Luis Alberto Grünewald, in his technical publication "SAFETY IN TOURIST ACTIVITY" makes the following introduction:
"The development of tourist activity in a destination basically involves considering the relationship between two variables: the demand - a tourist or hiker - and the supply of the destination. An approach to knowing the needs of the demand is to consider the set of statistically dominant behaviors of man when developing tourist activities, a set of values that have no materiality but that the demand psychologically accepts and moves according to them.
The first impulse that an individual has is a perceived need or deprivation that is transformed into a desire when communicating their needs and that leads to the development of a tourist or recreational product that allows them to satisfy that need. The main needs of the conscious and unconscious visitor when choosing a destination are the originality of the offer, the quality, the price and the safety.
We understand tourist security as the protection of life, health, physical, psychological and economic integrity of visitors, service providers and members of the host communities.
This permanent search for well-being that man has as his life objective has in his free time devoted to tourism and recreation an important guideline for his personal and social development.
THE PERCEPTION OF SECURITY
Safety must be interpreted as a subjective state that allows us to perceive that we are moving in a space free of real or potential risks. The lack of security generates a conflict, a clash or struggle of values and rights that consider:
- A setting, the urban environment where they move permanently or temporarily.
- Personal interests, as we have already said, the citizen somatizes the suffering and uncertainty for his family, his life, his property and in some cases moral damage if they have already been the victim of a criminal act, which produces a concrete feeling of loss of social and personal values.
- The participation of the direct actors in the conflict
- The citizen and the security agent
According to Garde Enciso, we can divide the tourist motivations of an individual into two large groups: those that are based on PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT and those that are based on SOCIAL IMPULSES.
Among the first we find:
• Physiological or vital needs. • The security-risk needs.
• The needs for esteem and notoriety.
• Desires for transitive self-realization.
The foregoing makes it possible to specify a first approximation to the objective of this work since it is considered that safety is one of the primary variables of high valuation for demand and competitiveness for a destination for its capture in the market. "
The security policy establishes three possible strategies when faced with a problem:
• Preventive, it seeks to reduce risk factors;
• Contingency, tries to minimize the seriousness of the problem once it has occurred;
• Corrective, redirect the situation
Hotel security considers the system of technical means and organizational measures aimed at preventing, reducing and controlling the various criminal actions as well as protecting people and property in a hotel establishment. The company is responsible for the training of its personnel, prevention, first aid and emergency planning, be it for the health of a client, fire or earthquake, thus assuming the corresponding responsibilities.
Basic Thematic Fields
• SECURITY OF PERSONS AND PROPERTY
• SECURITY AGAINST FIRE
• INFORMATION OR INFORMATION
SECURITY
• MEDICAL SECURITY
• BUILDING SECURITY • GASTRONOMIC SECURITY
Security of People and Assets Crimes in the Hotel Industry
It is common to focus the analysis of crimes in the hotel business from the outside, that is, their perpetrator as a person outside the establishment. But no less important is discovering the shortcomings offered by the system, whose weaknesses are installed from within. In either case, socio-environmental factors converge that interact with the environment and condition reality. The adaptive capacity of the Security specialist must be such that he must take for granted that the magical and pleasant service offered by a hotel to its clients, many times does not sympathize with the place where it is located, even more: it becomes a preferred target for crime.
For a crime to occur, a set of factors must be given that allow its consummation:
1- THE SUBJECT: a person with intentionality
2- AN OBJECT OF ATTRACTION: a person or an element of the person or the establishment itself
3- THE OPPORTUNITY: favorable circumstance that allows the seizure of the same and impunity to carry out the crime.
There are crimes against:
- Company property (towels, ashtrays, etc.)
- The guest or guests' belongings
(cameras, laptop, money, jewelry, etc.)
The crime can be produced by
- Criminals
- The guest himself
- A visitor to the establishment
- Dishonest personnel
- Third parties related to the establishment -suppliers-.
We find two components of the security system for crime prevention:
- The human component that corresponds to human resources directly or indirectly related to security in the establishment
- The technological component that is based on infrastructure and technical equipment with preventive and predictive purposes of active and passive protection.
