The Center for Hospitality Research at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, US has released a report concerning new technology used in restaurants.

The Customer Preferences for Restaurant Technology Innovations report looked at how a sample of restaurant customers reacted to 11 technology innovations - such as online booking, handheld order taking and pagers - and noted how customers' preferences for a specific technology are related to their familiarity with that particular innovation.

The technologies studied were split into five categories: queue management, internet-based, menu, kiosks and payment related.

The report said: "While technology-based innovations can ameliorate the inherent human variability found in service interactions, technology can also make it difficult to recover quickly from failures (when equipment magnifies an error) and may also reduce the server's personal connection with the customer.

"Therefore, before adopting a particular technological system, a hospitality operator must asses potential benefits to customers (along with customers' reactions to the technology) and compare these benefits to the cost of the system."

The university conducted a nationwide online survey of a balanced sample of restaurant visitors in the US during summer 2008. The survey found that younger participants were more likely to have used more of the technologies in other areas - such as internet banking and self-service petrol stations for example - than older respondents, but gender had "no relationship to technology use".

The report concluded: "Restaurateurs must determine whether a specific technology is appropriate for their restaurant. We believe that customers have become accustomed to technology that can be used to improve communications, increase efficiencies and reduce errors.

"To be economically sustainable, technology must do something that adds value in the eye of the customer. So, while technology might take away some aspects of personal service, it may improve service quality. If customers believe that an innovation adds sufficient value, it is probably here to stay." Details: www.hotelschool.cornell.edu