Jamaica Targets Full Hotel Reopening as Major Room Expansions Continue

33,000 rooms targeted to be active by December 2026; 3.741 million visitors projected for fiscal 2026/27; 1,000 additional rooms reported for Grand Palladium; 1,300 rooms scheduled for refurbishment at Bahia Principe; 365 additional luxury rooms targeted for 2027.

The March update said early assessments had suggested that about 80% of rooms would be available. The government subsequently raised that outlook to the full 33,000-room inventory by December 2026. The same report projected 3.741 million visitors in fiscal 2026/27, including 2.278 million stopover visitors.

That timetable matters because returning a room to inventory is not only a construction or staffing event. Door access, staff access and guest-entitlement stock also have to be ready for issue. The public report does not state which access systems any hotel uses, and CaribbeanRFID has no claimed relationship with the properties named here.

JIS reported in December 2025 that Grand Palladium's planned expansion would add 1,000 rooms, with construction then scheduled to begin in January 2026. It also reported Bahia Principe's programme to refurbish 1,300 existing rooms and construct another 365 rooms for 2027.

These are materially different projects. A refurbishment may inherit readers, encoders and old credential records; an extension may introduce a new building or commissioning phase. A hotel name, logo or shared estate does not prove that the electronic requirement is identical across both.

This is a recovery-and-expansion story, not a generic tourism forecast. Existing rooms are being returned to service while two large Hanover programmes add or renew inventory. That means procurement teams may be handling replacement stock for reopened areas, commissioning stock for additions and revised branded stock for refurbished rooms at the same time.

The public figures provide scale and timing, but not an access specification. Any claim about card technology, wristband use or installed readers must therefore remain a manufacturer inference until a property supplies system evidence.

For reopened rooms, we would request a known-working key card from each materially different access area and confirm whether the required credential operates at 125 kHz LF or 13.56 MHz HF/NFC. For a new wing, a production-representative sample should be encoded and read on the commissioned equipment before the bulk run is released. Frequency alone is not compatibility evidence.

Where CR80 is accepted, the manufactured hotel card is 85.6 × 54 mm and 0.76 mm. Artwork, reverse-face instructions, number range, finish and packing label should be approved with the physical sample. Each distinct design has a 500-piece minimum.

A reopened all-inclusive operation should confirm whether resident, day-pass, staff and tier bands still follow the same rules. Silicone can fit repeated wet use, but the closure and visual identifiers must match the current entitlement model. An adjustable band is wrong where the wearable is intended to prove non-transferable access.

This is manufacturer analysis prompted by the reported recovery and expansion—not a statement that either named property buys from CaribbeanRFID or uses a particular credential.

Repeating an old card merely because it still carries the property artwork is wrong when refurbished or new rooms have not passed the same encoder and reader test.

For island-specific product context, review RFID key cards and wristbands for Jamaica. Final suitability remains conditional on the installed system, a production-representative sample and the property's approval.