The Concepts of Shariah-Compliance for Hotel Reservation in Malaysia: A Review

Abstract

Hotels have started implementing Shariah Compliant Hotel (SCH) practices due to increasing demand for Shariah Compliant services and facilities from Muslim travellers. Basic principles and attributes of SCH concepts were designed and developed, however, current room reservations especially in online booking platforms that support SCH concepts were not widely practised. This study aims to review previous studies on SCH practices and propose the concept of SCH reservations toward online booking platforms. This study has identified several issues and challenges, including issues on SCH concepts and characteristics and/or attributes, issues on the perceptions and behaviours toward SCH implementation, and issues on how SCH is being implemented. Besides that, this study also finds that the key aspects of SCH research are divided into 4 main aspects; design and development of the SCH concept, characteristics and attribution, the SCH implementation, assessment of SCH implementation, and customer/tourist perceptions and behaviour toward SCH implementations. This study also suggests the concept of integrating SCH concepts into the current online booking platform, via having 4 processes; improving the current online booking platform database design, improving the process of applying SCH practices, validating hotel’s applications, and integrating and viewing SCH in online booking platform.