Rooms and Rates
Setting up the room types, rate types, rooms and rates for roomMaster requires a lot of attention to detail. If you fail to set it up properly, incorrect rates could be charged. This section gives an overview of setting up room types, rate types, rooms and rates.
A room is the actual room or location a guest will be staying. For special accommodations where you book more than one bed to a room (such as a retreat house or a hostel), you may want to book each bed as a separate room. In this case, room numbers may be 101A, 101B, 102A, 102B, and so on - this would be if there are two beds in the room and you want to actually book each bed to a different person. Do not confuse this with traditionally booking a room and multiple beds for one family.
Before setting up each individual room, you will create room types. We need room types because a guest will call and ask "I need a King Bed". They are probably not going to call and say "I need room 101". A room type defines each group of rooms that receive a different rate and/or is a requirement of a guest, like a king bed or a special bath.
If a room is near the elevator, near the ice machine, etc - this usually does not change the rate or is a requirement of a guest. So, this is not a different room type. If the room, however, is a smoking room or a non-smoking room, it probably is a requirement of your guest. In addition, if the room is a King Bed vs Two Double Beds, it is a pretty good assumption a guest is going to request one or the other. So, below are examples of room types.
| Room Type | Description |
|---|---|
| King | King Bed, Smoking |
| KGNS | King Bed, Non-Smoking |
| QEUN | Queen Bed, Smoking |
| QNNS | Queen Bed, Non-Smoking |
| HAND | Handicapped Room |
In addition to the different room types a guest can request, there may be something special about the room which will cause a different rate to be used. This could be because the room is a suite, has a special bath or has a better view. Since these features are "extras" you might charge more for, a different room type is required.
If the room has special features (such as it over looks the ocean, has a special bath, near the pool, etc) and you do not charge a different rate for it, then it should not be a separate room type.
If the room receives different rates because of senior citizens, airline, government, etc, this also does not warrant a different room type. Different or discount rates for the same room type are handled using Rate Codes.
Each room type will group all the rooms that will meet the requirement of the guest.
Here is an example where the rate makes a difference if the guest is near the pool or on the front side of the building:
| Room Type | Description |
|---|---|
| KP | Near Poolside |
| KG | Near Highway |
| KNSP | Near Poolside |
| KNS | Near Highway |
| DDBP | Near Poolside |
| DDBL | Near Highway |
As you can see, there are now six room types (KG, KP, KNSP, KNS, DDBP, AND DDBL) needed for the above establishment. This may be because rooms near the pool cost more than the rooms near the highway. Because it makes a difference in the rate, a new room type is needed.
Note: In this example, the major feature of the room type is not in the description. It is understood from the room type code that codes that start with K are King bedded rooms, and those that start with DD are Double bedded. Also, NS means the room type is Non-Smoking. A lot of information can be in represented in the code to be able to create a shorter description.
Rate Types
Where you can use room types to define different types of rooms and separate rooms that will be priced differently, Rate Types allow you to consolidate room types that might have different features, but are priced the same.
Here is the example from above but this time let's say all rooms that are pool side are priced at a high rate and highway facing rooms are priced lower:
| Room Type | Description | Rate Type |
|---|---|---|
| KP | Near Poolside | POOL |
| KG | Near Highway | HIGH |
| KNSP | Near Poolside | POOL |
| KNS | Near Highway | HIGH |
| DDBP | Near Poolside | POOL |
| DDBL | Near Highway | HIGH |
In this example, the bed type and smoking preference do not matter. If the room faces the pool it is one rate, if it faces the highway it is another rate.
It is very important to understand rate types because the rate type assigned to a room type is used to determine which room type(s) the rate is applied to, not the room type. Depending on your property, it could be that your room types and rate types are the same, but most often there are different types of rooms that are priced the same. Consolidating the number room types by using rate types also decreases the number of rate entries to be created.
