IMPORTANT STEPS TO PROCESS TRAVEL AGENT BOOKING

November 16, 2021

In this era of technology, there are various ways for travel agents to book the hotel reservations

  1. You can do booking directly with the hotel by calling the reservation department or the central reservation office. 
  2. You can do booking through the hotel website by using the special login or promotional codes. 
  3. You can do booking through the hotel sales representatives or sales manager.

When the reservation staff process the reservations of a room booking they need to be explicit with the requests and the information that has been given to the guest by the travel agent. Below are the significant points that should be checked appropriately and if any special requests or some details which are not filled in need to be immediately updated to the reservation record.

MUST CHECK THE ARRIVAL TIME AND THE DEPARTURE TIME

It is the most significant part and important aspect of the booking, the guests may require a room and he/she can do booking any time in 24 hours a day. If the booked reservation by the travel agent is anticipated to arrive early in the morning at 3:00 am, the room would have to be reserved for the previous night.

As well as same goes for late departure because possibly the booked travel agent had already confirmed a late departure to the guest but maybe the agent didn’t update the booking details for the same. In such a scenario, it can lead to guest dissatisfaction and complaints.

Therefore, hotel reservation staff needs to confirm at what time the guest will arrive at the hotel and whether guests require a 24-hour check-in. Need to make sure that the reserved room has been secured by paying an advance deposit either by a bank transfer or any guaranteed voucher by the travel agent or by credit card if no update then the room will be released by 18: 00 hrs in the evening and will be available for re-sale to other guests. 

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MUST CHECK DATE AND THE TYPE OF A ROOM BOOKED

For Travel Agent bookings and OTA bookings, it is very essential to double-check the room type usually the room type name in the hotel may differ from what is published on the OTA e,g. a room type called Garden Alcove in the hotel might be known as Superior Room in the booking channels. Always need to double-check to ensure that the booked room is similar to the room which is blocked for the guest by the travel agent.

As well, there are some other examples of why checking the booked room type is correct or not, therefore need to ensure that we are reserving the precise type of room desired by the guest.

  • How many bedrooms when reserving a suite?
  • Room with a balcony or patio?
  • Are we trying to squeeze four guests into a room that will accommodate only three?
  • Is a view important to our guests?
  • Must the room be located on a lower floor because the guest is nervous about heights, or disabled?

There might be more other special requests that require attention i.e. rooms for non-smoking guests, higher floor rooms, swimming pool view rooms, etc. For the booking dates, although these days all the online bookings are desegregated automatically from the website to the PMS or hotel software. Therefore, it is always suggested to double-check the dates according to the booking notes there might be some technical error that could affect the dates of the booking when the same got imported to the PMS.

In addition, if the booking request had come through email or fax, then need to ensure that the date, months and year are not in the opposite order. Possibly the hotel’s regional way of mentioning dates might be DD/MM/YYYY and the travel, agent’s region would be MM/DD/YYY. To prevent this kind of situation the easy way of mentioning the dates required is 15th August for 3 nights or can say check-in on 15th August 2021 and check out will be on 18th August 2021 which makes no confusion or any kind of guessing.

MUST CHECK THE TARIFF OR RATE APPLICABLE

Always need to ensure to double-check the room rate which was been booked (as per the correspondence or voucher) accompanied by the rate that applied in the PMS to the reservation record. There are numerous ways the rate could have been incorrectly picked up when the booking data was imported or entered manually.

In addition, must cross-check the included meal packages and that their inclusions are accurately applied to the reservation i.e. EP. AP, MAP, etc. Need to select the applicable TAC for the booking to make sure that the proper commission will be paid out to the travel agent. As well, must assure to select the hidden rate on the registration card that functions on the PMS for all travel agent bookings.

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MUST CHECK THE BOOKING POLICY AND CANCELLATION CHARGES

Always ensure sure to put the applicable booking policy and cancellation charges policy while sending the confirmation letter to the travel agent.

Therefore, the travel agent must counsel the guest about the cancellation charges at the time of booking the reservation. Also, need to check if the confirmation voucher had been made correctly or not and ensure that a long itinerary is included, and also have to issue a separate voucher for each hotel.

CHECKLIST FOR PROCESSING TRAVEL AGENT BOOKINGS

Following a proper checklist will prevent doing the mistakes or errors that might happen while processing bookings. The following points need to be noted down while creating a hotel travel agent booking.

  • Must check the guest’s name, address, contact detail and email id.
  • Check tariff is the rate quoted per room or per person.
  • What is included in the tariff i.e. meal plan, tax, service charge, etc.?
  • Is there any addition to a view, balcony, facilities, etc.?
  • Are there any policy or cancellation charges or policies to be mentioned?
  • Must check whether the booking dates are correct or not.
  • What kind of meal basis has been included i.e. EP, CP, AP and MAP?
  • Is there are any changes in the itinerary? If yes, have been updated in the hotel reservation?
  • How much and when does commission need to be paid to the travel agent (must choose the correct TAC for the booking)?
  • Must enter the proper billing instructions for the reservation.
  • Must enter the proper billing routing instructions to the reservations.
  • Make sure to attach properly all the reservation correspondences such as vouchers to the booking.
  • Ensure to add traces with instructions for applicable departments.
  • Must verify and send the confirmation letter to the travel agent.
  • For a multi-hotel itinerary need to create a separate confirmation letter for each hotel stay.