel, reducing the risk for hoteliers.
When guests book through an insecure channel, the agent can send them to a secure and PCI DSS-compliant environment. The credit card information is immediately tokenized, transforming it into a token that can be used for all booking and during-stay transactions, including on terminals, without revealing the real card details.
This way, hoteliers can handle payments securely without storing sensitive credit card information, significantly minimising the risk of data breaches.
How Clock secures payments with tokenisation:
- Booking: When guests book through Clock's booking engine, via the connected OTAs (channel manager or directly) or on the connected card terminal, Clock immediately tokenises the credit card details provided through Clock's payment partner, Adyen.
- Tokenisation: The token is stored securely within the Clock system, while Adyen manages the card details in a separate PCI DSS-secured environment.
- Collection: When it’s time to collect a payment, whether a deposit, a balance payment, or a charge for incidentals, Clock uses the token to process the transaction securely.
- Reconciliation: Clock's tokenisation and automatic payment records eliminate reconciliation errors.
- Handling: Staff members can never access the actual credit card details, reducing the risk of data breaches and ensuring compliance with PCI DSS standards.
Manual to automated entry and processing
Traditional systems: Guests provide credit card details through paper forms or unsecured digital means. Staff manually enter these details into payment terminals, leading to human error and increased security risks. This process is time-consuming, delaying payment collection and frustrating guests with long check-in and check-out times.
Clock: Guests enter payment details once through Clock's secure platform, which tokenises the details. Payment processing is automated, eliminating manual entry and errors. Transactions integrate into the hotel system for accurate, real-time reconciliation, resulting in a faster, more secure payment process and improved guest satisfaction.
From manual reconciliation to smooth integration
Traditional systems: Tracking and reconciling payments manually from multiple sources is complex and risky. Discrepancies can lead to financial errors and time-consuming audits. Staff spend hours reconciling payments and detracting from customer service, while errors in billing or delayed refunds can lead to guest dissatisfaction.
Clock: The system automatically records and matches payment data to bookings in real-time with tokenisation, eliminating manual reconciliation. Automated processes reduce errors and ensure accurate financial data, allowing staff to focus on enhancing the guest experience. With accurate billing and faster service improved guests and staff are happier.
Summary
Guests trust hotels to keep their payment details safe and billing information accurate. The widespread risky practice of manually collecting and charging credit cards in POS terminals proves that traditional systems and modern payments don’t go together. No person would willingly risk their credit card information to leak like that – likely not even you.
Clock’s hotel system with in-platform payments tokenises every payment, replacing sensitive credit card details with secure tokens. This modern approach protects guest payment information and your reputation, automates payment processing, and removes manual reconciliation errors.
By transitioning from a traditional hotel system to Clock, hotels can safeguard guest data, maintain their reputation, and enhance overall security, providing a smooth and secure experience for staff and guests.