Adding room numbers
Once the room types have been configured, you can then enter each room number in the Room Information screen. As you enter each room number, select which room type the room belongs to. You can then enter a description. This description is now a complete description of the room such as "Overlooks Ocean", "Does not have a TV", "Near Ice-Machine" or "Near Elevator".
For information on how to enter Room Types and Rooms see Room Types and Room Numbers.
Rates
If you have very specialized rates and do not plan on having weekly and monthly rates, you can override the rate at reservation and check-in time. If you decide to override your rates, you will not have visibility and marketing analysis of different rate types and rate charges.
First, you should list all your room types and the different rates that each of these rooms can use. The regular everyday rate is called the RACK rate in "Hotel Lingo". Other rate codes that could be used are WEEK and MNTH for weekly and monthly. If a weekly and monthly rate is not going to be used, these rate codes do not need to be added.
In the first property example above, the four room types are KING, KGNS, HAND, and DDBL. Only three rate types are used (KING, HAND, DDBL) since KING and KGNS use the same rate type, KING. The chart below displays a break down of the rate types and rate codes applied to each room type.
| Rate Type | Rate Code | Room Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| KING | RACK | KING | King Bed, Rack Rate |
| KING | RACK | KGNS | King Bed Non Smoking, Rack Rate |
| HAND | RACK | HAND | Handicapped Room, Rack Rate |
| DDBL | RACK | DDBL | Double Bed, Rack Rate |
| KING | WEEK | KING | King Bed, Weekly Rate |
| KING | WEEK | KGNS | King Bed Non Smoking, Weekly Rate |
| HAND | WEEK | HAND | Handicapped Room, Weekly Rate |
| DDBL | WEEK | DDBL | Double Bed, Weekly Rate |
| KING | MNTH | KING | King Bed, Monthly Rate |
| KING | MNTH | KGNS | King Bed Non Smoking, Monthly Rate |
| HAND | MNTH | HAND | Handicapped Room, Monthly Rate |
| DDBL | MNTH | DDBL | Double Bed, Monthly Rate |
Note: Again, room types KING and KGNS have the same rate type, KING, since they are priced the same.
For weekly and monthly rates, you will enter the weekly amount as well as the daily amount. The daily amount will be posted automatically for "broken" stays. A broken stay is a stay that does not follow the exact period whether it be weekly or monthly. If a guest stays for nine days with a weekly rate, the guest will be charged the weekly rate on the first day and then on the eight and ninth day, they will be charged the daily rate. This is a daily rate which you decide to charge your guest for that particular rate. It may have nothing to do with the calculation of the weekly rate.
Example: A guest stays on a weekly basis and the charge is $54.00 a night. One option is to create a weekly rate. For the weekly rate, it would be $378.00 and the daily rate would be $54.00. If the guest stays for nine days, they will be charged $378.00 on the first night, and then $54.00 on the 8th and 9th night. You may want to charge the guest another rate for the daily rate because they are getting a discount for every full week they stay. You would then change the $54.00 daily rate to maybe $64.00 for example. This would charge the guest $64.00 a night instead of $54.00 a night for every day that is not part of a full week.
If there is no discount for weekly or monthly, you may just want to create daily rates. Another option is to just charge the guest a daily rate and if they stay for a minimum number of days, enter a discount amount on their folio. This will make your rate tables simple by only entering daily rate entries.
Examples of different ways to setup your rates:
Example 1:
Your hotel is mostly based on daily rates. No matter if they stay for one night, seven nights or 25 nights, they will still be charged $70.00 a night. In this case, you would not setup weekly or monthly rates and just use a daily rate type. This is the most common
Example 2:
Your hotel is mostly based on weekly stays. A guest is usually charged $300.00 a week for this room type. If they stay any other period besides a full week, they are charged $70.00 a night. You decide to give them a discounted rate for staying for a full week. You would only need to setup Weekly rates. The rate code could be RACK or WEEK if you decide this is the only rate code you need. When setting up the rate, mark it as "Weekly". Next, for the weekly rate, enter $300.00 for all adults. For daily rate, enter $70.00 for all adults. With this configuration a guest staying 6 nights would be charged $420.00. A guest staying for 7 nights would be charged $300.00. And a guest staying for 8 nights would be charged $370.00.
