Courtesy Rides by Bolt for Business Embrace the Peak-End Rule of Guest Satisfaction | By Adam Mogelonsky

As was explored in a recent article about how Bolt Business can get used to offer guests courtesy rides in a frictionless manner, what I want to tie this back to is the psychological principle of the ‘peak-end rule’ put forward by Daniel Kahneman and Barbara Fredrickson.

As I’ve written about before and discussed in private with hoteliers during site visits across the globe, what this rule states is that from the totality of an experience, when reflected on in hindsight, a person is far more likely to recall the ‘peak’ and the ‘end’ of said experience. In the case of hotels, this would correspond with the best (or worst!) part of the stay as well as the departure.

And it’s this latter bit that concerns many of us hotel consultants. The departure is often transactional in nature, as embodied by the front desk agent saying to a guest, Would you like me to email it to you or print it out?

Technologists are smartly trying to disintermediate this through mobile checkout and automated folio settlement. But then you are left with no departure experience enhancement whatsoever. Rather, departure should be viewed as the start of the loyalty journey and thus a slight opex here can pay off tenfold in lifetime value (LTV) and net promoter score (NPS).

When you look holistically at the total guest journey in this manner, the idea of courtesy rides – as when executed in a scalable manner via a management platform like what Bolt Business is offering – may stand as one of the best ways leave the guest on a high note and differentiate a hotel brand over the long run.

Courtesy Rides as a Strategic Advantage

The hotel industry has a branding problem. Simply, there are often too many in a given market, and via decision fatigue prospective customers are looking for ways to simplify their booking thought process – trusting aggregate review sites, using the OTAs, employing TTAs, reading ranking articles and so on.

Solutions like Bolt Business’s Ride Booker thus allow hotels to not only offer frictionless guest transport while keeping costs predictable and manageable, but also give the brand a memorable talking point. It’s a small gesture with huge upside in perceived service quality.

As aforementioned, scalability in all this is critical for all categories outside of luxury where labor may be more readily available. Platform-driven courtesy ride programs therein offer powerful backend benefits for hotel operations; hotel teams gain visibility and control over transport services in real time, eliminating inefficient manual processes and making tracking, invoicing and reporting dramatically easier. Then leveraging the data macros from systemwide usage, analytics can provide hotels with insights into peak ride times, guest preferences and potential demand triggers, allowing for data-driven decisions on when and how to scale the offering.

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While shuttle services and complimentary rides has traditionally been out of reach for most hotels outside of said luxury, what I like here is that the flexible, scalable tools enable midscale or lifestyle brands to ‘surprise and delight’ guests with transport options. Think of the basic use cases: a routine ride to the train station or a premium vehicle for a VIP airport pickup, the level of service can be dialed in to match a guest’s loyalty status or in error recovery situations.

Just think holistically about this branding problem: there are sooooooo many brands. And even the boutiques are now being diluted by the ‘faketique’ imitators that have emerged over the past decade. Guests won’t expect a free ride, which is precisely why it will stick with them. It feels generous; it feels personal.

Returning to the Peak-End Rule

Hotels are all about memorable moments. So that it’s clear, the peak-end rule tells us that people remember experiences based on their emotional high points and how they ended. For hotel brands, this principle offers an unappreciated strategy: ensure that your guests’ final moments are not just transactionally smooth but a wow moment unto themselves.

Courtesy rides, then, are more than a logistic add-on — they’re a tool for emotional resonance and long-term loyalty. On a one-to-one level, the ROI may not pass muster with a parsimonious bean counter, but when you factor in the holistic emotional payoff, the benefits far outweigh the cost.