Tourism & Hospitality
Whale-Watching Operator Cuts Booking Errors by 85% With Reliable Connectivity and Modern POS
85% fewer booking errors
Double-bookings and missed reservations dropped from roughly 12 per month to fewer than 2, thanks to real-time cloud sync and reliable connectivity.
$0 lost sales
Zero customers turned away due to payment failures in the first full season — previously averaging 8–10 per week during peak.
100% dock coverage
Wi-Fi and camera coverage now extends from parking lot to departure dock, including the waiting area and equipment storage.
4 incidents resolved
Security cameras captured evidence in 4 overnight equipment/vandalism incidents in the first season, all resolved with footage.
The challenge
The operator ran whale-watching tours and fishing charters from a wharf-side ticket office and departure dock. The location had no wired broadband — all connectivity depended on a single cellular hotspot that was unreliable during peak tourist hours when hundreds of visitors overwhelmed the local cell tower. The booking system ran on a tablet that frequently lost connection, causing double-bookings and missed reservations. Card payments failed regularly, forcing staff to turn away customers or accept cash only. The operator had no security cameras on the dock or parking area despite repeated incidents of equipment damage overnight.
What we did
- Installed a fixed wireless broadband link from a nearby served area to the wharf office, providing dedicated 100 Mbps symmetrical connectivity independent of the cellular network.
- Deployed a UniFi gateway and three access points covering the ticket office, waiting area, and dock — with a weatherproof outdoor unit for the departure zone.
- Separated the network into business (booking system, POS) and guest Wi-Fi segments with bandwidth management.
- Set up two new POS terminals with cellular failover so payments could still process if the primary link went down.
- Migrated the booking system to a cloud-hosted platform (FareHarbor) accessible from any device with real-time inventory sync to eliminate double-bookings.
- Installed four UniFi Protect cameras covering the dock, parking area, equipment storage, and ticket office with remote viewing for the owner.
- Configured RingCentral VoIP so the booking phone number rings on both the office phone and the owner's mobile, ensuring no missed calls during shoulder season.
“We used to lose a dozen bookings a week to connection problems and spend half our time apologising to people whose cards wouldn't go through. Now the system just works. We can focus on showing people whales instead of fighting with technology.”