The Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas has decided that all guests who check in to its 1,200-room hotel should get the room for a full 24 hours.
For example, guests who check in at 6 p.m. will not have to check out at 11 a.m. or noon, standard check-out times for many hotels, but can check out at 6 p.m., after a full day in residence. The room must be booked directly on the hotel’s website, according to USA Today, and guests must inform the Palms of their arrival time.
“It always struck me as a bit odd that we make people check out at 11 in the morning or noon, and we don’t let them check in until 3 or 4,” said Palms CEO Dan Lee. “If you look at the car rental industry, you get a car for 24 hours.”
Lee said the change does pose scheduling problems for the housekeeping department. To make the late check-out work, some of the hotel’s maids will be working night shifts rather than day shifts now, he said.
“It does require a different type of thinking and training, and we’ve undertaken that because we are trying to be innovative and creative,” he said. “How do we provide more value to the guest by giving them more time for their money? That’s really what it’s all about.”
“Whoever determined that 12 noon was the perfect check-in, check-out time was thinking of the housekeeping shift, not the guest,” agreed Chekitan Dev of Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration. “With customers becoming more demanding, and intensifying competition for market share, the hotel industry is developing standard operating procedures that are more guest-centric rather than operations-centric.”
