Some say that "Event Planner" is the most challenging job in the world because of the tremendous tasks that they have to handle simultaneously. Therefore, here are some helpful websites and apps for professional and amateur event planners to alleviate your workload!

Hotel rooms are ready to go high-tech with new security products that can enhance the guest experience. As the organization Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP) prepared the 2012 guestroom exhibit Guestroom 20X for last week's HITEC tradeshow, the group sought new ways to make the room more modern, efficient and self-serviced.

Those hotel groups that fail to recognize the speed of change in technology and what this can bring to the business will find themselves significantly under prepared when the market starts to strengthen. While "its never too late" to act - there is a significant opportunity cost in doing nothing or worse still, cutting technology out of the day to day operations. For a hotel to effectively operate and ensure it is maximizing its incoming revenue, the right technologies needs to be in place. Through investing in the right technology at the right time, savvy hoteliers will be ensuring that their facility(s) are able to effectively maximize their ongoing revenue capability now and into the future.

Demand the top 11 productivity features in your accounting software and give your practice the opportunity to grow and multiply revenue. Accounting software that grows with you. Whether you serve the basic accounting needs of 25 clients or the highly complex needs of thousands, there is peace of mind in knowing your accounting software will grow with your business for decades into the future. The option to operate in heads-down data entry or a mouse-driven mode. Highly productive software will allow you to work in a heads-down data entry mode or in a drop-down mouse-driven mode. Import and Export transactions from QuickBooks and other software. Having your accounting software integrate well with mass market client-oriented accounting programs like QuickBooks is critical to productivity. The ability to automate processes whenever you need or want them to be automated. A key to productivity and getting it right in an accounting practice is having accounting software that will require only one step to run a predefined series of reports on one or multiple clients, with the option of automatically e-mailing of the reports to the client.

Hotel technology vendors release functionality previously unseen in hotels - enabling better guest service and tighter control hetras, the developer of cloud-based hotel management software, and Vectron, a leading provider of point of sale systems for hospitality and retail, announced today the certified integration of their products. hetras, the developer of cloud-based hotel management software, and Vectron, a leading provider of point of sale systems for hospitality and retail, announced today the certified integration of their products. The new seamless interface between the hetras hotel management system and Vectron's POS provides, in addition to the standard features one has come to expect, a host of highly advanced capabilities long desired, but before today never achieved, in a hotel environment. Some unique features of the interface include: Automatic discounts for loyalty club members at the article level. Front office credit limit detection at the POS with multiple resolution options (e.g. allow charge to room, allow partial charge to room, deny charge to room) Full guest check detail can be sent to PMS enabling detailed folios and statistics in the PMS. POS discounts can be sent to PMS in detail for full tracking of discounts in the PMS or accounting system Extensive handling of house bons (e.g. for hotels staff) between PMS and POS Both charges and payments (e.g. cash or credit card) can be sent from POS to PMS.

Using the ZMail® electronic communication platform from ZDirect, travelers receive a link in their confirmation email to a 'pass' containing hotel reservation information; The 'pass' is stored in Apple's Passbook, and when in close proximity to the hotel, automatically pops up on the iPhone lock screen for instant retrieval. ZDirect is a hospitality provider of electronic customer-relationship management services. Via ZMail®, hotels send personalized emails and text messages to guests before, during and after their stay to improve hotel-to-guest communications, build customer loyalty and increase onsite spending. "ZDirect's mobile integration to Passbook does what paper can't -- it alerts travelers to real-time changes in their reservations," "...ZDirect's integration to Passbook means no more printing of hotel confirmations which tend to get lost. To update their reservations, guests simply 'pull down' on their 'pass' to receive the latest reservation information. It's a convenience tool that is so important to today's mobile-dependent travelers, and it's a logical add on for hotels that use ZMail® for hotel-to-guest communication." said Shayne Paddock, ZDirect chief information officer. I think this is a excellent example that combining PMS with current trend. Passbook is an great app invented by Apple, and this collaborating way that ZDirect did is a huge step in PMS mobilization.

The biggest challenges or barriers hoteliers face in implementing green lodging practices: 1. Having enough capital to invest 2. Achieving ROI 3. Ability to find vendors/suppliers offering the products they need 4. Having enough time 5. Limited knowledge/resources 6. Garnering support from government or local organizations 7. Possibility of negative guest reactions

The travel marketplace is a global arena where millions of buyers (travel agents and the public) and sellers (hotels, airlines, car rental companies, etc.) work together to exchange travel services. Among the "shelves" on which buyers search for travel services are world's global distribution systems and the Internet distribution systems. There are currently four major GDS systems: Amadeus As the youngest of the four GDS companies, Amadeus has done remarkably well during its short tenure. Yet, in many ways, the company remains an anomaly. Amadeus has the greatest number of travel agency locations with the highest productivity per terminal in the world, yet its booking share is Number 3, and its revenues are dwarfed by Sabre and, to a lesser degree, by Galileo. Galileo Galileo's competitive strengths include market share, well-balanced and global presence, relationships with diverse groups of travel vendors, technologically advanced information systems, highly skilled personnel, and a stable product line. Compared to other GDS companies, Galileo is a cautious follower when it comes to technology. Sabre Sabre's competitive strengths include market position, global reach, stable product line, diversification of revenue streams, and intellectual capital. The Sabre business model is a strong one, and continues to make significant progress in advancing both its electronic travel distribution and its information technology solutions businesses. Worldspan Worldspan has a legacy of industry firsts that are not well known. The company therefore has an opportunity to raise the industry's awareness of its accomplishments and more importantly, its future strategy. Worldspan continues to look at benefits of creating its own consumer brand and has been partnering with different companies to expand the services that it can provide to its customer base.

This year, travelers are on track to pay U.S. hotels an estimated $1.95 billion in fees and surcharges - an amount that includes unpopular Internet charges. With this in mind, Hotel Check-In asked Robert Mandelbaum, the Atlanta-based director of information services for PKF Hospitality Research, to tell us about the state of the industry's telecommunications revenue stream - a stream that includes Internet fees.

This article introduces a new check-in technology, it will effectively increase guest satisfaction. This new system works by sending a confirmation email to guests with a bar code attached on the day they are scheduled to arrive. After scanning the code using a smartphone or a print out at the kiosk, a prompt asks the guest how many keys they would like and then prints them out. They are then free to go to their room upon completion. Also it introduces the online guestroom selection system used by Hilton Worldwide. Hilton Worldwide has already found success in its attempt to put the check-in process in consumers' hands. Within 36 hours of arriving at a Homewood property, guests receive an echeck-in reminder and a prompt to select which guestroom they'd like to stay in on a virtual floor-plan map. This article points out the digital check-in challenges as well: 1. Ensuring that the global Web platform communicates effectively with the local hotel system is always important. 2. Some training must take place at the operational level. 3. It's very rare that the suite that a guest desires is actually available at the moment they want to book it. This article presents the bright side of online check-in and the effect it brings to improve guest's satisfaction but the challenges remains which makes it difficult to implement vastly. But it could becomes a trend for the future check-in system.