To edit an existing rate, go to SETUP| RATES | MANAGE RATES and then
select the rate from the drop-down menu. Read more here
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Manage+Rates].
Click the Edit button. You will see a screen with the current rate...
HOW SECURE ARE CREDIT CARD TRANSACTIONS? IS BOOKINGCENTER PCI
COMPLIANT?
The BookingCenter system is behind our corporate firewall, runs with
strict security permissions, and is monitored 24 hours a day, 7 days a
week by our staff in Canada, Australia, a...
Customers will come to you from one of four places:
* New bookings will come through your property's marketing efforts.
Visitors to your website will click a 'Book It' or 'Check
Availability' button to make and confirm their booking. We enable your
we...
There are times when you may be experiencing issues with your MyPMS
software that can be fixed by clearing the Cache in your website
browsers.Typically, browser cache issues affect the system's ability
to perform certain tasks.
These issues include:
...
MANAGING GIFT CERTIFICATES ON A DAILY BASIS
When you get a person who wants to BUY a Gift Certificate, sell them
one in the House Accounts Screen (FRONT DESK | HOUSE ACCOUNTS). Make
sure you place the Gift Certificate number in the Description field so
...
Many properties sell and accept Gift Certificates as a normal course
of business. Here is how BookingCenter recommends doing this. Hint:
Many of our properties use a spreadsheet (MS Excel or Lotus 1-2-3) to
list the Gift Certificate they are selling and t...
HOW DO I CONNECT A CREDIT CARD SWIPER OR POS PRINTER?
If your credit card swiper isn't working as it used to, or as the
video in your MyCard series shows it's supposed to work (here
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcN6ydwYbCg&list=PLcPHA9qfWDYmqZaBTTTU8...
There are times when you wish to completely duplicate a booking. To do
so first load the existing source booking and from the Booking Data
tab, click Clone Booking at the bottom in line with other buttons.
Pressing the 'Clone Booking' button will make a...
Taxes are configured in the Setup area under SETUP|SETTINGS|TAX
CONFIGURATION
In North America, most businesses charge taxes _ON TOP OF_ their
rates, as they do not advertise taxed rates. If you do not charge tax,
don't tick either box for "Collect". If...
Any time a double-booking occurs, it is problematic for the Front
Desk. These can happen because of online bookings or because of
operator error.
Please follow the below action plans depending on the source of the
problematic booking:
1.) If a double-...
There are 3 ways to add a 'pet fee' to online bookings:
1) Using Per Person Rates. If you want to set the pet fee up to be a
per day fee, then setup your system to use the term 'pets' as an extra
person in place of the terms 'Children' or 'Infants' and ...
HOW DO I EDIT A BOOKING?
* Choose the booking to be edited via a 'Search' or by finding it in
the Tape Chart.
* With the booking chosen, choose the 'Edit' tab of the booking.
* In the Room Chart, simply click the current booking dates and then
clic...
The Check Out feature (a button available on the Booking Data, Edit,
and Room tabs of each booking) is only available on a Booking when two
events have occurred:
1) the System Date is 'today'. In other words, the check out date is
equal to the current S...
The on-line travel business is a very dynamic and continually
evolving. Currently, there are four chief criteria to gain visible
placement and improve your exposure; however, nothing is ever
guaranteed. The very complex 'algorithms' that determine your
pl...
To edit any letter in the MyPMS system, go to SETUP | PARAMETERS |
LETTERS.
FOLLOW THESE STEPS:
* OPEN LETTER: choose the Letter you want to edit by clicking on the
Letter I.D. or selecting it and choosing 'Edit'. The Letter will open
in an Editor w...
If you ever can not release a Out Of Order (OOO) assignment
'normally', here is a way to do it.
Find when the room started being set to OOO by using the Tape Chart
and going backwards in time till the first date it was set OOO. Then,
click on the Room a...
Bookings with Unassigned Rooms
Because the MyPMS system allows one to book a 'Room Type' and not
assign an actual Room until closer to check in, there can be times
when the Tape Chart availability looks off or shows a 0 or -1, etc.
