The Days Inn by Wyndham Saskatoon is a busy-year-round property located next to the Saskatoon International Airport with a pool and waterslide, which serves the largest city in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. With a 21-year history, the property caters heavily to families and young adult travelers and has a regular need to process credit card authorization forms.
For many years, these authorizations were processed using paper/PDF forms sent back and forth via email or fax. However, this insecure method of collecting credit card information would sometimes lead to chargebacks and fraud, and is no longer considered PCI compliant.
Aware of these issues and having dealt with around $5k per year in chargeback costs herself, General Manager of the Days Inn Saskatoon, Diane Wolfe, was on the hunt for a new way to handle credit card authorizations at her property when she found Canary — a Wyndham Approved Supplier.
“I was purchasing a hotel room for my son in another province, and they used Canary to process my credit card,” said Wolfe. “Given the experience I had with the software, I thought Canary’s Digital Authorizations solution was what we needed to reduce chargebacks and fraud at our property as well. And as it turns out, I was right.”
“Back when we used paper and PDF forms for credit card authorizations, we experienced a fair amount of chargebacks, and paid for them,” said Wolfe. “Unfortunately, around $5,000 per year was normal. But after a short demonstration of Canary’s Digital Authorizations solution, we realized there was a way to proactively deal with the issue of chargebacks and decided to sign up.”
After more than a year of using Digital Authorizations, Wolfe and her team have experienced zero chargebacks from any credit card that has been processed through the Canary platform.
“Since implementing Canary, we have not received a single chargeback case and it’s been more than a year since we signed on with the platform,” said Wolfe.
In addition to being PCI in-compliant, the process of sending paper and PDF authorization forms via email and fax was incredibly time consuming according to Wolfe.
“Before using Canary, it would often take our staff more than an hour to get contracts signed and credit cards processed,” said the General Manager. “This was especially the case if the person wasn’t tech savvy,” she continued, “...and when this happened, our staff would end up working as impromptu tech support by trying to explain how to attach a document to an email or send a fax. It wasn’t ideal.”
However, after switching to Canary, all of these issues were left in the past.
“We now have credit card authorizations securely completed in minutes,” said Wolfe. “Our staff members no longer have to spend hours of their day chasing payments and ensuring they are processed. Our customers take care of it on their own,” she continued. “Our front desk is at least 35% more efficient since implementing Canary.”
Today, Canary’s PCI compliant Digital Authorizations solution is helping the Days Inn by Wyndham Saskatoon save money in two different areas — the Days Inn team has eliminated chargebacks and fraud; and the front desk is more efficient than ever.
“We use Canary’s Digital Authorizations multiple times a day,” said Wolfe. “And we haven’t had a single issue with chargebacks or fraud through the Canary platform in the entire time we’ve used it,” she continued. “Our guests and staff are happier than ever.”
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