Will booking a holiday home always be the same?

How to communicate with your potential renters - how to turn site visitors into enquiries, and enquiries into bookings.
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Giddy Goat
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Post by Giddy Goat »

Mmm, very good point Bob!
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Martha
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Post by Martha »

I suppose there's no reason why I can't make my booking form available online to those who want to book immediately. Though in practise, people always have questions, but it might make them more reassured of a quick response....
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la vache!
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Post by la vache! »

Another reason for not having an automated system is if you have more than one unit to rent. My availability calendar is usually shows more availabilty than there actually is, because I can bump people up to another house which is available if they enquire for a booked cottage (which is shown as available on the calendar). I couldn't do this if the availability calendar was always correct.
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Mountain Goat
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Post by Mountain Goat »

We couldn't contemplate an automatic system, as we need to weed out the chancers with pets / too large a group / too many kids etc.

Turning it around, and looking at our efforts over the last 10 days to book accommodation on the Kenya Coast and/or Cape Town, it just doesn't work for us as potential guests.

However comprehensive the property listing, we still have a stack of questions to ask each owner apart from requesting a discount (we're a couple renting a larger-than-normal property). Interesting that with a month before arrival, we managed to squeeze a generous discount out of all owners except one.

MG
Margaret
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Post by Margaret »

But I would be interested in an automated system, even with 9 units. In fact, I use one with LateRooms and hrs, just for the one bedroom units. There is not a lot of difference between the apartments, I just allocate the best available.
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Post by la vache! »

Margaret wrote:But I would be interested in an automated system, even with 9 units. In fact, I use one with LateRooms and hrs, just for the one bedroom units. There is not a lot of difference between the apartments, I just allocate the best available.
I would never dare to book another gite for someone without their agreement first (assuming they had enquired for another). But then my gites aren't all the same in size or character.
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Post by Margaret »

Ah, but the trick with those booking systems is that you just describe the things which are common to all one bedroom apartments, so they are not expecting to book a specific apartment. And they have the option to make specific requests anyway. But that is why I find it works for the one bedroom apartments and not for the family ones.
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Post by la vache! »

But you can't offer them a house that is more expensive, can you? If someone enquires for my 4 person house, and it is booked, if I don't mark it as booked on the availability calendar then I can offer them the 6 bed house for the same price. I don't think you can do that with a booking system.
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greenbarn
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Post by greenbarn »

Here's my notion of an online booking system:

On your website, the potential guest (hereinafter referred to as PG) is very clearly given the option of contacting you for information, or reserving the property via the booking system.

If PG chooses to reserve the property, they fill in a booking form online with all details that you normally request. The property is immediately shown on your website as reserved. You receive the booking form along with the notification of the reservation.

PG does not get the option to pay a deposit at this point, and it's clearly stated that their reservation is subject to confirmation.

You check the details on the form. You now have various options: accept the booking and give payment details (whatever those may be - online, cheque etc etc). Go back to the PG and ask any necessary extra questions. Tell the PG that your property is not suitable for the requirements stated on their booking form (it doesn't take dogs, or 16 people), politely refuse it and mark the slot as available again.

For the PG who likes to be able to reserve at a click and get on with something else, it should work unless they really want to be able to pay the deposit immediately; that to me is the main risk factor with an automated system and is the point at which you lose all personal control, so I'm prepared to lose the PG who doesn't want to wait for confirmation and contact before paying.

Disadvantages: as soon as PG clicks your property can't be reserved by another PG, which is not good if the original falls through; there's a window where it's shown as unavailable until you change it back. Balanced against that is a key reason for having the system - genuine PG now sees their desired slot reserved for them. Maybe you can show the slot with different colours as provisionally booked, and booked (deposit paid).

I think it leaves sufficient control in the hands of the owner, and with sufficient opportunity for the essential personal contact prior to confirmation. From what I've seen of the system Helen uses, it can satisfy all of the above - I think - and it looks as though PIMS may do soon?

Many owners simply will not want such a system, and fair enough. For those who might be wavering, what pros and cons do you see, as I suspect I've missed something fairly fundamental?
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Post by Martha »

Greenbarn, that's actually pretty similar to what I'm thinking of doing, except the dates won't be marked as unavailable. Again, in practice, no-one has ever booked without asking some questions, as we're quite a big place, but it would give reassurance, I think.
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e-richard
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Post by e-richard »

Yes, GB, thats pretty much what I am thinking of.

A tweak, I am pondering that may solve one of your concerns, is to precede the booking form with a very simple date-check:

PG enters start date and end date. Thats all !

The system can then respond with one of 3 answers. Obviously the actual wording needs to be more verbose, but in summary:

1. Sorry dates unavailable
2. Dates are currently on hold, please click here to contact us...and make an enquiry/request
3. Dates are available, click here to book.

It can all be streamlined to feel cleaner than my description, but have I missed anything ?
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la vache!
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Post by la vache! »

Greenbarn wrote: For those who might be wavering, what pros and cons do you see, as I suspect I've missed something fairly fundamental?
It doesn't solve my problem of bumping people up when an alternative bigger unit is available, unless I'm missing something?
mitchellbryson
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Post by mitchellbryson »

Greenbarn wrote:You check the details on the form. You now have various options: accept the booking and give payment details
In my opinion the online booking form should do this for you. With terms and conditions that if they falsify details the booking will be cancelled, as most people will be honest. This means you can take a booking, knowing they fit your criteria and receive a deposit to confirm the dates automatically. Thoughts?

This way you only have confirmed bookings, that have paid a deposit.

Further more... when an enquiry comes through and you talk with them, when they're ready to book you should be able to convert the enquiry into a booking in the same way and it emails them a link to the payment page or gives them alternate ways to pay.

the system should then take care of the payments, even the rules regarding when the balance is due e.t.c. leaving you to talk with the guest about any questions they have prior to arrival.

I think the system I'm designing is automating things too far, I may have to tone it back a bit, but if anyone wants to see a prototype, just PM me.
la vache! wrote: It doesn't solve my problem of bumping people up when an alternative bigger unit is available, unless I'm missing something?
If you're managing all your properties in the same system, there's no reason why you couldn't just transfer the booking to another property. each property should have it's own bookings and enquiries and they could be transferable between them all?
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greenbarn
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Post by greenbarn »

mitchellbryson wrote:
Greenbarn wrote:You check the details on the form. You now have various options: accept the booking and give payment details
In my opinion the online booking form should do this for you. With terms and conditions that if they falsify details the booking will be cancelled, as most people will be honest. This means you can take a booking, knowing they fit your criteria and receive a deposit to confirm the dates automatically. Thoughts?
I think with most systems I've seen that's the default way of operating; my personal requirement would be to be able to change that such that the option for payment isn't presented until I'm happy, and have responded to the provisional booking with any personalisation of an email that I fancy. Again, I've seen systems where both options are catered for (not at the same time, of course!).
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Post by Martha »

Looks nice mitchellbryson.

I think that should be a backend option for the user to set - there will never be one single option that will suit everyone..
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