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Microsoft announced that they have partnered with Yelp to enhance their search results.  Google being the number 1 search engine, others are always looking for new ways to compete and possibly take over the number 1 spot.  Yelp is a website that provides users with reviews on businesses such as restaurants, hotels, bars, etc., like most free search engines, Yelp makes their money based off of advertising on their page. Aside from the addition to Yelp, Bing also added a Facebook connection to their search results.  If someone looks up a certain company that has a Facebook page, that page and user reviews will also come up in their search.  Recently Google added a feature called "The Knowledge Graph".  This feature can help distinguish the difference amongst your search if the topic you are researching has various meanings.  Bing came up with doing a "Snapshot" of the pages you search for to help you see more information about what you are searching for.    

This article is about a decision made by Texas Western, Hotel Management Company, to introduce Cloud-Based Business Intelligent system. According to the interviews with the company executives, this investment is really paying off. This system has taken system responsibility off their hands and allowed them to cut labor costs which were used to prepare daily revenue reports or spread sheets. Mobile access to all the information also appears to be a useful feature offered by Cloud-based system. 

The limits of GDS's are discussed in this article, as well as the lack of initiative of the big 4 GDS's to adopt and develop newer and more updated systems because of their prevalence in travel. According to the article, the face of the GDS systems look nearly the same as they did in the 1970s, and the airlines systems are not up-to-date enough to meet consumer demands. The author points to consumer trends in the demand for personalization, package variety, and simply the desire for more packages.

Global Distribution System is an outdated technology, that cannot be consistent with the ways travel is purchased nowadays, according to International Air Transport Association (IATA). Airlines are constantly adding service or 'bunbundling' their products. The ability to buy priority boarding or seating options, meals and baggages cannot be reflected through the GDS, thus the only way to purchase them is through the airline website. This is harmful to both airlines and customers. Even though, GDS has played an important role, it is time to start developing a new product that will 'present full product or data offerings via a new interface'. IATA is being involved into creating the necessary standards before starting to work on a new platform. GDS-managed technology is slowing the process down. However, there may be some legal issues involved in exchanging the system, which has to be resolved before the launch of a new technology.

McDonald's has been promoting mobile payments in the Austin, TX. Consumers' experience is not up to par compared to Starbucks mobile payments. Because the level of employees not understanding mobile payments is much different compared to Starbucks. In order to utilize the mobile payments, streamlined payments is the most important. Seconldy, experience should be seamless. Educating employees on how the technology works and creating a strong infrastructure would be necessary.

Ebookers.com has a new rewards program being introduced called Bonus+, with a focus on mobile use. They have done research and developed a program that allows travelers to earn rewards on hotel bookings, packaged trips and flight bookings. Bonus+ offers a membership which has three tiers to their program. If customers reach gold or platinum status, they offer a 24-hr support for hotel bookings and free upgrades at participating hotels. If customers are to book through their mobile app, they receive more discounts on bookings. This concept is very interesting and I'd like to see how much it will effect the status of travel agents. It will be interesting to see how many more companies will try to come out with rewards programs like Bonus+.

My article this week is about how GDS (Global Distribution Systems) can be compared to a seatbelt. The author opens the article discussing the main reasons we still continue to use seatbelts; even though they aren't the most comfortable or fashionable items to use, they still do their jobs in saving our lives when it comes to a collision of some sort. The author is in favor of GDS and makes the claim that like seatbelts, the GDS may not be the most up-to-date or may not appear to be as nice as other local systems to each individual airline, but they get the job done and there are no other systems out there like it that we know of (no other systems that do everything he GDS system does that is). The main topic of discussion that the article is concerned with is the recent decision made by the company Lufthansa to start charging its customers an additional surcharge for using GDS systems instead of going through its own system. The author clearly makes it know that she doesn't believe Lufthansa when they say they are charging this additional surcharge because GDS is the most expensive channel to go through. "Because there's no reason to think that an airline should expect to distribute its products without any cost, Lufthansa's recent gambit seems more of a tactic for increasing lagging direct distribution... Its strategy seems to rest in shifting distribution costs to corporate buyers" claims Rose, the author of the article. The author also points out some of the draw backs of using agency portals, the main reason being that a customer cannot compare rates of other competitors and that agency portals cannot handle high volume transactions like the GDS can. It is also made known that there are costs that come with other channels as well, like the prices you pay for building airline websites and keeping them updated. The author concludes that "Given the history of negotiations between airlines and GDSs, it's impossible to know whether Lufthansa is using DCC as

