Nature of Tourist

• Indian Tourist.

1. Prefer traveling in a group or with family.
2. Little casual, over punctuality.
3. Appriciate being address as sir/madam.
4. Mostly enjoy man made attraction and environment.
5. Prefer to have more Indian food.
6. Prefer in religious places.
7. Man of many words.

• British Tourist.

1. Very formal discipline, polite and well manner.
2. Ready to share group interest.
3. Travel alone or in group.
4. High interest in natural and cultural things.
5. Very diplomatic and business minded.

• Japanese Tourist.

1. Enjoy and appriciate nature and its beauty.
2. Belived in hard work and honesty.
3. Very polite and gentle.
4. Man of few words.
5. Love to travel with family, friend and group.

• French and Italian Tourist.

1. Highly formal and friendly.
2. Love adventures places.
3. Enjoy songs, music and arts.
4. Taking pleasure in countryside and cities.
5. Love gathering, fairs, festivals.
6. Love industrial freedom.
   

Types of Tourist

1. Recreational Tourist: The activities of these tourist are mostly related to money and mines. It is concerned with relaxation, rest and excitement is often on sand, sun and sea promoted area/location. This is centralized in big cities such as night clubs, casinos etc.
2. Business Tourist: It is related to professional work for the trade and commerce. So, tourist are mostly like to stay in big cities and towns where more commercial and trading companies are located. Such as international banks, shopping center, Business house, travel and agencies.
3. Adventure Tourist: It is mostly organized in adventure places and remote areas, where new experience and ideas such as trekking, rafting, bungee jumping, paragliding, horse riding, mountain climbing etc. Young generation are most interested in this type of activities.
4. Religious Tourist: The main purpose is to visit pilgrimages, to attend religious charities, religious merit. People are spiritually guided to visit pilgrims and usually determined by their religion and belief. For example: large number of people visit at Rome (Italy) considering with the pious birth place.
5. Sports Tourist: This activity is related to various sport event consists of programe and activities for the special purpose of promoting the paractise of sport by player or professional. It needs physically force and skills such as golf, horse riding, car racing etc.
6. Historical Tourist: Historical means magnification of the gone by days. The purpose is to see as historical monuments like Taj Mahal, Pashupatinath, Swayambhu, Lumbini etc.
7. Cultural Tourist: Its main aim is to provide knowledge. The people simply observe the culture and life style of the local peoples. In this area accomodation facilities is far away from the particular place.
8. Ethnic Tourist: The tourist are motivated and guided to see the way of life style of ethnic community. Tourist visit the destination to see the tradition, culture, customs, food habit, dressing, ornament, housing design etc.
   

Form & Formats used in Front Office Department

• Reservation Form.

This is the form which is filled by the reservation assistant at the time of the request of the room from the guest. The reservation assistant should inquire all the details mentioned in it. After filling up this form, all the reservation data are entered into the computer where the reservation system is computerized. This form is filled for the future reference. When the guest arrives in the hotel, the reservation of the room is done on the basis of this forms. This forms includes: Name, Address, Nationality, Date of arrival with flight details, Date of departure, Types of room required, Types of plan preferred, Modes of payment etc.

• Reservation Chart.

Reservation chart is also referred as the advance lettering chart or bed booking chart and used for allocating room in advance. A reservation chart is basic of reservation system. Each page of reservation chart represents a month. The vertical column represents each day of the month while horizontal column represents each room in the hotel. Each block represents room on a particular day of a month. Thus, when a room is reserved, a square formed by the room number and the date for which it will be occupied and crossed through a pencil and the name of the guest is written on the line. Pencil should be used so that in the event of cancellation or alternation of reservation, the name and line can be erased and replace by another. Reservation chart used in a hotel are mainly of two types:

1. Density Chart: It is used in a large commercial hotel or in the hotel where the guest stay only for one or two nights. When a reservation is recorded in this char, the customer is not allocated a particular room. Each types of room is groped together on the left hand side and days of the month across the top. When a booking is accepted, the number of days, starting with the day of arrival are marked off. This charts indicated the quality of room reserved by the types of room over a period of time. This chart only indicate how many rooms are reserved not the name of the guest or duration of particular booking.
   