This is usually it's ...
In the Edit Tab, you can modify the Arrival and Departure Dates, Room
Type and Rates of a confirmed, unconfirmed or Active Booking.
CHANGE THE ROOM TYPE OR ROOM WITH THE SAME BOOKING DATES
If you only need to change the room and/or room type and the b...
To use this feature, you will first need to designate which Letter you
will use as your Registration Card.
* Create or edit the Letter you would like to use as your
registration card. See Letters: Add Letters in MyPMS
[https://support.bookingcenter.co...
TO ADD OR EDIT A ROOM, GO TO THE SETUP AREA.
Click on SETUP | RATES | ROOMS and a list of Rooms of your current
rooms will appear.
TO EDIT THE INFORMATION IN A ROOM
* Click on the Room ID and click Edit
* Change information, Room Type and settin...
Travelers who make requests for rooms at your website can not over
ride a 'Minimum or Maximum stay' restriction set for a specific rate
for a specific date. But there are times when you may want to make
guests aware that there are other rates they could b...
Customers often wish to understand daily and weekly rates come out
different at times. The answer is usually because the Weekly rates are
set differently than Daily rates.
To learn, use the Manage Rates
(https://members.bookingcenter.com/site_rate_detai...
QUICKLY LOCATE GUESTS WITH ACTIVE SEARCH AND SEARCH BOOKINGS IN MYPMS
ACTIVE SEARCH
-----------------
To quickly locate an "active guest', use the Active Search located
next to the Quick list for "Arrivals", "Inhouse" and "Departures"at
the top of the ...
Go to FRONT DESK | HOUSE ACCOUNTS and click on the Tab of Folio you
need to close.
To Close a House Account Folio, there must be at least one charge and
payment and the folio must be balanced at $0. When the Folio is
balanced, a "Close this Folio" butto...
When we perform a system update to MyPMS we are often times updating
many files including web content and javascript. If your browser
doesn't automatically check for new updates you may still be using a
cached copy and experience problems or quirks.
If ...
SET # OFDEFAULT Days in Tape Chart
If you would like to set a new default number of days for the Tape
Chart to appear everytime you log in and become the default display,
then go to SETUP | PMS | SETUP.
* Click the Edit button
* In the first secti...
Rate Groups are used in group bookings to pull a set of rates for
allocated rooms to the Agent: MyPMS. Each Default Rate you create
may/may not belong to a Rate Group. If the Rates are in a Group, then
those Rates will be applied to the various Room Types...
INTERFACING TO YOUR G/L (QUICKBOOKS, MYOB ACCOUNTEDGE, SAGE,
PEACHTREE, ETC)
First our disclaimer:
The nature of hospitality financial tracking is mixed between accrual
and cash accounting methodologies. For those users who want to use
MyPMS to download...
Marketing to your guest database is a smart and easy way to increase
bookings business. Your Guest and Booking database can be sorted by a
variety of parameters, including source, guest type, arrival,
departure date, state, city, room type booked, and mor...
There are three methods to block or close availabiity for one room or
a group of rooms, for a specific time period. Choose the method that
best fits the way you want to manage the Availability Block Out. Any
one of these methods will block all availabilit...
There many be times when you receive a one payment several rooms and
the payment needs to be divided up and applied to each of the guest
bookings.
To move a transaction from one booking to another booking, there must
be a transaction created in the orig...
The first step in making a 'Direct bill' relationship with a Company
is creating a Company record in the Setup area. Go to SETUP |
RELATIONSHIPS | COMPANIES. This creates the Company relationship,
extends credit to the Company, opens an AR Account and app...
The Revenue Report in MyPMS allows one to report on revenue made
during a time period, by such factors as Company, Travel Agent,
Source, Room type, etc. This report contains the following components
with a breakdown of the logic applied to each component...
The Occupancy Forecast Report in MyPMS contains the following
components with a breakdown of the logic applied to each component.
As this report can be run with or without the 'Include Group Hard
Allocations' the explanation will be broken into two uniq...
