the FINANCIAL -- Three-quarters of hotel guests who regularly use Wi-Fi facilities
have said they would prefer capped free Wi-Fi access over charged-for
options promising greater connection speeds and reliability, according to Caterer and Hotelkeeper.
That's the result of a new survey by the Mystery Dining Company, which also found that the availability of Wi-Fi was an important factor for at least eight in 10 consumers when choosing where to stay.
Some 76% indicated that would prefer a less-reliable, slower connection offered for free with a capped limit, compared with more reliable Wi-Fi charged either by time or download usage. And 99% of respondents said that if they had paid £100 or more for their room then they would automatically expect free Wi-Fi access.
More than three-quarters (78%) of the 216 people surveyed also said they would be willing to visit a dedicated "Free Wi-Fi Zone" within a hotel if it meant access to a more reliable and faster service, which might offer smaller hotels a means to help meet customer expectation in the short-term.
Just under half (48%) of respondents said that downloading and sending e-mails was the main reason for needing Wi-Fi when staying away from home, while 39% said browsing websites and using social networking sites accounted for the majority of their usage. Only 8% generally used it for financial transactions and 1% said they used it to stream TV programmes or films on a regular basis.
When travelling for business the majority of guests said they would spend between 30 minutes and two hours online during each 24 hours of their stay, while one in five indicated they would spend more than this online. Comparatively the majority of leisure guests said they were likely to spend under 60 minutes using internet access.
Wi-Fi access was considered a very important factor when it came to choosing a hotel for 72% of business travellers, while a further 20% rated it important. While not as critical for leisure travellers, 25% rated it very important and 48% said it was still an important consideration.
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