"Rate parity seems unobtainable since my third party channels are a mess, my CRS is so slow - don't even get me started on
GDS! But I finally got setup with CR and combined all of them into one easy to use screen."
Come again? With so much terminology in the industry - we created this page to help you keep your head on straight. |
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| Availability |
| This is the number of rooms a hotel has available to be sold. |
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| Allocation |
| This can be the number of rooms allocated to a channel to be sold. This might or might not be
equal to the total availability a hotel has. Typically a hotel will provide slices of its total availability to different
channels by "allocating" it. |
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| Channels |
| A channel of revenue for the hotel. This can be a GDS, CRS, or a third party sales website like
Travelocity or Orbitz. |
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| Channel Management |
| This is the effort to manage channels of revenue by providing information regarding
a hotel's rate and availability information to perpetuate sales for a hotel. |
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| CR |
| ChannelRUSH, your web based hotel channel management suite of course :-) |
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| CRS - Central Reservation System |
| A CRS is a computer system used to store and retrieve information and conduct transactions related to the
travel industry. A CRS is typically a computer system provided to member hotels by their flag. |
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| CTA - Closed to Arrival |
| When closed to arrival is set for a date, this means a guest can not book this date if their stay
begins on this date. If there stay includes this date, but does not begin on it - then it would be bookable. |
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| CTD - Closed to Departure |
| When closed to departure is set for a date, this means a guest can not book this date if their stay
ends on this date. If there stay includes this date, but does not end on it - then it would be bookable. |
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| Cut Off Days |
| This represents the number of days a guest must book their reservation prior to their arrival. For example
if a guest wants to book a reservation to begin tomorrow, and tomorrows cut off days is set to 2, it would not show as bookable to the guest since it was not
booked 2 days prior to the arrival date. |
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| Extranet |
| The "front end" of a hotel sales website displays the hotel's information to allow guests to book stays with the hotel.
The extranet is the "back end" of a hotel sales website that allows the hotels to login to enter all of this rate and availability information. |
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| Flag |
| A flag is referred to as the hotel chain (such as Holiday Inn, or Hilton) that a hotel joins with. A hotel
can change their flag (i.e. switch from a Hilton to a Holiday Inn) during the course of the lifetime of the hotel. |
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| GDS - Global Distribution System |
| A GDS is a company that provides computer hardware and software to travel agencies for airplane, hotel,
and car reservations. The four big GDS companies are Amadeus, Sabre, Galileo and Worldspan. Third party channels can also
subscribe to a GDS feed to book these items as well. |
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| Lead Days |
| See Cut Off Days |
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| Margin & Markup |
Margin and markup are used to calculate how much a sales websites collects as their
fee from booking one of your hotel's room nights.
These two can be a little tricky in the hotelier industry as they are fundamentally different - and are commonly confused.
Here is an example scenario and a description of how markup and margin would be calculated.
Example Scenario:
Your hotel's double room sells for 100 dollars per night, and a guest books a one night stay on a wholesaler's website you work with.
The total amount collected from the guest is $100.00.
Your hotel takes $75 as your net rate, this means the wholesaler takes $25 as their fee.
Markup
The wholesaler's take is equal to 1/3 the amount your hotel takes - $25 to your $75.
This means the markup is 33.33% (1/3 = .3333 x 100 = 33.33%) for your hotel's sales on this wholesalers website. The wholesaler's take will always
be equal to 33.33% of the amount your hotel takes.
Margin
The wholesaler's take is equal to 1/4 of the total amount collected - $25 of $100.
This means the margin is 25.00% for your hotel's
sales on this wholesaler's website. The wholesaler's take is equal to 25% of the total amount collected from the guest.
So yes - a 33.33% Markup equals a 25.00% Margin for your hotel. These two principals are just two common ways of calculating how much your
hotel's net rate will be for room nights sold on a wholesaler's website. |
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| Max Nights |
| This represents the number of nights the guest's stay must be greater than
in order for them to book the reservation. For example if a guest wants to book a stay for 10 nights, dates with a max nights of
7 would not show as bookable to the guest. |
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| Max Nights Through |
| This is the same as max nights, but the guest's stay can begin, be a part of, or end on the date this value is applied to. The
regular max nights is for stays that -begin -on the date it is applied to. Max nights through is for any stay that contains the
date it is applied to. For example, if the 10th of January has a max nights through value of 7 - any stay that includes that date
must have at most 7 nights in order to show as bookable to the guest. |
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| Min Nights |
| This represents the number of nights the guest's stay must be less than
in order for them to book the reservation. For example if a guest wants to book a stay for 7 nights, dates with a min nights of
10 would not show as bookable to the guest. |
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| Min Nights Through |
| This is the same as Min Nights, but the guests stay can begin, be a part of, or end on the date this value is applied to. The
regular Min Nights is for stays that begin on the date it is applied to. Min Nights Through is for any stay that contains the date it is
applied to. For example, if the 10th has a min nights through value of 7 - any stay that includes that date must have at least 7
minimum nights in order to show as bookable to the guest. |
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| Net Rate |
| When your hotel's room nights are sold on a wholesaler, the amount your hotel takes from the sell
rate is your net rate. So if the guest pays $100 for a room night (which is the sell rate) at your hotel and you collect $75, this means your net rate is $75. |
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| PMS - Property Management System |
| A PMS is the software that is used at the hotel to manage all operations of that hotel. |
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| Rate Parity |
| Achieving rate parity for your hotel is when the same rate structure
exists across all of your hotel's distribution channels. This is important for many reasons - a couple being that it increases your
hotel's rate integrity, so the guest feels confident they are getting the best rate available no matter what channel they book your
hotel through. Another reason is to protect your relations with the channels you work with as they all feel they are on equal footing
when working with your hotel. |
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| Sell Rate |
| When your hotel's room nights are sold via one of your distribution channels, the amount the
guest has to pay for your hotel's room night is the sell rate. |
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| Stop Sell |
| This is the act of stopping the sales of your hotel's room nights on your distribution channels.
A stop sell (aka close out) would prevent your hotel from being able to be booked. This is typical when a hotel is sold out for a
certain time period. |
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| Wholesaler |
| This is a third party organization that sells your hotel's room nights. There are many terms for
this such as third party sales sites, distribution channels, extranets, merchants or merchant model. |