Reservation Rules
Rules are only checked when the reservation status is either New or Reserved. Reservations which are checked in, canceled or pending do not have to follow the rules assigned. Select Back Office > Reservation Rules Setup to enter reservations rules.
Since reservation rules are "Free-Form", they never effect external systems (GDS, CRS, Expedia, WorldLink, etc.) You must use all the options in Rate Setup for Closed for Arrival Departures, Minimum Length Stay, Closed Rates, etc. The exception to this is Require Assigned Rooms which will allow Worldlink to automatically assign a room if available when a reservation is received.
General
Period and Days Rule is in Effect
Enter a lower date and higher date as well as check off which days of the week the rule will be in effect. Any reservation who's check-in and check-out date fall within this range will execute the rule. The lower date, higher date and any date in between is affected as well as the days of the week this rule is in effect. For more information on Lower and Higher Occ percentages and how they effect reservation rules, please see the Reservation Rules based upon Occupancy section below.
Rules In Effect
Require Assigned Rooms When entering a reservation, you must assign rooms before you can save the reservation. If rooms are not assigned, the user will not be allowed to save the reservation.
Do not allow new reservations Block new reservations from being added with a checkin date within the selected date range, but allow existing reservations to arrive within the date range specified. For example, if you set this option for November 25 - 30th, you could not add a reservation to arrive on any date within the date range. However, you could change a reservation that was scheduled to arrive on November 21 to arrive on November 28, within the date range.
Require guarantee information When entering a reservation, you must enter a guaranteed hold type and a credit card number, a direct bill account number, or a deposit. If this information is not included on the reservation, the user is notified when saving the reservation.
Closed to Arrivals You cannot add a new reservation or change an existing reservation to check-in within the date range selected. Use this with the days of the week options to prevent any arrivals on a certain day of the week. For example, if you do not want to allow any Friday arrivals over the summer season, select the Closed to Arrivals option, enter the date range 05/15/11 to 09/15/11 and select just Friday.
No Discounts Allowed You cannot enter a discount percent or amount for reservation during the selected period. Use this for an anticipated high occupancy time frame to maximize revenue.
Minimum Nights Stay Input a minimum nights stay that will be required for check ins within the date range.
Display Comment in Popup Window Box
Enter the comment you want the user to see when making a reservation. Check the Show comment when making reservation option and the comment will appear once the check-in and check-out dates are entered on the reservation form.
An example would be if you wanted to make sure all reservations for the week of 12/25/11 to 12/31/11 had actual rooms assigned. Enter the date range and for a comment, enter "You must assign rooms to reservations made within this reservation period." Check the boxes "Show Comment" and "Require assigned rooms". The comment is just to remind the user they must block rooms when making a reservation, however, if the user fails to do so, a prompt will appear when saving the reservation advising the user a room must be assigned to be able to save the reservation.
When "Require assigned rooms" or "Require guarantee information" is checked, the user is notified when saving the reservation if the rules are not followed. A comment is shown telling them the error and letting them know to see their supervisor for more information.
To just display a comment to a user, such as "This is the busiest weekend, rates are increased by 20%", enter the proper date range for when the comment should appear, enter the message in the Display Comment in Popup Window Box and check the Show comment when making reservation option. The comment will appear to the user as a reminder.
Ignore this rule for Meeting type rooms (Rooms ignored in general availability) - Selecting this checkbox will force the Reservation Rule to ignore rooms that have been set to not affect general availability or occupancy.
Rule can be overridden with Overbooking Password - If an overbooking password is created and turned on, you can use this feature. If the checkin date, checkout date or number of nights change during a modification to a reservation, you will have to reenter the password.
Advanced Rules
For the specified date range and days of the week selected, you can create a free-form rule using Clarion Syntax or press Build to use the database Query Wizard to write a statement. If the statement created is true, the window will appear with the text that you have created. The reservation will not be able to be completed. This rule is checked when the user presses the OK button on the reservation.
