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?

How do I Refund payments and Direct Bill postings to a folio? 

How do I transfer a payment between two bookings not in a group?

How do I remove an incorrectly applied payment to a Credit Card?

Manually Dating Items / Charges to a Folio

Managing Gift Certificates

User Manual Articles:

MyPMS User Manual (Folio) 

 MyCard Video Tutorials (The MyCard Module allows Automated Credit Card Payments to your Merchant Account) :

MyCard Series- Video Playlist

Folio Video Tutorials:

Related Articles:

Manage Credit Cards Screen Behavior - void and modify auths, settle, and Delete.

How do I release / void an authorization?

Why some authorizations can be voided or incrementally adjusted, and others can not be?
Understanding the Accounts Receivables (AR) and Direct Bill System

Try this website if you don‟t know your location details - http://life.csu.edu.au/geo/findlatlong.html

Tip: Use decimal place Latitude and Longitude (DDD)

Google offers a free application to get your proper location at: https://support.google.com/maps/answer/18539?hl=en

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

How do I edit a booking?

How do I provide a discount to the guest?

How to cancel a booking after its been checked in?

How to I clone an existing booking to a new one?

How do I set a booking to a new guest?

User Manual Articles:

MyPMS User Manual ("Editing a Booking") 

Video Tutorial:

Related Articles:

Cancelling a Booking and Using Cancellation NumbersChecking Out a Booking - when and how can I do this?
Extending Long term stays, pre-charging rent and tax exempt status
How do I add another Rate Plan option to a Room Type in MyPMS?
Resolving Questions about Availability Issues and No Room Assignments

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 Report and the Night Audit summary of Folio postings sent via email

When A Same Day Check In and Check Out Occurs, I Can't Check Anyone Into the Room. Why?
Reports Knowledgebase Articles

Room Rent wasn't posted, How do I manually charge Room Rent?

User Manual Articles:

MyPMS User Manual providing an over view of Night Audit processes. 

Video Tutorial:

Related Articles:

How do I Print All Registration Cards For My Arrivals
Locked Users - How to Unlock Them and Avoid Getting Locked Out
How do I remove an incorrectly applied payment to a Credit Card?
Batch Report Date Request
How do I deal with a failed Batch?

This page highlights the Top Help Articles users have found to be most usefull when working with the MyPMS Rate Setup Screens:

Knowledgebase Articles & Documentation:
How do I add new Rate Plans?
(Single Parent Rate) (Child Rate) (Long Term Rate) (Item included Rate)
Set Daily Rates with Weekly Rate trigger
How to add another Rate Plan option to a Room Type in MyPMS?
Managing Rates and Availability to your Front Desk, Website, GDS and Global Booking Networks via MyPMS
Rate Groups - a collection of Default Rates - and Group Bookings.

How do I edit existing Rates?
How do I edit/ add Rate Restrictions?
Managing Long Term Rates for specific durations, such as weekly, monthly, or 'every 10 days'.

How do I configure and edit Taxes?

User Manual:
Rates Tab

Video Tutorials:
1.) Add New Rate Plan:

2.) Edit Rate Plans using Manage Rates Screen:

3.) Allocate Rate Plans:

YouTube Rates Playlist: Click Here


Related Articles:

Expedia Direct Connection FAQ | Bookings, Availability, Rates

Booking.com Direct | Top Help Articles

It is up to the XML to enforce collecting the CVV2 at the UI level, as BookingCenter's use of 'require CVV2' can not be enforced when an XML developer is developing the UI for the booking process.

Our advice is to save the most relevant current report, open it in Excel, or some other tool, and then edit it and save it so that it is what you want. You can then attach that file to this Ticket  or email, scan, or fax it to us at +1-718-228-5959. With a very specific document, we can quote a price to develop the report as you want it.

Create a new reservation for a guest called 'Direct Bill Charges For <Company>', assign the Cpmpany to the booking, and then cancel it immediately. Use this cancelled folio for charges and payments to this Company as you would a House Account folio.

We recommend a new ‘reservation’ for each Company account you need to do this for.

While the above solution is not as elegant as we desire, it does work correctly from an accounting perspective. Expect the ability to Add a Direct Bill to a House Account in the near term.

To unlink an individual booking from a Group booking, follow these steps:

1. Locate the Individual booking, either through the Group Booking or confirmation #, name, etc.
2. Go the the BOOKING Tab and go the Booking Information section.
3. You will see the group name and an unlink icon. Click the icon to unlink the booking.
   

Related Articles

How do I Transfer Payments between two bookings not in a group?

