Setting a hotel up

Closing a date, minimum stay and stop sell

The five rules that decide whether a night may be sold, how to set them, and how to lift one.

Five rules decide whether a stay may be sold. The booking engine and the desk have enforced all of them for a long time; Operations → Restrictions is where a hotel sets them.

The Restrictions tab: the layer, the grid, and the form that sets one.

Do this

The layer — stop sell, no check-in, no check-out, minimum stay, maximum stay. The grid shows one at a time.
Room type the rule is for.
From and to — the nights.
The value — on or off, or the number of nights for a minimum or maximum.
Apply. Bookings already taken are not affected; a guest holding a confirmed booking still arrives.
Export — the grid as a file.

Where the hotel is connected to a channel manager the change reaches the OTAs on its own. Nothing before today, because a night already gone cannot be closed.

Minimum stay — a booking arriving that night must be at least this many nights. This is the New Year's Eve rule.
Maximum stay — and no longer than this.
No check-in (closed to arrival) — a stay may run *through* this night but not *begin* on it.
No check-out (closed to departure) — a stay may run through it but not end on it.
Stop sell — nothing may be sold on that night at all.

Setting them

Pick the room type, the nights, and the rule. Then:

Leave the rate plan as "Every rate plan" unless you mean one in particular. Closing a room type is rarely a per-plan decision, and a rule set on one obscure plan is how somebody thinks they have closed a date and has not. The grid shows a paler cell where a rule is set on *some* plans and not all — that is the warning.
Use the weekday boxes for "every Friday and Saturday in March".
Blank leaves a rule alone. Zero clears it. Setting a stop sell does not wipe a minimum stay somebody set last week — you have to clear that deliberately, with a zero.

Reading the grid

The grid is sparse: a night with nothing set has no row. A blank cell means *no rule*, and it is deliberately different from a rule that is switched off.

Lifting one

Set the same nights again with a zero, or untick the box. There is no separate "delete" — a restriction that is not set is simply not there.

What it does to bookings already taken

Nothing. A restriction decides what may be sold from now on. A guest who booked before you closed the date keeps their booking, and the desk can still check them in.

When it refuses

"That range starts in the past." A night already gone cannot be closed. Restrictions begin at the hotel's business date.
A maximum below a minimum is refused, even though each night's row would pass on its own. Nothing could ever book it.
A call that sets nothing is refused rather than reported as success.

Who can do this

A manager or above — the same permission as the tariff. A receptionist can see the rules and cannot change them, which is why "minimum stay is 2 nights" at the desk needs a manager to override.

More in Setting a hotel up

Opening a hotel: the whole thing in orderSix phases from the GST certificate to the first night audit, and what each one needs. Getting the hotel group signed upWhat Asar does, what the hotel does, and why nobody here chooses your password. After the wizard: making the hotel actually readyThe wizard makes a hotel that exists. This is what makes it one that can trade. Setting the restaurant up, in the order it has to be doneGST groups and stations before dishes, dishes before tables. Backwards means rebuilding the menu. The first real dayOne booking end to end before you rely on it, then the three daily habits. The month after openingFour things to read on a schedule, and the one that changes on its own. Adding a hotel: the five stepsOne wizard, five steps, and the hotel exists. Everything after it is adjustable. Room types and real room numbersThe type sets the price. The numbers are the rooms a guest is actually given. Room categories and room numbersAdding a category, putting rooms in it, moving a room, and taking one out of the inventory. Rates, plans and the cancellation policyA rate per type and date, and the rules that go with selling it. Adding and changing rate plansCreating a plan, what the meal codes mean, pricing one plan off another, and what stops you retiring one. Rates run out — the check that is not about configurationA hotel that was ready in August stops being sellable in February. Load rates further ahead. Changing a room's numberA room keeps its bookings, bills and history when its number changes. A guest in the room does not stop it. Seasons — a date range that prices differentlySetting a peak or a lean period once instead of typing a hundred nights. Moving a room to another category, and what is waiting on youA room can change category even with bookings ahead of it. Each of those bookings waits for a manager: upgrade it free, upgrade and charge, or release the room. Going live: the readiness checksEleven or so checks per hotel, and what each one means it cannot do yet. The rate sheetEvery room type, every plan, every night, with the rooms still free above them. It opens on All plans. Counting a room as another category for a few daysWhen something about a room changes for a while — a balcony shut, a lift out, a view gone — the room can be counted as a different category for stated nights and go back to its own on the night after. The onboarding boardEvery hotel in the group at once, and what each is still missing. One number and the gaps — the derived rate sheetPrice the cheapest room once; every other room type and plan is a gap on top. Type what you want in hand and be shown the rate to push. Invoice numbers: where they start and how they countHotel details has a box for the next invoice number — type it the way your accountant writes it, 27ACP01, and every bill after counts up. The system's own bill number stays beside it as the internal record. Only an administrator; never rewound over a bill already issued. Lists and reasonsEighteen short lists your staff pick from, and why free text was worse. GST registrations — one per state, and every rule with a dateThe registration is the unit of filing: one GSTIN per state per legal entity, its kind, its dates, its e-invoice threshold; which hotel invoices under it; the HSN/SAC master with dated rates and the condition in words.