Complete Booking Engine and Schedules Guide

This guide explains how to create and configure a booking engine (e.g., for restaurants, spa, or entertainment), define its schedules, and manage access rules based on the guest’s board type.

1. Access and Basic Configuration

1. Access: Go to the menu Bookings > Booking engines. Select an existing engine to edit or create a new one.

2. General Information:

   • Title: Internal name to identify the engine.
   • Provider: Defines who manages the service (e.g., Entertainment). Here you can configure email addresses to receive booking notifications (recommended only for exclusive, low-volume services to avoid inbox overload).

3. Pricing and Payment Management:

   • Bookings only: Disable this option if you want to show prices and sell the service. If enabled, the system will not display prices.
   • Redsys payment: Enable if you want the guest to pay by credit card when completing the booking.
   • Reception ticket: Enable to generate an automatic charge in the PMS (if bidirectional integration is available).

2. Capacity and Availability Control

• Seats (Maximum Capacity): Define the total capacity of the restaurant (e.g., 220 people). If this total number is reached, all time slots close, regardless of the individual capacity of each slot.

• Search Type: Defines how the guest books:

  • Single: Book day by day.
  • Interval: Date range (ideal for buffets where the guest books for their entire stay at once).
  • Single Interval: The guest chooses between booking one day or a range.

• Calendar:

  • Open calendar days: Defines the “visibility window”. If you set 30, the guest will only see availability for the next 30 days. It is important to extend this if you sell services before the guest arrives.
  • Cancellation lead time: Time limit (in minutes) for the guest to cancel their booking from the WebApp.

3. Advanced Configuration and Restrictions

In the Configuration tab you will find key options:

• Groups and Master Restaurant: Useful for themed restaurants. You can configure a “Master Restaurant” with all complimentary booking rules and have the rest of the group’s restaurants “inherit” that configuration to avoid repeating the work.

• Guest Rules:

  • Force guests: Requires booking for all room occupants.
  • Force visit: Prevents repeating a restaurant if there are several themed ones, forcing rotation.
  • Daily limit: How many times per day the service can be booked (e.g., 1 for dinners).

• User Fields: Configure which data is required before booking (phone, email, etc.) or whether they should be hidden (Hidden).

4. Board Type and Complimentary Booking Management

This section is vital for controlling who can book and at what price:

1. Access by Board Type: In the Board Types tab, enable or disable access based on the guest type (e.g., allow “All Inclusive” but block “Room Only”). If disabled, you can customize a message suggesting an upgrade at reception.

2. Complimentary Bookings:

   • Configure how many free bookings the guest has based on their nights of stay (e.g., 1 free dinner from the 4th night onward).
   • Limit to included bookings: If enabled, the guest cannot book more times than their complimentary allowance permits. If disabled, they can continue booking by paying a supplement.

3. Booking Priority: You can limit the lead time by board type. For example, allow “All Inclusive” to book 30 days in advance and “Room Only” only 1 day, ensuring capacity for priority guests.

5. Upselling (Add-On Sales)

You can offer extra products during the booking process (e.g., bottle of wine, creams):

1. Go to the Upselling section and add a product with a title, price, and image.
2. Differentiated pricing: You can configure discounts by board type (e.g., the wine costs 22 EUR, but for “All Inclusive” a 5 EUR discount is applied).
3. Force Upselling: Requires the guest to choose a product to complete the booking (e.g., mandatory drink selection for a Balinese bed).

6. Categories and Schedules (Time Slots)

For the engine to work, you must create categories (e.g., Lunch, Dinner) and their schedules.

• Category: It is mandatory to upload an image; otherwise, the engine will not work. You can restrict entire categories to certain board types.

• Creating Schedules:

  1. Define the start and end time.
  2. Seats vs Rooms: Define the capacity. You can limit by number of people (Seats) or by number of rooms (useful for Spas). If you configure both, the slot closes when either limit is reached.
  3. Minimum Lead Time: How long before the service the sale closes (e.g., 15 minutes before). If you set -1, booking is allowed even after the slot has started.
  4. Maximum Lead Time: How far in advance the sale opens (e.g., 15 days before).
  5. Days of the Week: Check all 7 days of the week in the schedule configuration and manage actual closures through the “Closure days” tool. This prevents configuration errors when switching from high to low season.
  6. Pricing by age: Configure different prices for adults, children, and infants.

Productivity tip: If you already have a configured time slot (e.g., at 10:00), use the Copy button to duplicate it, and simply edit the time.