02 Homework 1 - ARG

TH1807
PAIR ACTIVITY: Case Study Analysis
1. Work in pairs and read the case below. Then, answer the questions that follow.
It is Thursday morning at The STI Hotel. The reservations manager has printed the list of reservations
for the day. The front office staff has prepared 229 kits for guests who have pre-registered for the Pet
Owners of the Philippines (POP) Conference. The Times Hotel has been designated the headquarters
for the cat owners, while The Sebastian Hotel, located two (2) blocks away, has been designated the
headquarters for the dog owners. The participants in the POP Conference are supposed to start
arriving at noon.
The Times Hotel had a full house on Wednesday night. A planning group, who has occupied 111 rooms,
for the Biology Researchers Conference was in the hotel. They held a meeting into the early hours of
Thursday morning. Several of the guests posted Do Not Disturb signs on their doors.
Caleb De Guzman, the Director of Engineering, has noticed the air-conditioning going on and off on
the fifth and sixth floors. Caleb investigates the problem and estimates that it will require about 12
hours of repair time. Caleb gets on the phone to the front office to report the problem, but the desk
clerks are busy, thereby failing to answer the phone. Meanwhile another repair call comes in, and
Caleb is off again. The air-conditioning situation is never reported to the front office.
In the hotel’s kitchen, the chef is busy preparing vendor orders for the day. He is also planning the
food production worksheets for the POP Conference. The chef has left a word with one of the suppliers
to return his call early in the afternoon to clarify an order for the banquet tonight. The organizer for
the POP wants a special Swiss chocolate ice cream cake roll. The sales office has also included an order
for two (2) ice sculptures—one (1) cat and one (1) dog. The banquet manager and several of his crew
are scheduled to arrive about three (3) hours prior to the banquet to begin setting up furniture and
tabletops. The servers will arrive in about an hour before the banquet begins.
It is now 11:00 AM. A group of conferees has arrived to register. They have brought their cats along
and want to know where they can house them. The front desk clerk does not know where the cats
should be housed. He calls the sales department and asks for directions. The sales department says
that the person who organized this conference specifically told the participants that they were to leave
their pets at home. This was not to be a pet show, only a business/seminar conference.
The housekeeping staff is unable to get into the rooms (checkout time is noon). The Biology
Researchers Conference attendees have not risen because of the late planning meeting. Also, two (2)
of the room attendants did not report to work this morning.
It is now 1:30 PM. The majority of the pet owners are in the lobby with their pets, waiting to get into
the rooms. With the air-conditioning out of order, and the lobby in chaos, the odor and noise are
beyond description. Housekeeping calls and says that it will need about two (2) more hours before the
first 75 rooms can be released. The switchboard operator has been bombarded with telephone calls
for the pet owners. The chef is anticipating his call from the vendor for the Swiss chocolate ice cream
cake roll. He finally calls the supplier and finds out that she has been trying to call him to let him know
that the supplier is out of this product, but no one answered the phone at the front desk. The chef
runs out of the kitchen into the lobby area. He finds the switchboard operator and verbally rips him
apart. The front office manager is up to her ears in kitty litter and responds likewise to the chef. It is
not the best of situations.
Just when it seems that nothing else can go wrong, a group of 10 POP members arrives in the lobby
with guaranteed reservations. The hotel is completely booked, and these additional reservations
represent an overbooked situation. The reservation staff forgot to ask if these guests were cat or dog
owners. The clamor in the lobby is now unbearable—dogs are barking at cats, cats are hissing at dogs,
and guests are complaining loudly.
02 Homework 1 - ARG *Property of STI

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TH1807
The banquet manager and his crew have finished setting up the room for the banquet. One of the
crew turns on the air-conditioning. There is a dull roar. Blue smoke pours from the vents. Thinking this
is only a temporary condition, he does not report this to the banquet manager. Later on, the banquet
manager instructs the setup crew to take the ice sculptures from the freezer and set them in front of
the podium and head table. The banquet servers will be arriving within an hour to start the
preparations for the banquet.
Lifted and modified from:

Bardi, J. A. (2003). Hotel front office management (3rd Ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. on 22 February 2019
QUESTIONS:
A. If you are the front office manager (FOM), how will you solve the problems at hand? Discuss
your recommendations in detail.
B. After the commotion has settled down, how will you analyze the situation? List the
opportunities for improving communications with the other departments involved.
2. Create your output in a Word file following these formatting details:

 Paper size: Short bond paper (Letter or 8.5” x 11”)
 Font: Calibri
 Font size: 11 pt.
 Spacing: Single
 Margins: 1” all sides
3. Your paper will be evaluated using this rubric:
CRITERIA PERFORMANCE INDICATORS POINTS
Presented applicable and insightful conclusions/analyses of the case 30
Provided balanced and reasonable recommendations to the issues or problems
Content 30
in the case
Required information is complete and correct. 10
Output is created using the given format 5
Mechanics
Output is written in an organized and logical manner. 5
TOTAL 80
4. Upload your output in 02 Homework 1-ARG section under 02 The Front Office Department module here
in the eLMS.
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TH1807

PAIR ACTIVITY: Case Study Analysis

02 Homework 1 - ARG *Property of STI

Lifted and modified from:

2. Create your output in a Word file following these formatting details:

02 Homework 1 - ARG *Property of STI

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