Fire Safety in Hotel Establishments
This topic is one of the most forgotten. Fires: without a doubt it is the latent risk 24 hours a day, 365 days whose origins are concentrated in electricity (bad installation, overloads, multiple plugs, connections), rooms (smoking, irons, kitchenettes, candles) and kitchens (fryers, hoods, ducts). Fire safety considers the system of technical means and organizational measures aimed at preventing, controlling and extinguishing fires in order to protect people and property. This system must be detailed in the FIRE SAFETY MANUAL of the establishment.
This publication is basically made up of the Facilities Maintenance Program, the description of the functions of each member of the security system and the Evacuation Plan.
The technical means correspond to the infrastructure and equipment that allows the implementation of a fire prevention, detection and extinction system, while the organizational measures correspond to the strategies, through plans and programs, that the establishment implements in order to successfully materialize the fire prevention, detection and extinction system.
The technical means are structured based on an active protection system integrated by elements, equipment and technological control, detection and automatic operation systems that allow detecting and communicating a fire (including emitting equipment -sensors, smoke / temperature detectors / flames, manual call points, etc. - and signal receivers - acoustic alarms, etc.).
The passive protection system is made up of the physical elements of the building, including, among others, the escape route signaling system, compartmentalisation of the rooms, smoke control and emergency lighting system.
An important issue to consider is presented, such as the building design guidelines along with the implemented safety standards.
The design criteria for projecting vertical -stairs- and horizontal -corridors- circulations as well as the elements that make up the system - hermetically closed stairwells, the doors must open in the exit direction and must always remain closed, easy access to identify and free of obstacles, if they have anti-panic bars since they must not have locks or bolts, the cladding elements must be non-combustible, etc., they are joined to the emergency signaling and lighting system in the integral design of the establishment.
There are a number of specific factors that greatly affect people's safety:
• Lack of knowledge of the facilities and premises where occupants and workers are located.
• Sleeping guests.
• Size of the facilities and consequently the number of occupants thereof.
ADDITIONAL RISK UNKNOWLEDGMENT
Few are those who are aware of the routes of travel when they proceed to stay in a hotel, however what really concerns us is the knowledge of the workers themselves, where there should be no ignorance of the facilities. This fact added to the lack of clarity of the indicative signs of the emergency exits, evacuation routes… is the main cause of deaths in the event of fire. The signs must be sufficiently clear and adequate so that evacuation can take place without the need for any indication.
However, the problems are given, either by defective signals, by excess (there are so many signals together that it is not known what they want to indicate), and location of the same incorrect (they guide us to wrong directions, to places without exit, to areas storage or private use, where there is no way out).
SLEEPING GUESTS
It is a fact that must be counted on, both in hotels and in Residences for the Elderly. This means that the person when an emergency situation occurs does not react fully, is disoriented and this can cause them to make incorrect decisions.
On more than one occasion, the person may not be aware of the situation, that is, they do not hear the alarm, they do not hear people passing through the corridors,…
Other important aspects are that the maximum occupancy that a hotel reaches it is precisely when the guests are sleeping.
HOTEL SIZE
The bigger the building, the more people it will be necessary to evacuate. The main problem occurs when evacuating, horizontal evacuations, in principle do not have to create problems, it is in vertical evacuations where many risks converge and one of them is the evacuation height, that is, if there are 20 floors, the fire brigade platforms do not reach.
The number and width of the necessary escape routes depends on the hotel's occupancy, which can be calculated directly for the maximum occupancy assumption or estimated at 1 person for every 20 m² built.
HIGH FLUCTUATION OF STAFF
Most hotels have a very short fixed staff, and generally hire staff based on the demand imposed by the seasons or contracted events, with which this staff lacks basic training in prevention of fires and evacuation, they lack a thorough knowledge of the entire building and of course they have no knowledge of the existence of the Emergency Plan, much less of its content. In fact, I have personally performed occasional waiter services in 4 and 5 star hotels in Bariloche, Argentina, and I never received any information.
