The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) and hospitality major, OYO, have come together to create an online certification course on best practices a hotel should follow in the light of COVID-19. The course will be available to individuals in both Hindi and English, and is expected to have a positive impact on hoteliers and hospitality professionals, especially in the budget, mid-segment and boutique hotels space, including homestays.
The pandemic has disrupted the hospitality industry and changed the way businesses will operate in the future. This course will particularly focus on redesigning and relearning all sanitisation protocols and ensuring minimal person-to-person contact for a hotel, in line with the standard operating procedures announced by the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India.
The course itself will allow individuals to go through nine training modules outlining the new key safety guidelines for the hotel, staff, guests, front office, food and beverages service, housekeeping, guest-room cleaning and food-production advisories. It will further include an advisory on how to deal with guests, who are suspected to be COVID-19 positive.
The initiative will help thousands of hospitality professionals and those associated with the hospitality sector, to create industry benchmarks and best practices.
While FICCI will oversee the implementation of the IT infrastructure and online delivery platform for the course, OYO has helped design and develop the course material for the programme. Certificate, upon completion of course, will be provided by FICCI, and the organisation will further create awareness regarding the programme in the hospitality industry. Minister of State (I/C) for Tourism & Culture Prahlad Singh Patel, tried to draw attention to the fact that since India’s tourism sector has massive potential, everything should be done to ensure the comfort of guests and visitors, in line with the vision of ‘Dekho Apna Desh’ and ‘Incredible India’.
As Ritesh Agarwal, founder and CEO, OYO hotels, rightly pointed out, the course will help those in the hospitality sector to come up with innovative ways of working, in line with local and central government guidelines, and reimagine operations to ensure the safety of customers and employees.
Dilip Chenoy, secretary general, FICCI, felt the initiative is a step in the right direction and will help “drive business” and “revitalise tourism”
