HostelDesk: A Web-Based Hostel Complaint and Maintenance Management System

Abstract

Hostel maintenance complaints are often communicated through informal channels, fragmenting records and making assignment, progress tracking, and resolution verification difficult. This paper presents HostelDesk, a web-based Hostel Complaint and Maintenance Management System designed to manage the complaint lifecycle in a hostel environment. The platform provides role-specific access for students, administrators, and maintenance staff; a hierarchical representation of hostels, blocks, floors, rooms, and beds; category- and subcategory-based issue registration; image and short-video evidence; and support for existing complaints. Complaint urgency is determined using category severity and affected-student information, with four priority levels and configurable service-level deadlines. Administrators can assign approved issues to internal personnel or record external maintenance work, while workers update progress and resolution details through a dedicated portal. Students subsequently verify the outcome, reopen or escalate unresolved issues, and submit feedback. The implementation uses React 18 and Vite for the responsive frontend, Node.js and Express.js for REST APIs, PostgreSQL for relational persistence, JWT-based authentication, bcrypt password hashing, and Multer for media uploads. The documented prototype integrates operational dashboards, monthly reporting, technician information, hostel/block heat maps, notifications, and audit history. The source documentation reports functional capabilities but does not provide quantitative performance or user-outcome measurements.

Introduction

The text presents HostelDesk, a centralized web-based hostel maintenance management system designed to simplify complaint registration, maintenance tracking and communication between students, administrators and maintenance staff.

In traditional hostel management, students report maintenance problems through verbal communication, phone calls, notebooks or messaging applications. These methods often result in poor complaint tracking, duplicate reports, delayed responses and a lack of accountability. HostelDesk addresses these challenges by providing a centralized platform that manages the complete maintenance process, from complaint submission to final student verification.

The proposed system has three main user roles: students, administrators and maintenance staff. The administrator also performs the responsibilities of the hostel warden.

Main Features of HostelDesk

1. Role-Based Access: Provides separate portals and permissions for students, administrators and maintenance personnel.

2. Complaint Registration: Students can submit complaints by selecting categories and subcategories, specifying hostel locations and uploading images or short videos as evidence.

3. Hostel Infrastructure Management: Maintains a structured hierarchy of Hostel, Block, Floor, Room and Bed to identify the exact location of maintenance issues.

4. Complaint Prioritization: Classifies complaints into four priority levels—Low, Medium, High and Critical—based on issue severity and the number of affected students.

5. Collaborative Issue Reporting: Allows students to support existing complaints and add comments, helping identify problems affecting multiple students.

6. Maintenance Assignment: Administrators review complaints, approve or reject requests and assign maintenance tasks to internal staff or external service providers.

7. Maintenance Tracking: Maintenance workers use a dedicated portal to view assigned tasks, update their progress and provide resolution details.

8. Student Verification: After maintenance completion, students can confirm whether the issue has been resolved. If the problem persists, they can reopen or escalate the complaint and provide feedback.

9. Reports and Analytics: Provides monthly reports, CSV exports, technician performance information and hostel/block heat maps to identify frequently occurring maintenance problems.

10. Notifications and Audit Logs: Keeps users informed about complaint updates and maintains a history of important activities, status changes and assignments.

System Architecture and Technologies

HostelDesk follows a client-server architecture consisting of a frontend, backend, database and media-handling components.

The backend manages authentication, authorization, complaint processing, maintenance assignments, notifications and database operations. PostgreSQL stores student details, hostel information, complaints, assignments, feedback and audit records.

Complaint Management Workflow

The system follows a structured maintenance lifecycle:

1. Student submits a complaint with location and supporting evidence.

2. Administrator reviews and approves or rejects the complaint.

3. The complaint receives a priority level and an assigned maintenance worker.

4. Maintenance staff inspect the issue and update its progress.

5. The worker marks the maintenance task as completed.

6. The student verifies whether the issue has been resolved.

7. The complaint is either closed or reopened/escalated if the problem persists.

8. The student can provide a rating and feedback.

Priority and Service-Level Agreement (SLA)

The system defines default resolution targets according to complaint priority.

These are configurable prototype targets rather than guaranteed resolution times.

Conclusion

This paper presented HostelDesk, a web-based Hostel Complaint and Maintenance Management System designed around the needs of a student hostel environment. The system combines role-based access, structured hostel and room allocation, CSV student onboarding, categorized complaint registration, image and short-video evidence, collaborative complaint support, severity- and affected-student-informed priority, configurable SLA deadlines, internal or external maintenance assignment, worker progress updates, student verification, feedback, reporting, heat maps, notifications, and audit history. The implementation uses React 18 and Vite, Node.js and Express.js, PostgreSQL, JWT, bcrypt, and Multer. The documented prototype establishes an integrated path from complaint submission to maintenance completion and student verification. Its operational contribution lies in maintaining consistent records and connecting users, locations, work assignments, and outcome confirmation. Since quantitative evaluation results are not supplied, claims about reduction in resolution time, improved service levels, or user satisfaction remain unverified and should be assessed through a future controlled or field-based evaluation. Future enhancements identified in the project report include email, SMS, and push notifications; a dedicated mobile application; cloud-based media storage; inventory management for maintenance materials and spare parts; QR-code-based room identification; automated escalation for overdue complaints; advanced analytics for recurring issues; intelligent complaint classification; and duplicate complaint detection. Future evaluation should also define the priority formula and thresholds, document test coverage and deployment conditions, and measure response time, SLA compliance, recurrence, and user acceptance.

References

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Copyright

Copyright © 2026 Vinothini T, Maheshwaran M, Manoj R, Manjunath S. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.