<< MArriots and a few others that I have stayed in have been running cat5 to all of the rooms and charge for the service. The cheapest I saw was a Sheraton in Kansas City and they wanted $10 a day. No offense to them but that's too much. I'd be happier if they could lump it in with the hotel charge and my company wouldn't have any problems paying but as an extra fee, the company would pay for the outrageous local phone calls before that.
One hotel (can't remember which one) had their printers and I believe a fax system in their "business room" hooked up so we could print from the room for a small fee. >>
Cool deal with the printing and faxing. $10 per night for the WAN access is a bit steep. The price is probably why they won't tag it on the room. They want to advertise the rate. Let's face it, competition is tough (especially in this climate) and a few bucks could lose a larger company's business in a large city.
But I'm glad we are seeing businesses looking forward enough to spend the pennies to wire the place.
I checked the hotel's web site and they state "internet accessable". I called and this means they have an extra phone port. THAT is what they call access?! Probably some outlet at a base of the lamp.
Hotels could even set up a wireless setup and easily retrofit.
I'm starting to detect a niche here. I could sell this to hotels or do like the movie deals. Set it up with my equipment, make them use my service, meter it by the minute and make a good buck while supplying something usefull to the business traveler! Just think. If it were wireless, you could pipe it to the rest of the hotel. You could make a whole host of services available to the guests via station or PDA throughout the hotel.
People could buy hotel services from the pool, book tomorrow's room at another (same chain) hotel, order room service to the game room, find a map of the hotel and view local advertising of local businesses and attractions. You could order a taxi from your bar stool!
I'm getting a bit psyched! I'm calling some people. I'm serious.
What do you think?