South China Morning Post

October 5, 2005

Its goodbye to the days of crocodile clips p. S3


Today's hotel guests expect rooms to be full of hi-tech gizmos that are easy to operate and provide a whole host of services

Remember those dim and distant days when you arrived at your hotel room and had to rummage under a desk to unscrew the telephone socket and delicately place two crocodile clips on the telephone wires to get an internet connection?

How things have changed. Improvement in internet services is just one of the technical evolutions I have witnessed during nine years of inspecting hotels in Asia.

There was the dial-up modem arrangement - you plugged the gadget Into the side of a telephone or scrambled around on your hands and knees looking for the telephone socket, only to find your British plug did not fit the United States standard socket.

Inevitably, even with the umbilical attached, getting dial-up connected was such a complicated process that the valet would have to be summoned - in the better hotels this person knew more about computers than you, but then again the same can be said of my six-year-old daughter. Unfortunately, by the time you had mastered the connection, it was time to log off, check-out and head to the airport.

Today, I can walk into a hotel and be Web Wi-fi'd before the check-in staff have swiped my credit card and handed over the key. In some hotels, such as Le Meridien Cyberport in Hong Kong, check-in is done en route to the room. E-mails can now be checked either through the Web on a 42-inch plasma TV, via the LAN or by using the wireless connection in the bathroom. When I stayed at the renovated Novotel in Bangkok's Siam Square recently, wireless was the only option available. The hotel has also placed more emphasis on service at the business centre. I was one of the three guests requesting printing from thumb drives - each was dealt with in seconds.

On the mainland, hotels have made perhaps the greatest technological leap forward admittedly from a poor base.

I recently checked into a four-star hotel in a commercial district in Beijing. Dangling from the wall was a vivid blue Cat 5 LAN cable. No brochure, no price list, nothing.

Suspicious of pricing policies some hotels charge exorbitant rates for broadband use I called reception. To my surprise, I was told in excellent English: Its free enjoy.

For some of the latest in cutting-edge technology, visit Hong Kongs new Landmark Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Aside from the usual features, its impressive bedside console can set three types of mood lighting and close the blinds and curtains I have always loved this feature in the Peninsula Bangkok, where you can enjoy river views without getting out of bed.

The Landmark boasts widescreen LCD TVs, iPod audio input connection to the rooms surround-sound system, a VGA link to plug your portable computer into the TV screen and the latest in laptop safes.

Perhaps the newest toy, though, is the internet protocol (IP) telephone. First introduced by the Langham Palace in Mong Kok, this new breed of telephone will let you send SMS and e-mail messages, and retrieve stock market quotes and local information including maps, flight schedules and weather forecasts. You can also use it to check your hotel bill.

It is so sophisticated that the hotel produces a 46-page operator manual.

Jon Stonham is the publisher of Asias Best Hotels & Resorts, the second edition of which was launched last month. He has visited some 1,200 hotels over the past nine years as part of his work-service for HotelClub.com, an online service for booking hotel rooms in the Asia-Pacific region.