ADDITIONAL RISKS
The activities held in hotels are numerous, from weddings, communions, company events, bachelor parties…, all of them increase the risk of a fire (paper tablecloths, candles, sparklers, fire shows, additional lighting, music equipment…). Many times the ignorance of the owner or the decorator in relation to the regulatory requirements, the tests and trials of materials and the Fireproofing procedures, makes them use materials with a high heat load, with a high fire risk, in the decoration of hotels.
The causes of fire in a hotel are numerous, but we wanted to reflect the most common:
• Accumulation of garbage, paper…
• Combustible materials near heat sources
• Open flames.
• Guest action (smoking cigarettes in bed, badly extinguished cigarettes near carpets, curtains, wastebasket…)
• Kitchens, heaters, hair dryers, air conditioners.
In the case of the EVACUATION PLAN, the human factor is fundamental. The chain of command from the detection of the accident requires a clear articulation of times and people. It is important to highlight in this Plan:
• Job description program for the establishment's staff (the chain of command in the event of a claim).
• Communications system program (internal and external) in the event of a claim.
• Action program in case of fire (with the role of each internal or external participant)
• Emergency medical assistance program.
• Evacuation program (establishing exit orders for guests, to make the process more effective).
• Action program with the Guest during and after the claim in order to avoid panic situations.
The fire safety system should not neglect the building's comprehensive security system in the event of an accident, since this circumstance can be used to commit criminal acts by third parties.
It is always important to implement an Emergency Plan whose main scope is to establish the emergency response procedure-guide, which defines the rules, the organizational structure, communications, responsibilities, resources, the integration of public services and authorities and enforcement procedures for each of the functions, to deal with the incident in an organized manner with the following purposes:
• Protect human life.
• Contain and control the incident that caused the emergency.
• Minimize damage to the environment.
• Minimize damage to the installation.
Fundamental prevention measures
Emergency exits are considered decisive within the prevention measures against catastrophes. Hotels and other establishments in which there is a large influx of public have to be prepared, and this is what the law establishes for certain contingencies, such as fires, floods, electrical blackouts, etc. However, despite periodic inspections in buildings considered 'at risk', it is not difficult to observe a certain laxness in compliance with the regulations, as evidenced by the presence of padlocks in the emergency exits of some premises or obstacles that block them.
• If a fire strikes someone in a hotel room, the most
It is common to see smoke in the corridor and stairs, which act as a chimney flue through which the air that feeds the fire circulates. The guest must be very clear about the exit before trying to reach it, since most likely they do not know the building. Therefore, the idea of looking for an escape between smoke and heat, and on all fours, to avoid poisoning, may not be the best. It is advisable to put a wet towel at the bottom of the door to prevent the entry of smoke, call reception and signal to be seen from outside. The fire may be coming from outside.
• In the event of floods, it is safest to stay in the upper parts of buildings. The higher the safer. Serve the experience of tourists who stayed in hotel rooms and managed to survive a catastrophe of a magnitude like the tsunami.
• When a cyclone, tornado or hurricane occurs, it is necessary to heed the guidelines set by the authorities, before, during and after. A state of emergency is decreed and certain recommendations are made public, such as avoiding leaving the house, not riding a motorcycle, etc. • The seismic and volcanic risk in our environment is not usually considered but
it is also not non-existent. If it does occur, it is safer to stay indoors and it is very important that the population take into account all the recommendations of the authorities and civil protection services.
Informational or Information Security Information
can contribute to generating security or insecurity in the Guest, which is why it is extremely important to handle informational communication as a valuable tool for the establishment.
Information as a Security Guideline for the Guest
Basically, information is all knowledge of data that expands or confirms facts that can be useful in making decisions for our purposes or for our clients, facilitating their anticipation or to predict events.
The task of communication in relation to safety, from the strategic planning of the company through the communication strategy with the client, must underpin all its actions, performances, speeches, messages, etc., so that the company can fully comply with its mission: to generate security for the guest.
Information security has as its basic mission the protection, orientation and assistance to the guest. Clear information on certain emergency services (doctors, police, ATMs, tourist information centers, etc.) of the place.
