Hotels contribute to the largest industry in getting payments from cards.
But with this comes an insecurity of data breaches, which is one of the main responsibilities of hotels. Securing customer data is the primary duty of hoteliers.
But with this important job comes the big responsibility, that hotels must follow PCI measures in "Rhythm".
Hotels need to be well-trained in PCI for the privacy of guests' information and business standards.
Now we will see why PCI is so important for hotels, what its requirements are, key strategies, and benefits of PCI Compliance.
Let's begin with the fundamentals,
PCI Compliance means Payment Card Industry compliance. It is a set of requirements developed by the PCI Security Standard Council (PCI SSC) for hotels.
PCI compliance requires compliance with requirements to protect card data and keep unauthorized access or breaches from happening.
You may ask now "Why should I be concerned with PCI Compliance?
The following section will give you the appropriate answer.
PCI Compliance is so important because it guarantees that companies provide credit card info in safe ways. This way businesses and guests are kept away from data thefts and fraud.
If a hotel doesn't meet the requirements of PCI Compliance, it may be at serious risk.
Hence losing guests, ruining the brand name, and damaging the reputation are the consequences for the hotel.
By following PCI standards hotels prove that they are committed to protecting the information and data of customers.
This adds more value to guests, and it will also be able to avoid costly issues such as breaches and legal action.
Did you know? According to research by Trust Wave's Spider labs, 98% of data is stolen from credit cards.
Here is the list of requirements to make sure data is safe: -
Hotels can improve the security of their network by installing and maintaining a firewall on their system to protect cardholder data.
It is necessary to use security software to block sensitive data traffic over public channels that can be easily tapped to prevent such acts.
Hotels need to keep their anti-virus programs updated and create secure systems and applications.
Grant access to cardholders' data to only those who need it and assign a unique ID to each person with computer access.
Deploy monitoring and testing of networks and cardholder data to make sure that these security measures are effective.
If you want to know the strategies to protect data safe and maintain PCI compliance, then go through this section below,
Keep in mind that it is the business owner's responsibility to make sure that their customer's data is safeguarded.
And prevent security breaches through card payments. That's why implementing strategies to maintain PCI Compliance becomes a necessity.
Here we tell you some tips to maintain PCI Compliance!
Educate all your staff about PCI Compliance and know how critical it is to keep their guests' data safe. Make sure they know the proper way to handle payment information safely and what to do in the event of a security breach.
Set up payment systems that pass PCI Compliance requirements. Make sure that these systems are correctly updated regularly as per security needs.
Organize frequent audits and evaluations of payment procedures and systems to find loopholes or compliance issues.
Make sure you respond immediately to the findings to ensure PCI Compliance standards.
Implement top security measures and firewalls for multiple-layer security to protect unauthorized access to sensitive guest data.
That stops hackers or intruders from accessing data from the internet connection.
Put strong encryption methods during data transmission and storage with the cardholder information to provide the highest level of protection.
This makes sure that the data will be unreadable to unauthorized parties, even if they have it.
Keep updated records of your PCI compliance work including policies, procedures, and audit trails.
Keep good records of security assessments, employee training, and compliance action to prove the requirements of the PCI standards during audits and assessments.
Implement strong access control allowing payment card data access only to those individuals who need it to execute their assigned duties.
Provide account holders with unique IDs, strong passwords, and multifactor authentication to enforce the process of authorization.
Through these core strategies, hotels will keep PCI Compliance standards and keep guest's data safe.
This prevents full safety for hotels and their guests from experiencing any data security threats.
According to a recent study, reputation losses and guest turnovers caused by a data breach cost US company $4.13 million on average per breach.
This is why employing PCI Standards in hotels is a good way to protect guests' data from breaching.
As there are numerous benefits of PCI Compliance and some of them are mentioned below.
Here are the common benefits of implementing PCI data security standards: -
PCI Compliance helps to protect sensitive customer information, such as credit card numbers, by securely storing and processing it to lower the risk factor of data breaches.
Compliance with PCI data security standards is a must requirement that customers recognize. Thus, building trust and confidence in your hotel security measures.
Having the best security measures with PCI compliance builds longer trust and positive recommendations, which eventually brings profit, and customer retention.
Non-compliance with PCI standards may lead to costly penalties and fines from payment networks (e.g. Visa and MasterCard), and to avoid these, hotels or businesses must remain compliant.
For Hotels, that operate transactions through credit or debit cards, that would be highly recommended to adopt security measures set out in PCI standards, this decreases the possibility of fraudulent transactions and financial losses.
Overall implementing PCI data security standards can help prevent a data breach in many ways, but most hotels find common problems in adhering to PCI compliance.
Let's explore the challenges faced by hotels while integrating PCI Compliance.
The implementation of PCI DSS (Data Security Standard) may be considered complicated and problematic even for the hotel staff whose understanding of cyber security is limited.
Hotels usually collaborate with some third-party vendors to carry out tasks like booking systems, settlement processes, online payments, etc. making PCI Compliance even harder.
Smaller hotels that have limited manpower, as well as low budget, may find it hard to implement suggested technology upgrades and staff training related to PCI Compliance.
Independent hotels usually do not have trained employees with knowledge of cybersecurity and monitoring PCI rules, and therefore they must hire external services that are costly.
Hotels gather and hold a huge amount of guest's data, which includes credit card details, ID proof, and other confidential information, which must be managed and protected following PCI standards.
To deal with these problems, hotel management must put all necessary measures in place like dedicated resources, training and educating PCI Standards.
PCI Compliance is not just a regular requirement, it is one of the most critical aspects for hoteliers, by implementing PCI Compliance hoteliers protect guest's data, enhance their reputation, and gain a competitive edge in the market.
Employing basic practices like conducting internal audits and adopting data encryption and multifactor authentication leads to safe environments for guests, which eventually boosts customer engagement.
All this can be done by partnering with BOTSHOT which offers the safety of guests' credit card data via platform integration with payment gateways.
With BOTSHOT's payment gateway hotels can get peace of mind by maintaining the security and privacy conditions outlined in PCI.
Therefore, the payment gateway of BOTSHOT ensures that the fraudulent transaction and payment information are not leaked to another party.