A small lodge moving off spreadsheets in a week (demo)

This is a demo story about a fictional property. It shows how RoomAnchor features fit together; it is not a customer testimonial.

The property

Tea Garden Lodge is an imagined 12-room lodge near the tea estates of Sreemangal, run by a family with four staff. Guests book by phone, through Facebook messages and through a listing on a home-sharing site.

The problem

In this story, the owner kept a spreadsheet on her phone and a paper diary at reception. The home-sharing listing did not know about phone bookings, so the lodge was sometimes double booked.

What they set up

1. Starter plan. One property, up to 20 rooms and five staff logins was enough.
2. Day one. The onboarding wizard took them through the property, rooms, taxes, policies, payments and team.
3. One room chart. Phone, Facebook and listing bookings were all entered on the room chart with their booking source, and the owner blocked dates on the listing as soon as a phone booking came in.
4. Guest messages. A pre-arrival email with directions and a welcome message went out automatically.
5. Test mode first. The team practised in test mode, where no money is taken, before going live.

How the week looks now

Every booking, from any source, sits on the room chart, so the family checks one screen before saying yes to a guest.

What to take from it

• Start small: rooms, rates and the front desk are enough for the first week.
• iCal sync with listing sites is coming soon with the channel manager. Until then, block dates on the listing as soon as a phone booking comes in.