Is it safe to visit such a place?
They robbed me, what do I do?
What is the pharmacy on duty?
What to do if you lost your passport and have to return to your country?
How to proceed if you run out of money for your return ticket? Questions like these are usually asked by hotel guests, but we can say that we generally find that the information is:
• The easiest security variable to solve
• The easiest security variable to implement
Here we have a paradox:
It is the least resolved in the vast majority of hotel establishments.
It is extremely important to understand that information generates security and the lack of it leads to generating anguish, fear, anxiety or even panic attacks depending on the type of problem that the guest presents.
We can identify three types of information that a hotel establishment must handle:
1. Basic
information 2. Preventive
information 3. Information against contingencies
While most guests deposit their valuables and documents in the hotel's safe deposit boxes, some prefer not to, which can sometimes be inconvenient. In this sense, the concierge should advise you to keep your valuables in the respective safe deposit boxes, warning you, without creating panic, about the situation in the city, since unexpected and unpleasant events tend to occur in all large cities.
Generally, when the contingents of tourists arrive, they leave their luggage at the reception, neglecting it while they check-in, and that is where the surveillance has to have all the senses alert to protect them. In the event of a robbery inside or outside the hotel, the guest must never be abandoned, the hotelier must be with him at all times, he must even accompany him to the police station or police checkpoint to make the corresponding report and even offer help economic if the case requires it.
Some fearful or phobic guests because they have suffered a bad experience, observe and ask about the emergency exits, for this reason, during check-in, every hotel must provide an alternative plan that includes the emergency exits, smoke detectors and sprinklers, so the guest will notice the organization and prevention and will feel calmer knowing that everything is controlled and supervised.
Every hotel, regardless of its category, must have excellent signage in corridors, elevators and rooms and all its employees must be trained to handle various situations, so as not to create nerves, panic or uncertainty, relaxing and trying to relieve the guest. Let's not forget, although it sounds strange, many guests die and many others break down during their stay.
Medical Safety
Basic Conceptual Guidelines
The World Health Organization defines health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not only the absence of diseases or illnesses.
The issue of medical safety presents a set of variables to consider:
- Destination endemic diseases and vaccination requirements.
- Information on the health characteristics of the destination.
- Information on the climatic characteristics of the destination.
- Advice related to the health of the Guests
- Information of the points of attention to urgencies or medical emergencies.
Ideally, each hotel should have a normal medical service guard who can assist any guest who needs it. On repeated occasions, a person's life depends on a few seconds, a good executive should not wait that second, he must do everything possible so that the guest leaves the establishment safely and satisfied.
We must remember that the tourist requires greater attention and assistance due to the lack of knowledge of the destination, so that information becomes a factor of the highest value.
The search for a state of well-being raises the need to implement a medical security system that must be analyzed from two points of view:
• From the needs of the guest
• From the needs of the hotel establishment employee
1.- From the needs of the host, it is necessary to establish a prevention strategy in the face of the different health risk situations that may arise during the stay in the establishment until considering the local guidelines regarding the different variables treated in what we call Medicine of the Traveler.
The guest generally has health services through Traveler Assistance Cards and / or Social Work. The Travel Assistance Cards operate through prepaid medicine companies, credit cards and health insurance, with assistance at the local and international level. They have different types of plans in which the amount of coverage and services vary, and they have different types of coverage.
Total tourist assistance: they have medical, legal, financial and insurance assistance services.
2.- From the needs of the security employee of the hotel establishment, it is necessary to establish a prevention strategy in the face of the different situations of professional risk that may arise during the development of their work.
Risk situations in the hotel
The following situations may occur in the establishment, among others:
• Risk situations due to accidents (falling in the bathtub or staircase)
• Risk situations due to infections (sick personnel contaminating)
• Poisoning risk situations (cross contamination)
• Risk situations due to the presence of latent pathologies (hypertension, epilepsy, asthma, severe allergies, etc.)
