Just a few weeks since its launch, HotelPlanner's AI assistant is taking phone calls, selling hotel rooms and servicing customer queries for over 10,000 customers a day. This number of daily phone calls is now set to dramatically increase.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla., Oct. 31, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- HotelPlanner, a company that for 20 years has developed technology that powers millions of hotel bookings announces a world first that will change how customer's find and book their hotels.
HotelPlanner.aiis the first end-to-end AI hotel booking assistant. Fluent in 15 languages the AI Assistant will take a call, respond to customer requirements, check the availability and price of suitable rooms, explain the unique nature of the room type, booking terms and respond to detailed questions about each hotel before processing a credit card booking. Then the guest will receive confirmation by text and/or email. The AI Assistant can book prepaid rooms for the best savings or a pay at hotel rate.
"We launched our Gig economy call center during Covid. It's been incredibly successful with over 7,000 active salespeople but the number of available agents limited our growth. We used data from over 8,000,000 reservation calls to train AI Voice assistants to not only look after our customers' many queries but sell rooms in a streamlined, enjoyable and efficient experience that has never been seen before." said Tim Hentschel, Co-CEO, HotelPlanner.
With access to HotelPlanner's inventory of over 1 million properties worldwide HotelPlanner's AI Assistants are already looking after the hotel needs of customers that speak English (in multiple variants), Hindi, Mandarin, French, German Spanish and Portuguese. Greek, Turkish and many more languages will be coming soon.
The Assistant can deal with complex queries such as "Hi James, I'm looking for a family friendly hotel, within a 4-hour flight of West Palm Beach, FL. I live on the beach, so I don't want a beach resort, and I want it to be 4 or 5 stars and have an indoor pool."
Feedback from users has been overwhelmingly positive, with lots of praise for the technology for its efficiency and ease of use. Customers can always ask to talk to a human agent, but such is the quality of the service that this is a very rare occurrence. Below is an actual transcript from a customer at the end of a booking process:
Customer: Will you be there when I check in?
AI Assistant James: I appreciate you asking, I apologize for the confusion, Derek. I should have been clearer. I'm a virtual assistant.
Customer: And I want to know your name so I can leave a….. Oh, sXXXt! Okay. I was gonna give a great review for you.
AI Assistant James: Really appreciate your kind intention Derek!
Other customers have enjoyed buying their hotel rooms from Santa in the North Pole, a Donnie in DC, a Bodie in California and a Sofia in Roma.
"We are incredibly excited to lead the charge in integrating AI into the travel booking experience," said John Prince, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of HotelPlanner. "HotelPlanner.AI not only simplifies the booking but as our AI Assistants continue to learn they will only get better. Now our human call centre team can look after customers with the more complicated and higher value bookings."
As the holiday season approaches, HotelPlanner is particularly thrilled to announce that proceeds generated from any booking taken by special AI Assistant Santa will be donated to Toys for Tots, ensuring that children in need receive gifts this season.
"We believe that technology should serve a greater purpose," added Hentschel. "By connecting travellers with Santa and supporting a wonderful cause, we are excited to make this holiday season memorable for all."
HotelPlanner.AI is now live, and travellers can begin exploring the future of booking with AI Assistant today.
For more information, visit HotelPlanner.com or to talk to the Assistant yourself visit Hotelplanner.ai
About HotelPlanner:
HotelPlanner is a leading travel technology company and hotel booking platform that combines proprietary artificial intelligence and a 24/7 global gig-based reservations and customer service network. HotelPlanner is one of the world's leading providers of individual, group and corporate travel bookings. Founded in 2003, HotelPlanner has enduring partnerships with the world's largest online travel agencies, well-known global hotel chains, individual hotels, online wedding providers, ancillary lodging providers, corporations, sporting organizations from youth to professional, universities, and government agencies.
HotelPlanner's family of brands includes its flagship site, HotelPlanner.com; its meetings & events-focused sites, Meetings.com; EventConnect.com; and VenueExplorer.com; Lucid Travel, which focuses on sports team travel; Eventsquid, which focuses on corporate and association event registration; and Cleverdis, a mainstay in trade show media.
Media Contact:
Tim Gunstone Chief Communications Officer, HotelPlanner Inc
Tim.Gunstone@HotelPlanner.com
Samantha Silveira, AMWPR, samantha@amwpr.com(212) 542-3146