I found this article of the rise of e-commerce in Kenya very interesting. We have been discussing GDS and e-commerce from an American point of view and it is great to note that African countries are also taking note of the importance of catering to customers through e-commerce.  Kenya's hospitality industry understands that more people travel nowadays than ever before, and the industry also understand that most customers prefer to book online on their own. The author of the article suggests and predicts that hospitality companies in Kenya will be capitalizing on the growth of Internet and mobile penetration in Africa. 

This articles talks about give a comparison on different event technology which is currently use among Asian countries. It also explains how the use of technology has become a competitive factor for those events managers that want to capture the attention of the market.

This article continues on our modules topic of offsite backups. It explains the need for them in case of emergencies, whether it be a breach or a natural disaster that compromises your systems. It mentions the the biggest services; Amazon S3 and also provides their opinion of top 10 options. It provides the benefits for each of the storage services and why they would recommend them. I personally found that Zetta was a great option as they are not only affordable but also very efficient and safe as it uses a push button. It concludes with information that can help a business decide which company is best for them and encouragement to choose one if you want to keep your data safe and readily available in case of an emergency.

The article explains the history of GDS, and how GDS doesn't hold any inventory, but they are held on the vendor's reservation system so if a travel agent approaches Air India for reservation, the GDS can route the travel agent to Air India's computer reservation system in real time. Of course any travel agency should invest in the GDS as GDS can provide the best holiday package to guests at the lowest rate, for a package which includes air, hotel, and car rental. The article also illustrates how important GDS was to the airline industry and how the booking process has changed in the past decade, as we can now book within minutes in the comfort of our home. Before it would take an employee over an hour just to book a single flight for a customer.

The role of travel agents has changed drastically over the last 30 years. When once you needed a travel agent to do all of your bookings for you, you now have access to all of these tools and can create your own travel experience. Therefore, today's travel agent needs to be tech savvy and must keep up with the trends and provide their clients with the most up to date travel information. They also must have an online presence, specifically social media that shows their "personality" and helps with marketing. As long as agents can keep up with the ever changing technologies, clients will go to agents for the "human touch" and real first hand experience.

This article introduces what is a Point of Sale System(POS) and the benefits, must -have capabilities of POS system. Also, the article explains the hardware and software components of POS system. A retailer said the POS it's the central component of the business and the system and combined everything together. POS combination of software and hardware that allows the merchant's transactions day by day for the business operations. Thus, POS system becomes very popular and very helpful for the business. There have the key capabilities and the benefits for selecting a new POS system. For software components, on-premise and cloud-based are two common software adjust methods. First of all, on-premise is a traditional software model, the business can purchase it and installed it on the computer system or servers. You have to pay for the updating and maintaining fee for that software, which means the business has to hire an IT to monitor it. Second, cloud-based, cloud0-based is a good example of the Software as a Service (SaaS) POS solutions. The business has to access the system via the internet. The benefit of cloud-based is when your internet goes down, most systems can save the information for you and you always can go back to check it again when your internet coming back. Besides, the hardware components for the POS are registered screen which is can monitor that displays the product database, the barcode scanner is a automates the checkout process. Credit card reader that can secure the systems. The cash drawer, you need a secure place to store cash for transactions.

This article explains what a Point of Sale System is. It also points out an important factor about software and hardware. Hardware requirementshttps://www.softwareadvice.com/resources/what-is-a-point-of-sale-system/ must be met regardless of what software system you have in place. There are two common software deployment methods: On-premise: A traditional software model. Purchase one or more licenses upfront for the software and install it on your computer system or servers. You're in charge of updating and maintaining the software, which may require dedicated IT personnel for larger organizations. Cloud-based: Also known as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) POS solutions. You access and support the system via the internet. Don't worry-if your internet goes down, most systems track sales and sync them once you're back online.