• Risk situations due to the presence of temporary pathologies (pregnant women, newborns, appendicitis)
We can also classify them into:
• Common situations (headache)
• Complex situations (fainting)
• Emergency situations (snake bite, yellow jacket wasp, etc.)
• Highly complex situations (massive intoxication)
• Extraordinary situations (landslides)
• Situations due to occupational risks of personnel.
Security Edilicia
Safety edilicia is the set of actions aimed at reducing the likelihood of a possible event unwanted relative to the architectural and urban object that forms the hotelier, is what has to do with accessibility to the physical environment, that is, the elimination of architectural and urban barriers for the displacement of the elderly, children, small people, temporarily disabled people, a person who has had an accident, a pregnant woman, and people with motor, sensory or mental disabilities.
It is a basic system for the prevention of accidents implemented by the establishment's Security Department and that must be interpreted as a sequential and methodological program of operating procedures that allow to increase the efficiency of the hotel's operation, as well as the permanent evaluation and periodic adaptation of the system.
Why implement a building security strategy in a hotel establishment?
In answer to this question we can point to at least four basic reasons:
• The guest consciously or unconsciously requires security during their stay.
• The hotel service provider must establish the best strategy in order to avoid an accident that could affect people (guests, employees, visitors, etc.) and property.
• It is a legal requirement. In the case of Argentina, for example, from the
National Constitution through the national and provincial laws, the
Municipal ordinances, or the recent Labor Risk Prevention Law; a legal body is formed that establishes a set of legal requirements to achieve physical spaces where the human being operates as safely as possible.
• Accidents always happen, even with very advanced prevention strategies and technologies.
Gastronomic Security
The topics that relate the gastronomic sector of a hotel in relation to Security are fundamentally:
Theft of merchandise. The most common cases are during the purchase and receipt of the products.
Criminal acts of employees against diners. The most common are:
• Wrong change to a diner
• Imitation of the customer's signature on an invoice
• Improper charge for unrealized drinks
Malicious acts of employees against the establishment.
The most common cases in the lounge are:
• the collection of the consumption without marking it in the box
• the payment of the consumption with tickets already used
• the payment of the consumption without tickets, charging more
• the collection of canceled tickets
• the invitation to their friends without paying
• the misuse of happy hour (two for one)
• the misuse of gift vouchers
• charging the customer with an invoice already collected from another customer
• adding consumption by hand to the invoice
• the falsification of invoices
• the error in the issuance of the credit card
The most common cases in the kitchen are:
• Appropriation of merchandise.
• Appropriation through the garbage container
• Appropriation through smaller portions
• Clandestine charging for meals
Malicious acts of employees against other colleagues. The most common is: • appropriates the tips left by customers at the tables
Criminal acts of the guests against the hotel.
The most common cases are:
• Order two dishes, taste part of one and return it
• When food is taken from the buffet for people who are at the table and have not paid their ticket
• When food is taken from the buffet for free dinner in the room
Food safety in buffets.
These services carry an extra health risk derived from the waiting time for food in the dining room, it is important to maintain the temperature of the Risseaut.
The word buffet (from the French "buffet") refers to food - breakfast, main meal or dinner - made up of a variety of hot and cold dishes, displayed on display tables equipped with hot or cold maintenance systems, depending on the type. the case, and among which the diner can choose, depending on their appetites or needs or suggestions from the chef. Increasingly used in hotels and restaurants, both due to its great versatility and the saving in personnel that this type of self-service entails, the buffet must respect requirements to guarantee the safety of the food offered there.
The fact that the wait takes place in the dining room itself, the place less controlled from a hygienic-sanitary point of view than the kitchen, and without heating prior to consumption (in the case of hot preparations), together with the high degree of manipulation by the diners themselves when serving, increases the risk of toxiinfection considerably, especially if the exposure time is prolonged.
Public Security
System that allows the free movement of tourists through the destination, reducing the percentage of conflict situations, mainly criminal acts -thefts and robberies- and accidents. Item closely related to information security.
Social Security
System that allows the free movement of tourists through the destination in the face of social problems such as mobilizations, strikes, etc.
