The Scenario:
Real Estate Office
John is the owner manager of a Chain of hotels named ???WELCOME HOTELS??? . John employs a number of people as administrative staff, accounts staff , Sales and attendants . The ???WELCOME HOTELS??? has branches in other cities as well, in all 20 branches. All the Branches need to be connected to each other, each branch has an assistant manager answerable to John and the same setup as below.
The staff is as follows.
Manager = John
Administrative Assistant = Linda
Accounts Manager = Sebastian
Rentals Manager = Leisa
Reception/Secretarial = Tim, Sam, Carol, Jose
Sales Representatives = Kate, Kim, Jimmy and Ronald
Data Entry/Basic Accounting = Ali, Samson, Lawrence.
The office deals with private and commercial rentals from clients local and abroad.
John has decided that he would like to increase productivity although he is not too sure how to go about it. Essentially what he wants to do is to increase the sales and/or lower her costs of operation. Currently the office runs using the following equipment in the various information systems.
John doesn???t have a computer on his desk. If he wishes to send a letter she calls in Linda to take shorthand or else writes it on paper and passes it to Linda for typing. Linda has a desktop computer running Windows Vista and Office 2003 software. She has a laser printer.
The accounts section uses a manual system with a debits and credits book, bank reconciliations book, and individual invoice records for clients. Sebastian uses a calculator to work out the sums at the end of the month. Harry Joan and Yentl would send out accounts to clients, calculate the amount owing for each client and help enter the figures in the accounts books. Data needs to be entered on more than one ledger (for example the main accounts ledger and individual client records as well as documents tracking sales of various sales person for the calculation of bonuses etc.). Sebastian also handles the pay for the staff, including taxes and levies such as income tax, payroll tax, and super-annuation and so on. He does this in the accounts books. Staff is paid fortnightly by cheque. Records are kept in filing cabinets. Staff pays take up to one week to process.
The Sales Rental Manager has a desktop computer running Windows XP and Office 2003. The secretaries share the use of two desktop computers with Windows XP and Office 97. Each computer has an Access database of properties. Sales contracts are also typed up on these computers. A 128M USB Flash RAM drive is used to back up the database each day.
The Sales representatives have laptop computers each with Windows XP and Office 2003. They have the same Access database as the office staff. They are able to show prospective clients, the various rooms and suites for sale on their laptops. Each day a USB Flash RAM disk is passed around so they can update their property database, but sometimes a sales representative will show a client a suite or dining hall which has already been occupied by another client, causing some embarrassment.
John feels that the current system is inefficient and would like to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the organization.
You are a systems analyst who has been asked by John to advise him on how to most successfully change his current information systems to improve productivity, and come with a long lasting solution which includes linking all the branches through the internet and having a reliable system in place.
Suggest a Information system for John that provides a comprehensive solution to his day to day needs and also increase the business and productivity of the ???Welcome Hotels??? group.