Example 3:
Your hotel bases their rates on weekly rates giving a guest a discount for staying seven nights or longer. If they stay less than seven nights, they are charged differently. In this case, a guest who stays one week or longer is charged $50.00 a night, but if they stay six nights or less, they are charged $80.00 a night. In this case, you would setup both daily and weekly rates. (RACK and WEEK marking the rate type accordingly). Next, the RACK rate would be setup as $80.00 each adult both for weekday and weekend. The WEEK rate would be setup as $300.00 each adult for the weekly and $50.00 each adult for a daily rate. With this configuration a guest staying 6 nights would be charged $480.00, $80 Daily rate x 6 nights. A guest staying for 7 nights would be charged $300.00, using the WEEK rate code. And a guest staying for 8 nights would be charged $350.00, $300 + $50, using the WEEK rate code..
Example 4:
Your hotel gives a discounted rate for guests who stay 21 nights or more. In this case, you can use just a daily rate. If the guest stays for 21 days, you can just add a discount percentage to their folio at check-in time. This will post the room rate at a percentage cheaper showing them the discount percent on their bill.
You may wonder why the rates are not tied directly to the room type screen and just allow you to enter the rate for each room or room type like other systems. First, each rate can be configured for different seasons. In addition to daily, weekly and monthly rates, there is always that "special" case such as airline discounts, government discounts, etc.
Derived Rates
In addition to the rates mentioned above, you may want to give discount rates to AARP or AAA members, or Government employees, etc. The easiest way to do this is to set these rate codes as a derived rates. Derived rates are rate codes that have their amounts calculated by adding or subtracting a percentage or flat amount to the amounts of an established rate, usually RACK rate. For example, let's say the RACK rate for rate type KING in our example is $100, and you want to give AARP members a 10% discount. You would set rate code AARP as a derived rate for 10% less than RACK for One to Four Adults. The advantage of this is if next year your rate RACK rate for the KING rate type increases to $110, you do not have to manually figure out the 10% discount rate and reconfigure the AARP rate records. roomMaster does it for you. This can only be used for rates that are always going to be the same amount higher or lower than a specific rate. If you want to use different percentages depending on the number of adults, the appropriate percentages or amounts for each number adults on the reservation can be entered.
Derived Rates Rules
- A derived rate code cannot be used to derive another rate code, i.e. if your AAA rate is derived from RACK, you cannot use AAA to derive your GOVT rate.
- A derived rate code must be derived from a rate code using the same charge type, i.e. a rate code with daily rates amounts can only be used to derive other daily rates, not package rates.
See Setting up Rate Codes for more information.
Special Discount Rates
Special rates can be setup where the guest might get a discount for staying a certain number of nights or stay three nights and get the fourth night free. The requirements to receive the discount are configured on the Discounts tab when setting up the Rate Record.
Tax exempt status
When you check-in a guest or take a reservation, you have the ability to mark the record as "Tax Exempt" -- there is no need to create any special type of rates to handle tax exempt status. All you have to do is remember to mark the folio as such. If you are sure that each time you use a particular rate that is tax-exempt (such as a monthly rate), you can mark the rate record as tax-exempt which will automatically change the folio for you. The system uses account code 100 to post room taxable. If the folio is marked as tax-exempt, it will automatically use account code 101 instead.
Taxable will charge all taxes related to the account being posted.
Non-Taxable will only charge taxes related to account 101, usually when a client only has to pay the bed tax.
Full-Exempt will never charge tax to the guest folio.
See Tax Information for more information.
For detailed information on entering Rate Codes and Rates, see Rate Information.