A booking engine is a highly convenient way for travellers to make a reservation at your hotel. The booking engine displays your rooms availability in real time along with the rates so that users can pick the dates they want, check the room availability and finalize the reservation.
There may be additional features to further enhance the user experience – like confirmation email upon completion of payment, etc. A booking engine can also integrate with channel manager software so that other travel agents can book room for customers at your hotel.
There are many benefits of having a booking engine:
- Guests can book rooms by themselves – Guests can self-serve themselves without having to contact you.
- Lot of people trust online booking – People these days have become accustomed to using online reservations and they have begun to trust and love the simplicity and ease of the whole operation. Booking engine can safely accept credit card payments and complete the transaction.
- Provide faster service – People can check availability of room and finalize the reservation within a few minutes in just a few clicks. No time is wasted and this can be done at any time of the day or night.
- Looks more professional – Having an online booking facility will enhance the professional image of your hotel. As most hotel websites have this feature nowadays, it has become an essential part and if your hotel does not have this feature it will make the site look bad and outdated. People may be surprised and they may want to look for another hotel to stay if they don’t find a booking engine on your site.
- You can offer perks – People usually look for additional perks or offers when they book directly. By offering something extra you can encourage guests to book directly instead of through a travel agent. A booking engine can allow you to offer such perks to your guests.