2. Convectional Chart: It display the availability of each rooms in the hotel by room number. This chart shows all the hotel rooms on the down heft hand side and data of the month across the top. This chart is normally suitable only for small hotels where guest usually stay for a long period of time and which has a wide variety of rooms.

• Reservation Slip.

Reservation slip is a piece of paper which is filled up by the reservation assistant after he/she finishes the reservation form . It is made in two copies. One is attached with the reservation form and another is kept in Whitney/Reservation rack in an alphabetical order. This paper is filled up in various colors for different purposes. Different colors of reservation slips are used in different purposes.

1. White color- Individual
2. Yellow color- Groups
3. Green color- VIPs
4. Pink color- Through Travel Agencies
5. Purple color- Conventions

• Room Status Board (Forecast Board).

A forecast board is another means of determining the room's availability. It is usually situated on a wall near the reservation desk so that the reservation assistants have quick access to room status information hen they have to check for the room availability.The forecast board normally indicates a period of four months.

• The Hotel Dairy (Booking Dairy).

Immediately after updating the accommodation availability chart, the reservation clerk must enter all of the booking details into a hotel dairy. However encase of computerized reservation system, this will be done automatically. It helps to control the fraud and misuse of reservation system in the front office department. This dairy is normally checked by front office manager on a daily basis to have a quick view of status of room reservation on a particular day.

• Reservation Revision Cancellation Form.

This form is filled up when a guest request for the cancellation the revision of the reservation made on the earlier dates. This reservation assistants fills up all the necessary details on this forms. In case of cancellation the reservation rack is updated by removing the reservation slip. The reservation chart is also updated by removing the allocation of the room made by the guest. In case of cancellation and revision of the reservation, new adjustments are made in reservation rack and reservation form.

Section of Front Office Department.

• Reception/Registration Section:

This section is located in the lobby. It also allocate the room and established the rates for different types of guest. The person of the section is called Receptionist. GSA (Guest Service Officer) has direct contact guest. The function of this section are:-

1. Warmly received all arrival guest.
2. Complete registration formalities and perform guest check-in.Perform pre-registration formalities for group, VIPs and disable guest.
3. Co-ordinate closely with house-keeping department for clearance of department room, room change and UR (Under Repaired) rooms.
   
4. Issue VIPs amenities voucher to the food and beverage service.
   
5. Co-ordinate closely with bell desk for luggage handling and rooms keys.

• Information.

It is located at a front desk and responsible for handling mail and messages with room keys. It also provide information regarding outside and inside of hotel's rules and regulation, facilities, services. It also handle the e-mail, fax, xerox machine, cable through the business center.

• Cash.

It is also located at front desk and handle by front cashier. The main function of cashier are as follows:-

1. The secure payment from the guest arrival.
2. To change foreign currency as per rules and regulation of the hotel,
3. To manage safety deposite locker.
4. To settle guest account while check-out.
5. To balance cash at the close of shift.
6. To complete the guest check-out procedure.

• Reservation.

The term reservation means booking in advance. It is basically blocks/reserve the room as per the request or specifies data. The main functions are as follows:-

1. Handle all cancellation and revisit as reservation made by the guest from different source and modes.
2. Keep out reservation corespondence complete and systematic.
3. Process nd confirm reservation request.
4. Forecast future room reservation status.
5. Update room availability chart.

• Telephone Section.

This section is handle by telephone operator and it is located at the back of the office. Its main function is to handle incoming and outgoing calls. It is also responsible for managing wake up calls as requested by the guest and preparation of telephone bills made by guest and staffs.

• Lobby.

It is an area which is located at the entrance of a hotel building with sitting arrangement for guest's visitors to meet and wait. It is synonym to the word "Foyer" which means a wide passage or large hall just inside the entrance of a public building. The dimension and design of this area rely upon the size and design of the building. Basically lobby area must be furnished with all the necessary things. Example:- Lobby desk, Bell desk, GRE/GRO, Reception desk, Cash counter, Rest room, Business center, Safety lockers etc

• Bell Desk.

