Why You Need Hotel Quality Assurance Checklists

A hotel operations manager must monitor assets and operational procedures to deliver an excellent customer experience. From housekeeping to kitchen hygiene, you need to ensure quality and compliance. That’s where hotel quality assurance comes in.

Maintaining guest satisfaction is key to a hotel franchise’s success. Guests complain if something isn’t working. With apps like Yelp, negative customer experiences lead to bad reviews, and a bad review can do serious damage.

This is where hotel quality assurance comes in. Yes, it can feel daunting. However, you can use standardized checklists to break down quality assurance procedures into smaller steps.

This article explains why you need a hotel quality assurance checklist, examples of quality assurance procedures that could use such checklists, and procedure templates to help you get started with hotel quality assurance plans.

Why You Need Hotel Quality Assurance Checklists

Hoteliers need to know how to deal with every situation and train their staff to be up to the task when problems occur.

Hotel quality assurance (QA) checklists are lists of tasks hotels rely on to maintain high quality of services and amenities. Hotels create checklists for standardizing front desk services, performing general maintenance, cleaning rooms, and training staff, along with checklists for full-service amenities.

Hotels that do everything in their power to prevent common problems from occurring have a better chance of retaining their customers and keep an undamaged reputation.
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Standard operating procedures are vital for efficient hotel maintenance. And hotel maintenance checklists make them easier to follow. Over time, your staff will improve at performing quality assurance procedures as they perform the same daily tasks.

However, you still need to be able to monitor the staff and change the procedures when required. A computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) like MaintainX allows you to check in on staff as they work on checklists. CMMS also automatically logs data about completed procedures so you can use it later for a QA audit.

The best part? MaintainX offers ready-to-use templates, so you don’t have to create checklists from scratch.

Hotel Quality Assurance Checklist Templates

Checklists eliminate guesswork and minimize room for error. While creating lists can be time-intensive, we know from hotel reviews that not doing so and, as a result, receiving poor reviews will hurt your bottom line. The best CMMS offers built-in, fully customizable checklists to get you started immediately with your quality assurance program.

Here are examples of hotel quality assurance templates available on MaintainX:

1. Guest Room Housekeeping Checklist: Housekeeping is central to the hospitality industry because it directly influences the hotel’s aesthetic appeal and cleanliness. There are too many boxes on a housekeeping room checklist, and that’s where this template can help.
2. Frymaster BIELA 14/BIGLA 30: Use this inspection checklist in your hotel’s restaurant to maximize your fryer’s life with preventive maintenance. Removing grease and buildup regularly from the fryer makes cleaning effortless. However, following the manufacturer’s maintenance and cleaning guidelines is best. MaintainX allows you to customize checklists to quickly change items per the instructions.
3. Kitchen Operation Checklist (Opening): Completing kitchen procedures promptly and consistently ensures you never have to lose your reputation because someone forgot to dice onions in the morning. The kitchen operation checklist helps executive chefs or general managers monitor and confirm the completion of all procedures before opening the kitchen.

Of course, hotels & resorts need to maintain various other areas, such as:

• Building systems: lighting, plumbing, and HVAC systems
• Equipment maintenance: elevators, Wi-Fi connections, and cooling systems
• Hygiene: public areas, pool, laundry, and lounges
• Exterior: windows, gardens, and sidewalks

Checklists make hotel management easier to delegate tasks to the appropriate staff. However, your staff may still find it overwhelming.

3 Tips for Keeping Up with QA Logs

Keeping maintenance logs ensures you have the data you need when it’s time for a QA audit, FDA inspection of the hotel restaurant, or even a room inspection by a travel org. So if your staff finds it challenging to complete their checklists, offer help. Best practices to ensure your maintenance logs are always up to date include:

1. Use a CMMS

A CMMS is critical to ensuring logs are always up to date. Sure, your staff can still consistently maintain logs without it. But a CMMS makes the entire process simpler for you and your staff.

A mobile CMMS allows staff to quickly enter data or mark checklists as complete as soon as they’re done. You can monitor in real-time completed checklists in real time and collaborate with staff via the CMMS on additional checklist tasks when needed. You simply can’t achieve that level of efficiency with any other tool.

2. Ensure Everyone Knows How the CMMS Works

CMMS is a cost-effective tool that streamlines your maintenance workflows—provided your staff knows how to use it.

If your team isn’t entirely comfortable using the CMMS, they might skip checking off the tasks on the checklist. They might also fail to seek help quickly when needed if they don’t know how to do it using the CMMS. And that’s why it’s critical to train your staff to use the CMMS effectively. But let’s be clear: the best CMMS requires little-to-no training.

3. Explain the Importance of Keeping Logs to the Hotel Staff

Your staff may often need to spend many hours standing. This can be mentally and physically taxing, so they may not see consistent logging as a priority. This can lead to inconsistent record-keeping.

You won’t have visibility over quality assurance procedures or the data required for QA audits unless the staff consistently logs data. Help your staff understand the importance of maintaining accurate logs consistently and how they can avoid mistakes.

Get Started with Hotel Quality Assurance Checklists

Checklists make quality assurance easier and help you deliver a best-in-class guest experience from the moment guests check-in. While there are other inspection apps out there, when you use checklists on a CMMS like MaintainX, you can monitor the workflow in real time and compile maintenance logs automatically. In addition, when housekeeping team members and hotel maintenance workers use QA checklists across all areas of the hotel, positive reviews will follow.

Your staff will have complete clarity about the procedures and, if needed, can seek help from within the CMMS itself to ensure zero disruption to other hotel services.

Additional checklist templates to get you started include:

• Maintenance and Operations of Establishment Checklist: This checklist helps ensure your equipment is clean and hygienic. Over time, this procedure can improve profitability and employee safety.
• Traulsen Under-Counter Refrigerator Cleaning Form: This checklist helps staff with the steps required to clean the exterior, interior, and condenser coil on a Traulsen under-counter refrigerator. Keeping appliances in good condition according to brand standards is crucial.
• Back-of-House Cleaning Checklist: This checklist includes the steps required to perform deep cleaning and to keep the restaurant’s back-of-the-house spotless and hygienic.

Ready to beat out other hotel companies? Ready to be awarded luxury hotel status for customer service? MaintainX checklists are fully customizable. Try your first checklist today for free.