114. Lost & Found: Make it Seamless
Anecdote from Tokyo, Japan:
As we had a red-eye flight that evening, we left our luggage at the hotel after check-out and headed out to explore the city for several hours before heading to the airport.
While we were already in the train heading to our lunch destination, my nephew realised he had left behind a new box of specialty chocolates in his room's mini bar. Eventually when we returned to the hotel in the evening to retrieve our luggage, we asked the porter if he could check on this item.
The employee followed up right away by checking with the receptionist at the front desk, who then made a call to check on the necessary. Eventually, the porter came back with the good news that the Housekeeping attendant had found it earlier when clearing the room and now his colleague was retrieving the said item from Lost and Found.
Within 15 minutes since our first enquiry, the box of chocolates was brought to us in the lobby. My nephew was most pleased it back and commented on the very good service.
Now, while I am happy for him and appreciated the employees' effort, I wondered if the process could have been a lot more seamless, such as the suggested sequence below:
a) Housekeeping finds item in room and hands over to Loss and Found, alerting Front Office at same time
b) Relevant department to check in system for any useful comments/information: e.g. known departure time, holding of luggage, etc. Update found item in system.
c) Bell team to indicate pending item found. This could be a colour-indication on the luggage tag or a separate note attached to the guest luggage. If item does not need refrigeration, it can even be placed at the porter desk/area for easy retrieval.
Imagine that the above had been carried out. What this meant for the guests is, rather than having to ask about the lost item, the bell team would have ready awareness once the luggage tag was handed over. (Or even better, the guest is recognised before the room number or tag is given.)
That would have been much more seamless.
Reflective thoughts: Seamless collaboration across departments is not easy to achieve on a consistent basis. Without a proper system or process in place where everyone knows exactly what to do and how to do it, the results usually vary since it depends on "who you get".
What are the inconsistencies in terms of inter-departmental collaboration you would like to work on? What are your next steps, and by when?