Properties have the ability to customize the order in which Room Types
and Rooms display on the Booking Engine.
TO CHANGE THE ROOM TYPE ORDER ON THE BOOKING ENGINE
* Go to SETUP | RATES |ROOM TYPES
* Click on the Room Type ID
* Click the Edit Butt...
MyPMS and Management Tool customers can use automated yield management
via the Yield Management Module.
Details can be found at:
http://www.bookingcenter.com/interfaces-and-modules/yield-management/
[http://www.bookingcenter.com/interfaces-and-modules/...
When a user books a Package rate - either in MyPMS or online via the
Booking Engine - there is a Restriction message that highlights when a
restriction, such as a Minimum or Maximum Stay or Closed to Arrival,
is present for the booking.
When the Package...
VERIFY IF AN EMAIL (CONFIRMATION, CANCELLATION, ETC) WAS SENT AND / OR
RECEIVED
There easy ways for a property manager to check to see if an email
(confirmation, cancellation, etc) was sent by the BookingCenter
system.
1) Use a CC and BCC solution such...
There is nothing static about hotel operations. Rooms change and Room
Types get altered. Doing this in MyPMS is easy and can be done by the
operator, but the user must have Manager level access to the Setup
area. Rooms and Room Types can have 'sort' value...
MYPMS FOLIO - TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the MyPMS Folio Screen:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
Room Rent wasn't posted, How do I manually charge Room Rent?
[https://su...
This sample file - attached here as 'sources.csv' - can be used to
import all 'Sources' that a property wishes to use to record the
source of each booking.
Download, fill it in with your 'Sources' - 'sort order' if the order
they will appear in the ...
HOW DO I GIVE A DISCOUNT TO THE GUEST? There are times when you need
to provide a discount to a guest when a booking is created or after
the booking has already been created. Or find a way to reverse Items
and/or Taxes from one folio so that they can be m...
MYPMS EDIT TAB - TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the MyPMS Edit Screen:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
MOVING OR EDITING A BOOKING BETWEEN ROOMS, TYPES, OR DATES
[https://su...
MYPMS FOLIO - TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the MyPMS Night Audit Screen:
Knowledgebase Articles:
MANAGER'S REPORTANDTHE NIGHT AUDIT SUMMARY OF FOLIO POSTINGS SENT...
MYPMS RATES - TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the MyPMS Rate Setup Screens:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
How do I add another Rate Plan option to a Room Type in MyPMS?
[ht...
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the Packages Screen:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
**Selling Packages Online**
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Packages] Complete Guide
to setup a...
MYPMS GROUP BOOKINGS - TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the MyPMS Group Bookings Screen:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
How do I manage folio charges on group bookings?
[http...
PERFORMING A TRACEROUTE
Traceroute is a common utility that determines the network route data
is taking to a destination. It is available on all major Operating
Systems.
If you are using an Software as a Service (SAAS) product like MyPMS,
BookingCenter ...
The 3 digit on the back of the card (4 digit on the front of American
Express) is called the card security code and is typically referred to
as a CVV2 code. This CVV2 code is used as an extra security precaution
for online or other 'card not present' tran...
In order to accommodate a custom report, you will have to format what
fields you want and how you would like them laid out. A 'prose'
description, such as a written summary, is not adequate for designing
a custom report. What does work is a visual descrip...
There is no way to 'Add a Direct Bill Payment' to a House Account
folio at this time (we are working on it, though). In the meantime, if
your House Account charges need to be Direct Billed to a Company for
payment later on, here is what we recommend:
Cr...
Webinar Recording - May 6, 2014
Take control of Agent Allocations and maximize online distribution in
your MyPMS system. Learn how to setup your agents and allocations to
make managing online bookings easy. Perfect for new users or those of
you who may ...
GETTING STARTED WITH AUTO LETTERS
This function allows you to send automated "pre" and "post" stay
emails to your guests based on date driven events such as, check-in or
check-out date. Auto Letters is used in conjunction with the LETTERS
Function to se...