It is located at either side of lobby needed by bell captain and followed by bell boys. This desk is responsible for handling the guest luggage during arrival and departure. The bell desk section also handle the paying, deliver guest mail and messages to the concern guest room.

• Business Center.

The person who handle the business center in known as Business Centre attended and the main function of this section is to provide the communication facilities and service like STD, ISD, E-mail, internet, fax, xerox etc.

• Travel Desk.

This section of front office is responsible for arranging the packages, tickets etc for the guest as per their request.

Why Front Office Dept is Important in Hotel??

The main function of Front office department is to reserve, register and assigned rooms to the guest act act as a continued source of information to the them during their stay in the hotel. The revenue collected from the sell of room contributes more than 50% of the total sell. The primary function of the Front Office department are as follows:

• Deal with room reservation.
• Check-in Arriving guest.
• Prepare guest arrival and departure list.
• Received guest and help them to complete registration formalities.
• Help to marketing and selling promotion process.
• Deal with the various inquiries and information of in-house and outside activities.
• Deals with mail, messages and paging of the guest.
• Deal with deposite for safe castody.
• Produce daily report and statics.
• Deal with accidents and unusual events.
  

Maastricht Hotel Management School

Wine and Its Types

Wines are potable & fermented alcoholic beverages obtained from the fermentation of juice of fruits mostly grapes. Mostly grapes are used in wine making because the juice of grapes contents high amount of sugar than any other fruits. Different varities of grapes like Palamino, Pisot, Peanut, Hair etc are used in wine making. The plant that produce the grape which is suitable for wine making are known as "Vitis Vinefera". Wine can also made from other fruits like Strawberry, Cherry, Apple etc.

Types of Wine

• Table/Natural/Still Wine: These wine do not contents co2 gas. So, these wines are also refered as still wine. The alcoholic contents of these wine ranges from 8% to 16% by volume. These wines are of 3 types:-

1. Red Wine (Vin de' Rouge): Red wine are basically produce from black grapes. Being fermented in contact with grape skin, these wines obtains their color. Red wines are dried & less sweet in nature. These wines are served in 18-22 degree celcius in a special red wine glass.
   
2. White Wine (Vin de' blance): White wine are usually produce from green grapes & the grapes juice is usually fermented away from the skin to avoid the color. Normally these wines are dry to very sweet. White wine are served chilled at 6-8 degree celcius in a special white wine glass.
   
3. Rose' (sweet/pink ) Wine: These wines are light pink in color & are produced from the black grapes not fermented with the skin. These wines are served chilled 6-8 degree celcius in a special rose' wine glass. Rose' wines are basically made in 3 ways:

a). By mixing red wine and white wine together.

b). By pressing the grapes slowly that same colour is extended.

c). Made from the black grapes fermented with the skin only for 48 hours.

• Sparkling wine: these wines contains co2 gas to make them fizzy. these wines are made from table wine that has under gone a secondary fermentation. The co2 gas is either produced manually or trapped during the secondary fermentation. The alcoholic content of this wine is less than 14%. The sparkling wines available from france, Spain, Italy, Germany. Among the various types of Sparkling Wine "Champange" is the most popular. This wine is made from three types of grapes, named Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier and Chardonny.

Champange: Champange is produce in Champange region, North-Eastern part of France. This wine is made by traditional method known as "Champonise" which means secondary fermentation in the bottle. This wine is mostly served in special occusion and festivals. It is served chilled 6-8 degree celcius in a "Champange Flute" or "Champange Sause" or "Champange Tunlip".

• Aromatised Wine: These wines are prepared with the addition of brandy or other spirits and flavored with the herbs, barks or other botanical plates and flowers. These wine often served in a combination with other beverages as cocktails. The alcoholic content of these wines ranges from 8-16 % by volume.
  

• Fortified Wine: These wines are fortified by the addition of alcohol either during or after the fermentation process. These wines have an alcoholic content ranges from 15-22 % by volume. These wines can be served before or after the meal. These wines are consumed in small amount.