Front desk Live

Taking a booking

A room, a rate and a guest in under thirty seconds — quoted first, so the price the desk says is the price the system takes.

A booking starts with a quote. Pick the room type, the nights and the plan, and the system prices the stay from the rate card — the season, the occupancy, the extra adult, the child, the meal plan — and says what it will cost before anything is written. The desk reads the number to the guest, and only then takes the booking.

What a booking carries

Who — the guest, found or created in one search. One guest is one row across every hotel in the group; a second stay does not make a second person.
Where the business came from — walk-in, phone, the hotel's own page, a company, an agent, an OTA. The chart colours the bar by it, the reports cut by it, and the invoice is raised to the right payer because of it.
Who pays — the guest at the desk, a company on account, or an OTA that already collected. A company says when it pays when it is opened, and every booking for it inherits the answer.
The rate, fixed — the price typed at booking is the price the night is posted at. The desk may name the price until the guest is in house; after that a change is a decision with a name on it.

Holds

A room can be held while the guest pays: it comes off sale for an hour, the guest gets a link, and the hold either becomes a booking or lets the room go. The sweeper runs every minute so a hold never outlives its hour.

Group bookings

A group is one booking with many rooms and a rooming list; it can be cloned for the next date, and each room can be checked in and billed on its own or on the master.

The refusal to book a room that is closed, a night that is stopped or a stay that is too short comes back in one plain sentence — the same sentence the booking page and the channel manager use.

More on Front desk

The booking chartRooms down the side, nights across the top, every stay drawn as a bar — the one screen a front desk lives on, with the price and the rules on it. Check-inThe guest, their ID and the room in one screen; the bill that is already open is the bill; and a room is free the moment the last guest has left. The registration cardThe GRC the guest signs, on the hotel's own paper, drawn from the booking and reprintable. The folioOne stay, one bill — or several windows on it when the company pays the room and the guest pays their own dinner. The GST invoiceA tax invoice with the right slab, the CGST/SGST split, the buyer's GSTIN when there is one, and a QR code anyone downstream can verify. Check-outSettle, or bill to a company, or — for a small balance — waive it at the door with a reason and a name. The bill is still there after the guest has gone. Credit and debit notesAn issued invoice is never edited. A wrong value goes down by a credit note and up by a debit note — separate, numbered, pointing at the original. Room move and upgradeMove a stay to another room, or up a category, from the chart, with the reason and the person written on the move. No-shows and cancellationsA policy on every booking, a retention charge the audit applies, and a charge the hotel cannot collect is not posted as if it could. Group bookingsOne booking, many rooms, a rooming list, and each room checked in and billed on its own or on the master. The guest recordOne guest is one row across every hotel. A shared email is not a person, and the guest who is already booked is not booked again. Corrections by the administratorThe administrator can correct any booking — audited, in house, departed, billed — and the log is the price. Room blocks and closed datesRight-click a room to block it, with a reason, a range and a name; close a date for the whole hotel; and the channels are told in the same minute. Arrivals and departuresWho is expected, who has not arrived, who has not left — with the rate and how they pay, because the desk asked for those two columns. Money owedEvery balance somebody has to chase, in one panel — and a payment link that is chased until somebody knows what happened to it. Every change says who made itThe booking's own timeline: taken, changed, moved, checked in, billed — each with a person, a time and a machine. A full room is a question, not a wallThe owner's standing rule — refuse only for money; otherwise say what you see, ask once, and write down who said yes. A discount on the bill is a decision with a name on itThe folio's fourth tab: a percentage or an amount off the whole bill, the room, the food or one line, the GST reduced with it, a reason from the hotel's list and a name on every line — a manager above the hotel's limit. And a small leftover forgiven at the door, under a ceiling, recorded. The clock on the door has a priceEarly check-in and late check-out as the hotel's own policy — as many bands per side as it wants, in hours from the door time, each a percentage of the night or a flat amount. The desk posts; a manager waives with a reason; the list of who was charged or waived is a report. A mistake made today is undone todayUndo on the card walks back what the desk did — a check-in, a payment, a charge, a cancellation — as a stack, until the night audit closes the day. A cancelled booking is put back from Find. A bill closed at zero is reopened by an administrator to void, refund and close again. Every one recorded.