When you unlink a reservation from a group, the group booking data is
no longer linked to the booking. The booking details will remain the
with the Individual after it is unlinked.
To unlink an individual booking from a Group booking, follow these
steps...
Because the A/R (accounts receivables area) will allow multiple
payments to a "DB:" to be posted to a _SINGLE FOLIO_, the A/R is a
'dynamic' statement.
If these payments are posted 'along the way', the A/R will reference a
folio that may have additional...
There are three ways to make a booking. All three open to same NEW
BOOKING window. For step-by-step instructions, go to the online manual
at New Booking
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/New+Booking]
* Booking By Inquiry
* Booking By Av...
The Folio is a powerful and flexible tool for applying charges and
payments to a customer's bill. Each Individual and Group booking has a
Folio Tab in the Booking Screen. All Charges and Payments will appear
in the Primary Folio and can be modified easily...
When bookings are made, there is a log saved for MyPMS users in the
'Edited By' column of the Log. Bookings made by your staff should be
obvious, such as 'BOB_M' was made by your user Bob_M at that time
specified.
We define the other users you may notic...
Properties sometimes report that rooms that they have marked out of
order aren't properly showing on the out of order report.
The most common cause of this occuring is that the default rate plan
assigned to the room type of the room not showing in the r...
Individual Letters: Customize your letters with Merge Fields
To create or edit any letter, go to SETUP | PARAMETERS | LETTERS. See
Add Letters
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Add+or+Edit+Letters] and
Customize and Edit Letters
[https://sup...
WHY DO I SEE MULTIPLE AUTHORIZATIONS IN MANAGE CREDIT CARDS, WHEN
USING MYCARD, AND HOW DOES THIS AFFECT MY GUEST?
Properties will notice that often times, when using MyCard, that the
Manage Credit Card screen shows multiple authorizations, as well as
t...
Group Letters: Customize your letters with Merge Fields
To create or edit any letter, go to SETUP | PARAMETERS | LETTERS. See
Add Letters
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Add+or+Edit+Letters] and
Customize and Edit Letters
[https://support....
MERGE FIELDS - FINANCIALS
To create or edit any letter, go to SETUP | PARAMETERS | LETTERS. See
Add Letters
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Add+or+Edit+Letters] and
Customize and Edit Letters
[https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/K...
REPORTS- TOP HELP ARTICLES
This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most
usefull when working with the Reports:
KNOWLEDGEBASE ARTICLES:
What types of Accounting Reports does MyPMS provide?
[https://support.bookingcenter.com/...
When a room is marked as Out of Order status, the room will not be
offered as an available room to be assigned for reservations or
check-ins for the effective dates. Additionally, the room will not be
counted in your occupancy statistics. The room will be...
The “WARN ON CHECK-IN” flag gives you the option of
setting a "warning" pop-up message when a specific Guest Type is
checking in. With this option enabled any Guest Type that set to YES
in 'Warn on Checkin' will automatically show a warning me...
House folios have the same functionality as the Guest folios, however
they are NOT linked to a room number or Guest. House Account folios
are useful when you have items other than Room related charges such as
meals, point of sale items. This can be for an...
Customize a POS Receipt Letter to email or print from your House
Accounts Folio to your POS printer. This new Letter Type, called
"POS", is used in conjunction with the Print/Email function in the
House Account. The POS Receipt is a Letter and is viewed a...
To create a Receipt for all or selected items in any House Account
Folio, use the POS Receipt function located below the Folio, called
"Print checked items to POS Printer". The Receipt is a Letter and is
set up and customized in SETUP | PARAMETERS | LETTE...
Manage House Accounts with Search, Print and Email functions. To learn
more on House Accounts and managing folios see, House Accounts Folios.
[https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/587/]
Go to FRONT DESK | HOUSE ACCOUNT...
Each night that Night Audit runs, there is an email generated by
BookingCenter that is titled "CHARGE FOLIO RESULTS
FOR". This email lists the in-house rooms, guest names,
and amount charged to each folio via the 'Charge Folios' proces...
