Background
Based around an elegant town house, originally built by Count Leon de Ferrari and surrounded by beautiful Mediterranean gardens, St Mary’s Hall Hotel on St Mary’s, Scilly Isles, offers contemporary style and comfort blended into a traditional setting.
The hotel has 27 rooms, and prides itself on its locally produced, sustainable food, created by a team of chefs and ‘inspired by soil and sea’.
The problem
“We were very keen to move into the cloud"
St Mary’s Hall Hotel used Hotel Executive, Avondata’s previous server-based system, until 2021. Running the hotel from a server, especially when the hotel was closed in winter but the system still needed to be physically maintained and backed up, wasn’t ideal, and the management team was also keen to gain the advantages of a cloud-based system which could be accessed from any device, at any time, anywhere.
General Manager Peter Jackson has been very impressed with Rezcontrol from Day 1. “I started working in the hotel on reception at about the time the decision was made to migrate,” he explained. “So I had one season with Hotel Executive and I have seen the year on year improvements since we migrated – though Rezcontrol was excellent from the beginning.”
The solution
“Rezcontrol is incredibly resilient and is always being improved”
St Mary’s Hall Hotel is an avid ‘early adopter’, keen to take on nearly all the system’s innovations, which they find very useful to keep improving and refining the hotel’s processes and admin while freeing up staff time to spend with guests and creating numerous efficiencies.
“It’s rare these days to get straight through to a help desk – this is one area where Rezcontrol really stands out”
“We’ve also always been so impressed by the service we received,” said Peter. “It’s quite rare these days to get straight through to a help desk, and for the same person to take full ownership of any issues and solve them quickly, often on the same day. If there is anything we need to understand or get an answer to, we just pick up the phone. Lauren and Shelly are brilliant!”
The benefits of Rezcontrol
“Both platform and integrations drive efficiency and increase revenue”
Peter and The St Mary’s Hall team have experienced multiple benefits since migrating.
“The customisable planner is so clear, and the whole system is so intuitive and easy to use,” said Peter. “We especially appreciate the on-screen symbols for groups, sole occupancy, twin bookings and so on as we can see the booking detail at a glance without having to delve deeper – and we love the new booking engine!”
“We really make the most of the platform features – from derived rates to marketing automations, payment services to management reports, it all comes together so well. And we LOVE the new booking engine!”
“Rezcontrol comes together so well,” said Peter. “We took on the new booking engine immediately, as it offers so much flexibility and advanced features, and we particularly like Rezcontrol’s own rate management system, with its derived rates which save us a great deal of time. We can control all our rates from the base rate, setting options for adding on meals, or offering discounts, without having to do it manually.”
The hotel is also making good use of the marketing automations. “We are using these more and more now, and would like to use post-stay more to extend return offers to our guests,” said Peter.
The team also finds Rezpay payment services easy, secure and foolproof to use, and the reports and ledger functions and invoice archive very useful.
“Rezcontrol has some great integrations – we love Resdiary and Rezgift”
In terms of integrations, with the hotel being renowned for its restaurant, Peter makes full use of Resdiary – and appreciates the integration between room and table bookings – as well as Rezgift, as the property sells a great deal of dining gift vouchers as well as offering vouchers for upsells and extras such as champagne in the room.
Excellent onboarding and support
“Most of all though, the tech support team is so helpful. Queries are always solved so quickly, and nothing ever seems too much trouble. Our onboarding and migration were very smooth.”
Testimonial
“Rezcontrol is so resilient as a system, and always being improved and developed. Avondata really listens to its customers and the support is second to none. The platform features and integrations really help us save time and create efficiencies, enabling us to focus more on our guests.”