1. A guest card which serves to identify a hotel guest and to provide that guest with room access, which is suitable for insertion into reading devices such as slotted key card systems on a recurring basis, and which comprises: a base support having opposing planar surfaces; at least one thermal recording layer formed on at least one planar surface of the base support for displaying a digital photographic image, graphical, numerical or textual information, or combinations thereof; and at least one machine readable information storage system contained on or within the base support and/or the thermal recording layer, wherein the base support has a printable front side or upper surface, which contains printed information about an issuing hotel or hospitality suite, and a thermal back side or lower surface, which contains an encodable magnetic stripe, a scannable bar code, a digital photographic image of the hotel guest, printed information about the guest, and instructions for use of the card.