PACKAGE RATE PLANS NOW INCLUDE A LINK TO DISPLAY THE PACKAGE ITEMS
WITH THE PRICE, THE QUANTITY, AND THE RECUR TIME.
* The link is visible next to the Package Rate in the New Bookings
and in the Booking Details when a Package Rate is chosen.
* When ...
_OTA Contract Rates: Your Role as the Property Between an OTA and
BookingCenter_
Upon starting and maintaining a relationship with your OTA Contract
Rate program and BookingCenter, here are a few things that will help
you understand your role in the con...
For your security, the MyPMS Log in Session is set to automatically
expire if the system remains idle between 5-60 minutes. This means
that the User will be automatically logged out and returned to the
MyPMS log in screen if the system remains idle for th...
The MyPMS system can be used on tablets and smartphone in many ways.
The easiest way to do this for your specific 'device' (Android, Apple
iPad, iPhone, BlackBerry, etc) is to add the app's icon to the 'home'
on your device. Please read the instructions a...
WELCOME TO BOOKINGCENTER VIDEO TRAINING AND THE MYPMS BASIC FRONT DESK
OPERATIONS SERIES.
In part one of Basic Front Desk Operations, we will create a new
booking, search for a booking and go over the check-in and check-out a
Guest.
Recommended for fi...
DOES BOOKINGCENTER PROVIDE AN EMV DEVICE AND SERVICE FOR
'DIP/TAP/SWIPE'?
Yes! We have details on how you can enroll and sign up to receive an
EMV terminal on this page:
https://www.bookingcenter.com/interfaces-and-modules/mycard/
[https://www.bookin...
WHAT IS THE GROUP BOOKING ENGINE?
The Group Booking Engine is an online booking engine that offers a
central location for individuals to book a room as part of a Group
Reservation. By logging in to a secured area, bookings can be viewed
and added to a gr...
Some customers send Letters (such as Confirmation Letters, Group
Contracts, Registration Letters, etc) to email addresses where the
email 'bounces; or is not received by the guest.
The most common cause of this is more strict email sending policies
are S...
The Folio of every Guest Booking, Group Booking and House Account MUST
BE BALANCED on the departure date in order to check-out a guest AND to
complete the Night Audit. A guest due to check out with an unbalanced
folio will appear in the Night Audit under ...
When printing a guests folio properties may notice information in the
header that says 'BookingCenter:Property Management Software - Print
Folio' and at the url of the booking at the bottom of the page i.e.
'https://mypms.bookingcenter.com/tblfolioitemswr...
The Tape Chart has a variety of powerful features that make managing
booking and availability easy and efficient. To learn more about the
Tape Chart Functions, see Tape Chart
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Tape+Chart] in the MyPMS
User Manu...
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT THE BOOKINGCENTER-EXPEDIA DIRECT
CONNECTION
HOW DO I GET STARTED WITH MY EXPEDIA DIRECT CONNECTION?
If you DO NOT have an account with Expedia, go to Expedia | New
Account Setup
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/...
When we activate a BookingCenter property, we add the main user to the
'company' so that that user can login to
https://support.bookingcenter.com [https://support.bookingcenter.com]
and 'Submit a Ticket' to our support staff and track issues with
answers....
Bookingcenter provides an API (application programmable interface) for
marketing systems that perform loyalty tracking. This allows our
customers to work with numerous 'loyalty' systems as well as their
own. Basically, all Bookings get posted to an outsid...
The 'paying' of a Direct Bill (whether the folios have been placed
into a Statement or are in 'un-statemented invoices') is intended to
be made by a qualified accounting person _AFTER_ the charges and
payments have been finalized with the Company offered ...
There are many times when a property wishes to use a Complimentary or
Free Rate in a Booking. There are ways to do this, but we usually
recommend the approach that gives the best tracking analysis of Comp
Rooms.
Best apporach: Create a rate plan you ca...
