Guests are smiling more these days after checking into 5-star hotels, for the hospitality landscape in Bangalore and the country at the moment looks to be a near buyers market rather than a sellers market. Four years ago, the hospitality industry took a bold move by aping their western counterparts and withdrew complimentary services. 

From complimentary breakfasts to airport transfers to laundry and much more, everything that made the consumer feel like a king was removed and was made a paid-for-item. Now in 2012, the customer is once again king, and the basket of complimentary items has only become larger. 

Complimentary breakfast, which costs a hotel between Rs 400 and Rs 600 per person, has been enhanced with more offerings which include a 'made to order' section in addition to the buffet spread and an option for guests to order to their rooms at no extra cost as per a report in ET by Anshul Dhamua.

"Offering complimentary services has a lot to do with the demand and supply equation. At the time when most of these benefits were withdrawn, the strategy was clear-- to help grow the bottomline. Now the market dynamics have changed. There are many brands flooding the market across price points, subsequently yields have dipped and hence hotels will re-look at their strategies. So if one player offers incentives to attract customers, the others are sure to follow to retain their business," says a senior official at the ITC Maurya, The Luxury Collection, New Delhi. However, the ITC official adds, "We are clear, complimentary airport transfers are a thing of the past irrespective of room category." 

According to Chakraborty, in markets like Bangalore where 80% of a hotel's inventory comprises business travellers, hotels have started offering free pick-up and drop facilities from the hotel to the guests' work place. 

"There are two sets of business segments that we target- the public domain, people who book via websites and through third party vendors, and the corporate clients. For the former category of guests, hotels continue to offer drill down rates---which don't come with any complimentary offers," says Nikhil Kapur, GM, Ista Pune. Many star hotels are offering such drill-down rates, which are approximately 5% to 10% cheaper than rooms bundled with complimentary offers, as the 'best available rate of the day'. 

For corporate clients though hotels are negotiating their room rates with complimentary add-ons in order to make the offers more enticing considering the choice of hotels that consumers have to choose from. 

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