Economic Security
Traveler reinsurance system to prevent risks from an economic perspective. The issue of economic security presents a set of variables to consider, but fundamentally it has to take into account in these cases the cost of sending the money, the speed of reception by the recipient and the ease of accessing this service.
Security in Recreation and Events
System that allows protection during a recreational activity or during the performance or participation of a sporting event such as classical, musical, recreational, etc. of the destination visitor.
Road and Transport Safety
System that allows the free and safe movement through the communication routes of the visitor from the exit of the place of habitual residence until their return to it.
Environmental Safety
System that allows the protection of people in natural spaces and against weather problems.
Tourist Services Security
System that allows the protection of tourists during travel through the different tourist and recreational service establishments (hotel, restaurant, travel agency, etc.) of the tourist destination.
Security Against Terrorism (State Spring)
As we can analyze, we find a set of conflict points on security in the relationship of the environment with the visitor in a tourist or recreational destination. The most significant ones that must be resolved are:
• Protect the visitor from the people
• Protect the visitor from the criminal
• Protect the visitor from the cultural environment
• Protect the attraction of the visitor who takes a “souvenir” • Protect the visitor from the tourist attraction
Bedroom Safety
The most common problems are:
• Tripping - from beds, rugs and furniture
• Guest's kettle - can lead be thrown by a child?
Will steam affect other electrical appliances?
• Brackets protruding from shelves or TV cabinet
• Windows that cannot be opened
• Stability of furniture and accessories
Bathroom Safety
Slip, the most common accident related to bathroom safety.
To prevent we have:
• Skaters and handrails that can help prevent slipping, especially when showers are located in the bathrooms.
• The surface of the floor must be reasonably non-slip.
• The temperature of the water must be considered with regard to the risk of burns and legionella (a microorganism that develops in cooling towers and infects us orally through water spray)
Safety Window
When considering safety windows and glass, observations should be:
• Are windows safely cleaned by personnel and contractors?
• If the windows are part of a door, are they made of safety glass?
• Is there a danger that a person could fall from a window? (bottom edge of windows should be at least 800mm above ground level unless a barrier is present to prevent falls)
• When there is a danger of hanging from a window at height, the devices should be provided to avoid the total opening of the window. Remember: beds and other furniture that children can access to open the windows.
Elevator Safety Elevators
for passengers and equipment or food must be periodically inspected by a competent person, in accordance with the requirements of lifting operations and lifting machines in each country.
All elevators when in use should be scrutinized in detail:
• After major significant changes are made.
• Every 6 months if the elevator is used at any time to carry people and every 12 months if it only carries loads, or according to an examination regime, and
• As a result of "exceptional circumstances" such as damage or the fact long periods of use or a major change in operating conditions that may affect the integrity of the equipment.
Pool and Spa Safety
You should consider the following points:
• Safe storage of chemicals (COSHH).
• The surface of the floors surrounding the pool must be without flaws.
• Adequate staff training.
• Proper supervision of the pool for lifeguards or lifeguards.
• Adequate water disinfection.
• Regular daily water test and record of such tests.
• Adequate signage for warnings.
• All facilities must be protected against the entry or unauthorized use of persons outside the facilities.
The first problem lies in the lack of culture that only external clients are clients, those who pay and allow us to live, when in reality the internal client is the first stone we need to build an effective and satisfactory management of external clients.
In short, a properly trained, motivated, satisfied and accomplished worker will perform all their tasks much better, thinking not only of their satisfaction, but also of their colleagues, their company and of course, their company's clients, their passengers.. This idea must reach each and every one of the company's departments and all the people linked in one way or another to it.
When we say departments, we mean administration, logistics, production, handling, maintenance, cleaning, transportation and a very long etcetera. The receptionist is just as important as the room or room waiter, the maid, the one who is in charge of cleaning the premises or the one who delivers goods. They all work to give a better service to their clients and to satisfy their needs and expectations.
For more information visit www.alimentosyseguridad.com, thank you.
Hugo Orellana
Industrial Technician in Food
Trainer in Food Handling and Good Practices in Food Services
www.alimentosyseguridad.com Page 20.
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