What is a resident? 
Who is undesirable. 
What about credit Cards
These are the god send for both the hotels and criminals. If you do get a funny credit card and it comes up to call the authorisation center, DO IT! keep the person talking, make a joke about them spending a lot for a change, hence the phone call. This does happen a lot a Christmas time. We have known for receptionist to drop credit cards down the back of the desk to delay the person.
Your premises will have a special code for 'funny' cards. When you make the call in front of a person, use it in a phrase, don't say 'err, I need a code x, I have a stolen card'. Check the card thoroughly. If you have a stolen card then the card people will probably quietly call the police for you, they will tell you to check the person in and give you a special code for the machine, while the go faster taxi heads for you. If the signature card is scratched and unreadable, take no chances, call even if it does go through the machine. There is a big myth that a found credit card gives you £50, this lead to people stealing cards or 'holding' them at reception. This does not happen any more. You now only get the money if the 'declined keep card' message comes up. Sorry!
Thankfully in the days of Chip and Pin, the most common form of fraud and theft is via 3rd Party credit cards forms. If you dont see the card, don't take the booking
Where should I go?
For smaller items like alarms or the direct to TV CCTV systems, try Argus, Maplins or Tandy. For more complex systems, try some of the national accredited companies.
One word of advice, what ever system you get, ensure you have the serial numbers, instruction book, help line numbers and they are registered in your name. One hotel bought a system, it went wrong, the company installing it went bust and the manufacturers would not help as it was in the installers name, nice for a £15k system.
Speak to your local beat officer or hotel group. They may have good or bad experience of certain systems.
- As a private establishment, you have the right to use reasonable force to remove someone from your property, providing you tell them first!
- As soon as someone verbally or physically threatens you then call assistance where possible. You can try and calm this person down, but is that before or after they hit you. Only act in self defence.
What do I need?
You can say that whatever you have is not enough. The smallest attack alarm is a must. Panic or raid alarms also need to be easily in reach and connected to the local monitoring or police centre. For larger hotels, I would also suggest that you make at least one of your phones able to dial straight out with CLI so that you can dial the emergency services and have the call traced. Obviously CCTV is the next item on the agenda. c.c.t.v or closed circuit television is not the newest thing on the market, but there are now some wonderful systems out there. Why buy a dummy camera when a small web cam for the same cost can be connected to your computer to monitor things. Then if the need arises, you can start recording the images. There are a lot of video systems out there that can also be plugged straight in to a video recorder, and cost about £100/$160.
Computer video recording. One of the biggest problems you may encounter is that the courts may not accept digital video as reliable evidence due to tampering of images. Always have a video back up and change the tape. The other problem with giving police evidence from a computer is the threat of virus. Ensure that any video footage from a computer includes the software to play it back.
When siting cameras, please make sure that you do not leave it for the security company to decide. You know the building better than they do, and consider thing like street lamps glaring into the camera at night time. Talk to your staff about concerns as well.
