CASE STUDY: Firmdale Hotels
Mitel Performance
Managing a unified communications (UC) network infrastructure that extends to multiple locations can be challenging. In the 24/7 hotel industry, uptime is critical to guest service, making this task even more daunting. Firmdale Hotels tackled this problem head-on, deploying Mitel Performance Analytics (MPA) to monitor and manage service quality for their Mitel UC solution. Martello’s solution for voice quality in hospitality help bring reliable service to staff and hotel guests.
Challenge
Firmdale Hotels are a group of eight boutique hotels in London and New York, known for their high standards of excellence and unique townhouse style of decoration. The company’s winning approach has been recognized with a number of awards, including the Queens Award for Enterprise in 2000, 2006 and 2009, in recognition of its outstanding achievement to international trade. The company recently launched the latest addition to its London portfolio – the Ham Yards urban village in Soho.
Firmdale chose a Mitel unified communications solution for its hotels. The solution’s simplicity and flexibility have contributed to improved reachability of staff and greater efficiency. To complement this streamlined communications infrastructure, Firmdale needed a management and monitoring tool that would assist the IT department in maintaining round the clock reliability. Uptime is critically important in the hotel industry, and with devices and applications spread across multiple locations, Firmdale wanted greater control over this infrastructure.
Customer Needs
• Uptime and service quality for guest service
• Single login for all Mitel equipment
• Secure remote access to troubleshoot problems
• Access to device and network data for forecasting
Solution
Working with Mitel authorized partner, 4Sight Communications, Firmdale deployed Mitel Performance Analytics (MPA) fault and performance management software, which is designed to monitor and manage Mitel UC solutions. Today, the company can manage devices in all of its locations from a single pane of glass.
It is an important convenience for Firmdale’s IT department, as they previously had to access each Mitel device separately using different logins. “Accessing Mitel devices with a single login saves us time and allows us to troubleshoot problems without onsite visits”, said Mark Rupert Read, Director of IT for Firmdale Hotels. “We also appreciate that this access is secure, giving us peace of mind”.
MPA has brought other benefits to Firmdale’s IT operations. The software monitors the performance, availability and reachability of Mitel devices on a 24/7 basis, as well as third-party applications such as routers, servers and voice mail. When an issue such as low voice quality or high memory utilization is detected, an alert is dispatched to IT staff in real-time via email, SMS or Twitter. “Quick alerting to exceeded thresholds for service quality has a significant impact on our business, ensuring we avoid downtime for our critical unified communications systems”, said Mr. Read.
“Hospitality is a 24/7 business, and Martello’s software-as-a-service has been keeping Firmdale ahead of UC network performance problems for more than four years, improving our guest experience. Martello is always improving and augmenting its offering, solving more of our network performance challenges from a single pane of glass.”
– Mark Rupert Read, FIRMDALE HOTELS
The MPA dashboard takes management of Mitel unified communications a step further, with at-a-glance reporting of trends and statistics by device and by location. Using a standard web browser from a PC or mobile device, Firmdale can monitor the performance of their systems on an ongoing and historical basis: “Insight into statistics and trends on our network helps us to plan more effectively and ensure optimal performance”, said Mr. Read.
Firmdale’s success with MPA is bolstered by the support and expertise of 4Sight Communications. An early adopter of MPA, 4Sight understands the value of proactive UC management.
In MPA, Firmdale now has a powerful tool at its fingertips, ensuring their business communications network will always be as responsive and reliable as the guest service they have become known for.
