Analyzing customer profitability in hotels using activity based costing

This paper investigates the use of customer profitability analysis (CPA) in four and five star hotels located in Algarve (Portugal). Traditional accounting systems have been criticized for focusing on product, service or department profitability, and not on customer profitability, thus failing to provide effective information to marketing-related decisions. Results are reported by operating departments, whilst marketing activities focus on customer market segments. Recognizing the growing emphasis on customer value creation, and to overcome the mismatch between the provision and use of information in hotels, CPA techniques have been suggested. Notwithstanding their benefits, namely a strategic focus, hotels still apply traditional techniques. A structured questionnaire collected through personal interviews showed that CPA is far from widespread in hotel management; instead, hotels accumulate costs in profit centers and in cost centers. None of the surveyed hotels had adopted activity based costing, despite this technique being viewed as the most appropriate to calculate individual customer profitability.Este artigo investiga a análise de rendibilidade de clientes nos hotéis de quatro e cinco estrelas do Algarve (Portugal). Os sistemas de contabilidade tradicionais focalizam-se na rendibilidade dos produtos, serviços ou departamentos não fornecendo informação eficaz para decisões de marketing. Os resultados são relatados por departamentos, sendo as atividades de marketing direcionadas para segmentos de mercado. Reconhecendo o foco na criação de valor para o cliente e o “desencontro” entre fornecimento e utilização de informação nos hotéis, a literatura tem sugerido técnicas de análise de rendibilidade de clientes. Apesar dos beneficios destas técnicas, nomeadamente o foco estratégico, os hotéis utilizam técnicas tradicionais. Um questionário estruturado recolhido presencialmente revelou que a técnica CPA está pouco difundida no setor; os hotéis acumulam custos por centros de resultados e por centros de custos. Nenhum adopta o custeio baseado nas actividades, embora seja o método mais apropriado para atribuir custos a clientes.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The History of Public Relations in Greece from 1950 to 1980: Professionalization of the “art”

The early development of public relations in Greece is explored through a focus on the period between 1950 and 1980. Specifically, the article considers the origins and early developments, important actors, international influences, professional bodies and the field of practice. It found that Greek business public relations was greatly influenced by American practices and through influential practitioners’ contact with the International Public Relations Association (IPRA)

THE CONTRIBUTION OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE INVESTMENTS TO THE GROWTH OF CONFERENCE TOURISM IN GREECE

The classic model of the Greek tourism product, sun, sea, ancient ruins, is no longer sufficient nor in all probability sustainable. Rival countries have a similar tourist market. This is why diversification of the tourism product and restructuring of supply are needed to face two considerable challenges: those of growing competition and of the chronic structural problem of Greek tourism, which is seasonality. Recently moves have been made to promote Greece as a tourist destination. Promoting Greece as a country for conference tourism is though something completely different. It is directed at a different kind of public and promotes different strong points of the country.That is why both the public and private sector play a key role in developing and promoting Greece as a conference destination.Conference tourism, Private Investments, Public Investments.

COST ACCOUNTING IN GREEK HOTEL ENTERPRISES: AN EMPIRICAL APPROACH

The purpose of this paper is to provide insights of the Greek Hotel Industry practices in the field of Cost Accounting. To this end, a survey was conducted with 85 firms of the Greek hotel sector with the use of questionnaires. Results show that hotel enterprises have a high fixed cost structure and also face a high proportion of indirect costs. The gathered data led us to the conclusion that the majority of the hotels use traditional cost accounting systems. Nevertheless, the adoption rate of an activity based costing (ABC) system is considered rather satisfactory considering the rates that come from surveys conducted in hotel enterprises in other countries. According to the statistical analysis, the factors that mostly affect the managerial decision of hotels in favour of an ABC system include their cost structure and the cost calculation per customers' categories.cost accounting practices, cost accounting systems, cost accounting techniques, activity based costing, hotel enterprises, Greece

Cost-based Management and Decision Making in Greek Luxury Hotels

The use of cost accounting systems by hotel businesses is improving the quality of decision making. The development of theories on costing, combined with advances in information technology, has improved the theoretical capabilities of such systems. However, two questions remain largely unanswered: a) whether these theories lead to tangible improvements; and b) what are the variables that drive the success of cost accounting systems. Our research shows that hotel managers need to be convinced about the use and performance benefits of such systems in the decision making process.Cost Accounting, Decision Making, Luxury Hotels, Greece

Selling Rooms Online: The Use of Social Media and Online Travel Agents

Purpose – This paper aims to focus on the reason why hoteliers choose to be present in online travel agent (OTA) and social media web sites for sales purposes. It also investigates the technological and human factors related to these two practices. Design/methodology/approach – The research is based on a survey sent to a wide range of hotels in a Swiss touristic region. The empirical analysis involves the specification of two ordered logit models exploring the importance (in terms of online sales) of both social media and the online travel agent, Booking.com. Findings – Findings highlight the constant tension between visibility and online sales in the web arena, as well as a clear distinction in social media and OTA web site adoption between hospitality structures using online management tools and employing personnel with specific skills. Practical implications – The research highlights the need for the hospitality industry to maintain an effective presence on social media and OTAs in order to move towards the creation of a new form of social booking technologies to increase their visibility and sales. Originality/value – This research contributes to understanding the major role played by OTAs and social media in the hospitality industry while underlining the possibility of a major interplay between the two

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse