Lavished with praise and envy in equal measure by some last year for its RFID tag-driven, social media frenzy for clubbers, Ushuaia Ibiza Beach Hotel is at it again.
Not content with arming its guests and visitors to its high profile club nights with wristbands so they can check-in automatically and share content on Facebook, Ushiaia in Ibiza, Spain, will allow registered users to pay for items around the hotel with nothing more than their fingers.
The system is being deployed throughout the hotel's bars, restaurants, club area and elsewhere so users can get access to a number of services such as event bookings, F&B and every other service provided by the hotel.
The technology comes from a Spanish provider called Pay-Touch and is essentially a biometric scanner which checks and matches the user's fingerprint against a pre-registered and verified image.
The idea is that guests and clubbers can head out for an evening without having to take along any cash. To help promote the system, registered users will be given priority access to the hotel's events.
The hotel is pushing guests and visitors to register for the system ahead of their arrival at the resort. They can also get access and log their details (and prints) at booths once they arrive at the property.
The company says the technology is fully compliant with PCI-DSS security standards and also allows users to register more than one payment card to be credited with each purchase.
Ushuaia saw its RFID wristband project reach thousands of guests and club visitors when it was introduced in 2011.
After the summer season finished, officials claimed the hotel's Facebook page (where wristband-wielding guests could post their content) jumped from 4,000 to 70,000 in the space of just a few months.
The hotel managed to collect 6,000 items of content during the period and an average of 300 wristbands were used each day (7,000 were manufactured beforehand and only 2,000 were lost or not returned).