London Aparthotels Chain Westciti Extends Check-in Flexibility with Keycafe

Aparthotels are all about flexible living and independence for guests. That’s something Westciti has known from the start and has been striving to achieve in its entirety for its serviced apartments in Croydon, London.

With a range of guests at corporate and leisure levels, Westciti has to cater to everybody and a big part of that is the ability to allow guests to check in and out at whatever time of day they like. And because they have 80 units yet only 9 staff members, this has always been a bit of a logistical challenge for them.

Up until Westciti partnered with Keycafe to handle their key management, they were forced to keep a member of staff at the reception 12 hours a day in order to allow guests to check in and out. This took up a large percentage of the overall staff hours they had available and restricted the check in times. They did offer after-hours check-outs using a traditional lock box, but it was unsightly and required a code change every week.

The Westciti team reached out to Keycafe in the hope that they would be able to automate the key management process, expanding check-in times and saving the team plenty of time and money.

The implementation was an instant success. After installing Keycafe’s fully automated key management system, Westciti was able to free up staff time to focus on other important matters at hand, developing the business further and expanding check in times for guests to 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Guests receive a unique code on the day of their arrival which is used to pick up their keys from a SmartBox, and when checking out they use the same code to drop off the keys - no staff needed on-site. Westciti receives alerts for both events, so cleaning staff can be notified and operations are kept on schedule.

Westiciti management also stores master keys in their SmartBox which can easily be distributed to housekeeping and maintenance staff for when any work needs to be carried out on their properties.

Dat onderhouds- en huishoudelijk personeel sleutels kan pakken wanneer ze die nodig hebben, heeft het hele team tijd en moeite bespaard. Bovendien weet het Westciti-team precies wie welke sleutels heeft opgenomen en wanneer. Nu gaan er minder sleutels verloren, wat het bedrijf nog meer tijd en geld bespaart.

“Ze zijn allemaal erg blij met deze technologie, want het ziet eruit als een heel gaaf systeem”, zegt Rishi Bansal, CEO van Westciti, wanneer hij de reacties van gasten op de SmartBox beschrijft. “Het is een geweldige ervaring en het heeft veel lasten verminderd, zowel voor ons als voor onze gasten.”

Westciti is zeer tevreden over de hoeveelheid tijd en geld die dankzij Keycafe is bespaard en waardeert hoe eenvoudig het systeem te installeren en te gebruiken was.