Global Distribution System (GDS) is a system operated by an organization that empowers automated exchanges between travel specialist organizations for mainly airlines, lodgings and vehicle rental organizations and travel agencies. Travel agencies generally depended on GDS for administrations, products and rates so as to provision travel related administrations to the end consumers. A GDS can connect services, rates and bookings uniting items and services over every one of the three travel segments: i.e., aircraft reservations, hotel reservations, vehicle rentals. The biggest global distribution framework is Amadeus. GDS is not the same as a PC reservations framework, which is a reservation framework utilized by the specialist organizations also known as vendors. Essential clients of GDS are travel specialists both online and office-based to reserve spot on different reservation frameworks kept running by the sellers. GDS holds no inventory; the inventory is hung on the merchant's reservation framework itself. A GDS framework will have constant connect to the merchant's database. For instance, when a travel office asks for a reservation on the administration of a specific carrier organization, the GDS framework courses the demand to the proper aircraft's PC reservations framework. This empowers a travel specialist with an association with a solitary GDS to pick and book different flights, lodgings, exercises and related administrations on every one of the merchants working in a similar course who are part of that GDS network. There's no uncertainty that global distribution frameworks will have an imperative influence in the travel landscape for a long time to come, yet their conventional job is changing and being tested by every one of the progressions occurring in the travel business. While such changes will affect the future development open doors for global distribution frameworks, there will keep on being a job for them as they advance to address the issue

This article is meant to show the reader about the importance of accounting in the Hospitality & Tourism industry. The role of an accountant is crucial to the success of a hospitality company. The article also goes onto answer the questions that commonly face accountants.

In this article titled, "Importance of Accounting in Hotel Management", the author stresses that accounting is crucial in numerous industries and processes, including the hospitality industry. Hotel accountants need to create month-end accounts, compare profits to previous periods, analyze forecasts, prepare budgets and business planning, financial statements, balance sheets, cash flows and payroll control. Aspects to take into consideration are the amount of total sales achieved per year, average prices of hotel rooms, and month's profit comparisons. An interesting quote I read in this article was that "it is important to distinguish accounting from management. Accounting is a tool used by good managers". Accounting in hotel management is crucial to keep track of cash flows, forecasts and aforementioned reports. While analyzing how accounting can further add value to managers or how it can be optimized, I believe that real time reports and data analysis can create red flags so changes can be performed on time and systems can be optimized. After all, this allows the business to become more efficient in order for them to focus on their core strengths and direction.

I found this article interesting, as technology is constantly advancing, and this supports just that. Sabre has announced it is introducing a new lodging solution that will allow travel agents to access content from three different companies in one, thanks to a new agreement with Sabre. This solution will allow for an easier shopping experience, with a wider range of the best hotels and rates side by side. Overall, as Christian Gerron says in the article, "it is to provide their customers with the best choice and flexibility." At the end of the day, that is just what any hotel, travel agent, and any other sectors of our industry want, what is best for our customers. 

This article discuss Sabre which is one of the biggest GDS systems in use ad their decision to integrate with Bedsonline, TravelBound and the Expedia® Affiliate Network (EAN). The reason they decided to do this was to increase their inventory and in turn better serve the customer. What I found interesting is that Bedsonline and Travelbound are both travel agent exclusive companies, this shows that despite availability that OTA's have travel agents still play a crucial role. I would also like to use the side by side comparison tool.

It is said the the central reservation system is essentially the core of reservations since the internet plays a huge part in making those reservations. It goes from property management systems, to the CRS which is then distributed to GDS's, wholesalers, or other viewing options. This allows the hotel to have profiles that can be viewed online by consumers and agents to get a feel for the services. Additionally, it is said that is allows for great visibility to attract more customers which allows for groups and blocks. It also allows the consumer to check around for competitors to ensure they are finding the best rates and deals. All in all, it connects the entire globe to reach a wider audience to maximize profit.