Luxury Hoteliers Magazine 2nd Quarter 2017 | Page 77

THE CHALLENGE Luxury hotels the world over face ever increasing challenges in trying to mitigate the many and varied threats to their security while maintaining a suitably robust security posture. The great conundrum, or balancing act if you will, is to ensure that two opposing requirements are met. Firstly, that every guest that walks into the hotel feels welcomed, well taken care of and relaxed. Then, once inside their room they feel safe and secure. Upon leaving the hotel, they want nothing more than to return to the oasis of calm, high-end luxury and service that the hotel has provided. At the same time, hotels must maintain a high level of security to ensure that those same guests are kept safe and secure. They expect that their hotel is protected from all forms of threat including personal, physical and cyber attacks. The Reality The ease of access, the sheer number or persons and vehicles within the site at any one time make this level of security difficult to uphold. Hotel staff, merchant s, deliveries, restaurant staff and guests are the firsts level of ILHA 77