August 3, 2015 (Austin, Texas) — A study supported by Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP), reveals that only 34 percent of guests would disclose personal information, in general, on a hotel app; but drilling down through the responses, the positives increased based on whether a specific detail would impact a hotel stay. The factors that influenced a guest’s willingness to reveal information include: benefit of disclosure, positive emotion and trust in app. The study’s details, authored by Agnes DeFranco CHAE, Ed.D. and Cristian Morosan, Ph.D., both of the C.N. Hilton College, University of Houston, are now widely available in an infographic.

“HFTP frequently commissions studies on industry trends to assist the hospitality industry in its strategic planning,” says Frank Wolfe, CAE, CEO of HFTP Global. “Mobile communications is quickly growing as a popular means for hotels to interact with their guests, and this information helps these organizations plan mobile outreach tools.”

Some additional details from the study showed:

• Personal information respondents were willing/likely to disclose: room preference; room amenity preference (i.e. pillow type); gender; smoking preference; and dining preference

• Personal information respondents were not willing/likely to disclose: credit card information; income; driver’s license/passport number; and geographic location

• Number of mobile devices respondents travel with: one device – 35%; two devices – 32%; three devices – 23%

The results shown are based on data from a survey distributed in April 2014 by DeFranco and Morosan. The online survey was conducted with hotel guests who had stayed in a hotel during the past 12 months prior; and a total of 317 questionnaires were collected. The sample consisted of approximately 59 percent males, relatively mature, with age categories relatively evenly split throughout the sample. Most respondents had annual household incomes between $50,000 and $100,000 (45.4 percent). With regard to their stay, most respondents traveled exclusively for leisure (42.4 percent), stayed in midscale hotels (40.1 percent) for approximately two to three nights per stay (59.7 percent), in most cases having three to six hotel stays per year (44.3 percent).