When writing an advanced rule, there may be times you want to take into consideration the Day of the Week, such as "Is the checkin date a Friday or a Saturday?". This can be done using Modular Arithmetic (modular division) of 7. The remainder of a date divided by 7 will indicate the day of the week where 0 (no remainder) is Sunday, 1 is Monday, 2 is Tuesday, 3 is Wednesday, 4 is Thursday, 5 is Friday and 6 is Saturday.
**RES:CHECKIN % 7 = 5 ** (is the checkin date a Friday)
Such as, say you wanted a 3 night minimum when checking in on a Friday or a Saturday:
RES:CHECKIN % 7 >= 5 AND RES:NIGHTS < 3
Here is another example which means that only Apartment rooms, APT, can checkin on a Saturday and must be only be full week stays: (This allows 14, 21, 28, etc. night stays as well)
RES:BEDTYPE = 'APT' AND (res:checkin % 7 <> 6 or RES:NIGHTS % 7 <> 0)
Users can also enhance Advanced Rules using SQL Syntax in addition to Clarion Syntax. Click here for more information.
Alert Type:
Halt - Any statement which evaluates to true will alert the user, and the user will not be able to save or continue with the reservation.
Warning - Any statement which evaluates to true will alert the user and allow the user to press either [Continue] or [Cancel]. Only if the user presses Continue, the reservation is saved, otherwise, they will be returned to the Reservation form. (Not Valid with External applications)
Informational - Any statement which evaluates to true will display the message to the user with just an [OK] button. Once the OK button is pressed, the reservation is saved. (Not Valid with External Applications)
Additional information on how Rules are Evaluated
The results from the Period and Days Rule is in Effect section have to all equal true in order for any other part of the rule to be included. The occupancy which it uses is the checkin date occupancy excluding its own number of room(s) request. So, this is applied to ALL RULES.
The Rules in Effect on the General tab are applied to roomMaster regardless of the Advanced rule and Advanced rule checkbox.
The Advanced Rule is applied when saving and creating a reservation as all fields must be completed in order to evaluate the rule properly. This rule is evaluated in addition to the Date and Yield Occupancy percent condition on the General tab. Again, all information is required to evaluate all parts of the advanced rule.
Note: Reservation Rules are not applied to reservations made through WorldLink. Any restrictions, such as 3 night minimum, would need to be made through the Global Distribution System (GDS) directly.
Overbooking Security
This feature allows you to force a managers password anytime a reservation creates an overbooking. When activated and a reservation creates an overbooking, the user can either have a manager enter a password, or press cancel to correct the reservation so that it does not create an overbooking.
Reservation Rules based upon Occupancy
Accessed by clicking Back Office > Reservation Rules Setup > Insert
Use Reservation Rules based upon occupancy as a yield management tool for your property. For example, you can trigger a "Closed to Arrivals" rule to be applied when your hotel reaches a 90% occupancy or trigger a "No discounts allowed" rule when the hotel reaches higher than a 75% occupancy. You are in total control of the occupancy trigger point and the dates and days that the rule will be in effect. The rules are based on Check-in date. Other rules you may use include: "Require assigned rooms", "Require guarantee information", "Do not allow new reservations', or you may require a minimum night's stay.
When adding a Rules record you may set the Lower and Higher Occupancy percentages to 0% to force the Rule to be in effect at all Occupancy levels. You can even set the Higher Occupancy percentage to as high as 120% to allow for overbooking. The Occupancy level used by the Rule is based on the first day of a guest's stay. For example, If a guest makes a reservation for three days and the Occupancy over those three days show as 60%, 70% and 80%, The Rule will look at the first day of the reservation; 60%.
If a Room Type is set to not affect Reservation Occupancy (Yield Management), for example a meeting room, then the Occupancy Low/High amounts set in the Reservation Rule will be ignored, since that Room Type itself does not affect Occupancy.