VingCard launches NFC room key system for hotels

The hotel room key market leader, part of the Assa Abloy group which recently ran an NFC trial at the Clarion Hotel Stockholm, has now brought the technology to market.

Vingcard Elsafe
VINGCARD: NFC is 'game-changing technology for the hotel market'

VingCard Elsafe has launched a new solution for hotels that uses NFC-enabled mobile phones as virtual guestroom keys.

The new solution is based on the mobile key technology tested earlier this year by VingCard and parent company Assa Abloy at the Clarion Hotel Stockholm. It allows hotel guests to book their hotel rooms as usual, through a PC or any other web-enabled device. On the day of arrival, the room number and the digital hotel room key is sent securely to the guest’s mobile phone. When the guest arrives at the hotel, they can skip past the front desk and go directly to their room. The hotel room door is unlocked by simply holding the NFC phone near the door lock.

The NFC solution works in conjunction with VingCard’s existing Visionline system. This features standalone electronic locks that communicate with a central property server and allows security managers to add, remove or update access rights for any of the users instantly, regardless of if the doors are online or offline. The NFC system works with existing RFID locks, such as VingCard’s Signature RFID locking solution.

“Our groundbreaking NFC-based mobile key solution is a simple, user-friendly way to save valuable time for today’s tech-savvy guests,” says VingCard Elsafe’s Tim Shea. “Because our solution uses NFC, it requires no additional action by the guest such as dialing a number at the door, making it the quickest, most convenient and reliable solution on the market. This is game-changing technology for the hotel market that doesn’t require additional hardware expense to deploy.”

“Our solutions are designed to allow our customers to easily transition from one technology to another, or augment their systems with additional features, as new protocols are introduced and adopted by the market,” Shea explains.

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2 comments on this article

  1. “Because our solution uses NFC, it requires no additional action by the guest … This is game-changing technology for the hotel market that doesn’t require additional hardware expense to deploy.”

    I assume it doesn’t require additional hardware expense for hotels who have RFID/NFC locks?

    Many hotel keylocks use magnetic key cards.

    Are the magnetic key locks that we see in most hotels by default RFID/NFC enabled?

    If not then wouldn’t changing all of the locks be a significant expense for hotels?

    1. New hotels are getting the NFC locks as well as others are being done during remodels. NFC is just one of many RFID technologies. The existing locks are usually magnetic stripe, which is not RFID at all. The existing ones that are RFID are most likely HID or Sielox technology. With any RFID technology there is security concerns. So remember to use those other locks when you are in the room.

      Sources: I travel a lot in the Hilton brand of hotels and I work on timeclocks with RFID technology.

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