Properties can place many tax values on their RENT Item (rate applied
as a Charge nightly). BookingCenter rounds most currencies to the
third decimal point, to leave a 2-decimal value. We follow the
generally-accepted norms in how rounding occurs: .005 up...
BookingCenter has 4 Booking Engine Templates that meet ADA (American
with Disability Access) Compliance. This means our templates meet the
highest standards of ADA Compliance using World Wide Web Consortium's
(W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
[ht...
Manage and prepare for OVER bookings from Networks such as OTAs and
GDS'
All BookingCenter systems have a Room, a Room Type, and Rate called
OVER. None of these can be edited or deleted, as the Central
Reservation Service uses these to assign any
If a customer request their "Right to be Forgotten", we send them to
the Property who _may_ had a booking with them, and that property can
remove them, as documented in the Privacy Page below. Thus, the right
can be retrieved via the place the Guest made ...
With the release of Self Checkin
[https://www.bookingcenter.com/selfcheckin/] and eSign
[https://www.bookingcenter.com/esign-digital-document-signing/], it is
possible to send your Guests to https://mybooking.bookingcenter.com
[https://docs.bookingcenter....
If one wished to Place a Cleaning or Meal Plan fee(s) into a Rate
(common requests from our customers), there are a few ways to do it:
* If the Cleaning fee is for _TRACKING PURPOSES ONLY_, and is
already embedded into the Rate, then the easiest way i...
BookingCenter supports a wide range of EMV devices for use with MyPMS,
as you can view here
[http://www.bookingcenter.com/point-of-sale-hardware-and-forms/].
The question of which device to get is based on pesonal preferences
and how you will use it. Fo...
In certain tax jurisdictions, there are different tax rates throughout
the year. This often takes place is locales where an occupancy tax
will be higher during peak tourist seasons.
The example below is based on an occupancy tax rate that is 11% from
Ju...
BookingCenter has been working with Long Term Stay properties for over
20 years and has some great tools for managing the unique needs of
Long Term Stay guests.
Here are a few common questions when managing these types of bookings:
* Rates - We have...
EMV devices are network devices that must be on the same subnet as
the machines that will connect to the EMV device(s). Thus, your Mac,
PC, ipad, tablet, etc must all be on the same network as the EMV
device. For this reason, nearly all installations mak...
Kiosk and Mobile Hardware Ideas
In an effort to further secure your virtual front desk, we have
outlined some options to assist in _locking _down your Kiosk for the
self check-in process. We don't recomemnd these products or vendors,
but these are links...
This wireless device has some issues you should be aware of:
1) When the device 'updates' and downloads a new 'application' (which
occurs whenever card issuing changes happen, which is often) the
'wi-fi' method for connecting needs to be re-set. Thus, y...
We have had requests from customers who wish to automate the delivery
of Lock Codes
[https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Keys+and+Room+Access+Options]
to be sent using Auto Letters, as opposed to Self Checkin. This is
usually done to reduce cost...
When using MYCARD EMV devices, your credit card transactions are sent
to the device from the BookingCenter software. The device then acts as
a mini server connecting and sending the transactions to TSYS/Global
Payments to complete your batch settlement. I...
We have a number of articles that can help with exporting data from
BookingCenter if you wish to leave our service.
The first and most comprehensive is the use the Search Bookings
function under the BOOKINGS TAB in the Front Desk. See Search Bookings
[h...
The email fields in our Desktop PMS, Channel Manager, and MyPMS
systems we support for BOOKINGS, SUPPORT, and BILLING notificartions
are intended to be _single_ email addresses only.
There are times when customers need these to go to multiple email
addr...
If you see a maintenance screen when trying to load a BookingCentrer
web page, click FORCE REFRESH on your browser to see if it's a 'stale'
page from an older event. Our maintenance messages are normally no
more than a few minutes, yet if a 'stale' browse...
When a property participates in a 'Merchant Model' program, the credit
card provided with the booking will be issued by the OTA, or merchant,
such as Expedia or Booking.com. Thus, you are guaranteed to get paid,
but the card will not be the card of the Gu...
Help Desk Software by Kayako