What does the statement "The PMS has taken ownership of the reservation" mean?
When a reservation is sent from eRes to Apex, and certain changes are made in Apex by the property or hotel, it is said that the "PMS has taken ownership of the reservation".
Ownership is taken when the following changes take place in Apex:
- When a group reservation is "Picked up", this is when the Room list or Name list is completed in Apex.
- When a Room number is assigned to the reservation in Apex.
This means that no further itinerary changes made to the reservation in eRes will be sent to Apex.
- Should the user change the arrival, departure, number of rooms, duration of stay or rate code on the reservation these changes will NOT be sent to Apex.
- Should a deposit be loaded against the reservation or guest details changed these changes WILL be sent to Apex.
Lets take a detailed look at the impact of these changes.
1. Group Bookings
When a reservation is made in eRes that has either multiple itinerary lines or include 2 or more rooms booked on a single itinerary, it is classified as a Group booking in eRes. For example 5 x Twin Rooms booked on a single itinerary (The same would apply for 1 x twin, 1 x double, 1 x superior- 3 itineraries on 1 eRes reservation).
eRes will send down a reservation (single line) for 5 x Twin Rooms with 2 Pax each. Apex PMS will receive this booking exactly as it is. When the Apex PMS user does a pickup, it effectively breaks that original reservation itinerary and creates:
- Group Master: No rooms booked against it, but merely a group folio where charges can be sent (A Group Master or PM Account).
- 1 x Room for 1 x Twin with 2 Pax.
- 1 x Room for 1 x Twin with 2 Pax.
- 1 x Room for 1 x Twin with 2 Pax.
- 1 x Room for 1 x Twin with 2 Pax.
- 1 x Room for 1 x Twin with 2 Pax.
There are now effectively 6 x Accounts (same Res number) but the itinerary is no longer a single itinerary with 5 rooms but rather 5 itineraries with one Group Master. Due to the fact that the interface does not send the reservations or their itineraries back up to eRes but merely availability, this means the link between the reservations have been severed.
eRes has 1 x itinerary for 5 rooms and Apex PMS has 5 itineraries with 1 room each. When a change is made on eRes, it can no longer be updated on the PMS as the details have changed downstream and it wouldn't know what itinerary to affect.
The same would be applicable if the Arrival date has been changed on the Booking in Apex. If eRes said the booking arrives 12 September and the PMS user changes it to 13 September, then eRes would assume the PMS has the correct details and is the Master of the booking. There needs to be a single system of record, and that normally resides on the PMS as it has the actual stay details.
Please Note
Another fact to note is that the PMS works on Room number level whereas all upstream channels like the OTA's (Booking.com, Expedia, Agoda etc) as well as the GDS and Direct Connects book on Room Category level.
2. Fully Independent Traveller
If the PMS user is allocating Room numbers in advance, it opens up a scenario where a Room Type/Category is not available for a FIT booking because the rooms where already removed.
- In the example below the current date is 1 September, lets say we have 2 rooms available on the PMS which are both of a "Standard Double" Room Type/ Category. Because the property is now allocating specific units in advance they have Mr Smith coming in for 1 night on 1 September and then allocate 1 room to him. They have Mr. Brown coming in for 2 nights and because the property is "pre-allocating" they put him in Room 2. Please see below:
Apex
| 1 September | 2 September | 3 September | |
| Room 1 | Smith | ||
| Room 2 | Brown | Brown |
- Room 1 and 2 both have been allocated for a future arrival. These 2 rooms however belong to the same Room Type/Category which is being fed to the CRS and Channels. As these channels do not work on Room number but only on Room Type/ Category, eRes would look a little something like this:
eRes before Pre-Allocating we display the below availability:
| 1 September | 2 September | 3 September | |
| Standard Double | 2 | 2 | 2 |
Then we make a booking for Mr Smith and allocate Room 1
| 1 September | 2 September | 3 September | |
| Standard Double | 1 | 2 | 2 |
As you can see, eRes does not know about the room number. It just knows the Room Type has 1 less room available of the specific Room type.
Then we make a booking for Mr Brown and allocate Room 2 (Again eRes reduces the Room Type/Category).
| 1 September | 2 September | 3 September | |
| Standard Double | 1 | 1 | 1 |
eRes and Channels are selling on a Free Sale basis, whereby trying to sell all the rooms without compromising the gaps in the "pre-allocation" of rooms.
If we look at the Apex example again:
Apex PMS
| 1 September | 2 September | 3 September | |
| Room 1 | Smith | Available | Available |
| Room 2 | Available | Brown | Brown |
- If a guest asked a reservations agent in the above scenario "Do you have a room available for 3 nights?" the guest would be turned away (being a prospective guest paying the highest rate) as you cannot accommodate the guest in a room for 3 nights because you have already allocated all the rooms. Potentially losing 3 x nights of revenue.
- Although there is a room available for 3 nights, due to the fact that you have pre-allocated it leaves you with either turning away the booking (when looking at the PMS availability) or alternatively you can sell the room upstream, but you will now either have to tell Mr Smith or Mr Brown to move rooms which is not ideal if they have already been told they are getting their preferred or requested room or have received a room number on their confirmation.
- As you can see there is not much we can do from a system point of view. We cannot make 1 x Room number = 1 x Room Type. This approach makes it impossible to yield as well as the OTA's and Booking Engine won't support a list of 50 Room Types should you have 50 rooms. Also the administration of managing this is not going to work. The whole purpose of Room Types and Categories are to yield optimally.
Thus the standard operating procedure in most hotels are to only do "Pick-ups" and Room Allocations the night prior to arrival. This also eliminates problems where a room may be placed out of order for maintenance or in use for a walk in reservation, without having committed to a guest on specific room numbers.
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