Historic hotels group boosted by technology overhaul

DURHAM, U.K. - Dec. 13, 2013 - PRLog -- ONE of the region’s most prominent hoteliers has invested in a new telecoms system which will significantly reduce its overheads and improve its customer services capabilities.

No Ordinary Hotels, which runs historic County Durham hotel Lumley Castle and its sister venue Coombe Abbey, in Warwickshire, brought in Ogilvie Communications to transform its ailing technology infrastructure.

In an industry which relies heavily on 24/7 communications, the hotels had been lumbered with a telecoms system which required constant maintenance – often involving the sourcing of parts that were becoming increasingly rare.

Meanwhile, calls between the two hotels in the group had to be made on a public network, adding extra overheads to the business.

The Gateshead firm was tasked with creating a system that would not only enable the hotels to increase their efficiency by tapping into groundbreaking communications technology, but which was also completely reliable.

Ogilvie delivered a Samsung VOIP telecommunications solution to the hotels and carried out a complete refresh of their existing voice and data network.

The cabling infrastructure was in need of an overhaul to bring it up to a standard where it could be easily maintained and was capable of handling VOIP.

Given the historic nature of the hotels, this required great care and expertise to carry out the work without damaging the aesthetics of the properties.

A software upgrade was also undertaken which means the high speed link between the two sites can now be used for all staff across the group to communicate without incurring any costs.

The new infrastructure also gives the hotels disaster recovery back-up should communications in either hotel fail.

Simon Ward, telecoms operations manager at Ogilvie, said: “The project took meticulous planning, as every possible foreseeable issue was laid out and dealt with before installation began.

“We worked closely with the hotelier’s staff to establish exactly what their requirements were and to ensure that the whole process could be carried out smoothly and with minimal disruption caused. Ultimately the hotels are now supported by a reliable, modern communication system and supported by fully qualified personnel to handle any future maintenance.”

Ahmad Mohammad, head of IT at Lumley Castle, said: “Ogilvie provided the VOIP based telecommunication solution for coombe abbey that encompasses the staff and hotel guests’ networks for voice and data. I get a certain sense of joy working with their team of professionals who consider customer satisfaction as paramount.”

Ogilvie Communications provides integrated telecoms, mobile, voice, IT services, infrastructure services, monitoring and security consultancy. For more information visit: www.ogilvie-communications.com.

ENDS