MyPMS Groups: Top Help Articles

If these payments are posted 'along the way', the A/R will reference a folio that may have additional payments to it at a later date. For example, if you were to Apply Payment on 5/4 via "DB:<company>" and then do it again on the same booking 2 weeks later on 5/18 for the "DB:<company>" , the original invoice (folio) would be referenced but a new A/R amount would be there. ie, a second payment took place.

To avoid this in a long-term, extended stay scenario, do one of the following;

• Check the Guest out each week/ month /etc and issue the "DB:<company>" only once at 'checkout' and then create a new cloned booking for the next week/month. Do this each week to cleanly separate what was 'consumed' and what was 'billed' to the Company.
  
  
• For each week, 'Add New Folio' to the booking and post each week's "DB:<company>" payment to a new folio on the same booking. This will create a separate folio (invoice number) that won't change and the booking can be as long as desired. You might even call the folio 'Week 1', 'Week 2', and so on. 

1. Booking By Inquiry  
2. Booking By Availability
3. Tape Chart

To add a new Booking follow these steps:

• First, go the BOOKING TAB in the Front Desk. Choose your preferred booking method.
• Choose from the date, rate plan, room or room type and you will see the NEW BOOKING button.(The same booking window opens for all three options.)
• Click the NEW BOOKING button and it will open in a new browser window.
• Complete the booking by first choosing the Rate Plan and Room and then entering Guest Information. This information will appear in the Booking Tab of the Booking once it is completed. (A Room must be assigned to see the booking on on the Tape Chart.)
• When finished, click COMPLETE BOOKING.

Useful features and Tips:

• Source and Guest Types will automatically populate for existing guests records when entered as a new booking.  

Guest Information

• Auto-fill:
  • Return Guests: Most Guest information fields can be auto filled by typing in a partial or full name or address of guest.
  • First-time Guests: enter the zip code and the city and state will automatically populate.
• Reset Guest I.D. : This feature is used in Group Bookings to save individual gues information while remaining as part of the Group. See Reset Guest ID

Booking Information

1. Source and Guest type is required. Source (I.e. Repeat Guest, Walk-in, Website, Trip Advisor) and Guest Types (I.e.Corporate, local, Tour). Go to SETUP | PARAMETERS to set up Sources and Guest Types.
2. Booking Comments: These will appear on on email and letters to guests and to maids and on Housekeeping sheets.
3. Guest comments: Stays with Guest. Not visible to Guest.
4. Projected Income: Total of the projected Room Rent of stay based on Rate Plan.
5. Guarenteed by. Choose the payment type (Receipt type). You are just indicating how you will take payment NOT charging anything to the Guest. To use our Direct Bill and AR system, see Understanding the Accounts Receivables (AR) and Direct Bill System

Related Articles

Edit A Booking

What's the difference between Authorize at Checkin and Authorize manually?

Trying to Check In a Booking, I get a 'Server Error'

There is a two column reporting system for payments and charges in Folios.  Next to each transaction you will see two icons: Modify (change $ amount of transaction) and Delete (deletes transaction from folio)

• Charges and Payments: The two column format allows you to  see each charge or payment as a line item with a corresponding $ amount in the Charges or Payments columns. The total of each column is shown at the end with the Cusomter balance shown at the end of the Folio.  A positive balance indicates an $ amount due. A negative balance indicates a credit balance due to a prepayment or deposit.

• Modify and Delete Icons: Click on each icon to either Modify (change $ amount of transaction) or Delete (deletes transaction from folio)

 The following are the main functions of the Folio:

MyPMS Folio - Top Help Articles

How do I Transfer Payments between two bookings not in a group?

Transferring Postings (Charges and Payments) Between Folios

Manually Dating Items / Charges to a Folio

If you are developing an XML solution for an Owner(s) of Unit(s) part of an Owner Channel Program (https://www.bookingcenter.com/nontraditional/), then the ability to make changes to the 'Auto Assign Room' is not within your command - that setting affects all bookings within the PMS and thus is the choice of the owner of the PMS.  BookingCenter won't be able to assist when attempting to Save a Booking and receiving this message, as the message displays that a specififc room is not available for all days the booking is attempting to be saved.  In such error conditions, the XML developer should provide error reporting to their Unit Owner(s) to make sure the booking is saved manually via the PMS, Owners Area, or Agents Area.

Take the next step in Global Distribution. Get more out of your OTA Channels!

The BookingCenter Contract Rates Program facilitates a direct connection for preferred placement on major OTA search engines like Booking.com, Expedia and Orbitz. Our seamless GDS Interface allows you to automatically manage availability and rates in your PMS system. Learn how to make the most out of your Global Distribution System with effective OTA Channel Management.

The following topics are covered in this webinar:

• OTA Overview- Are OTA Contract Rates right for you?
• How to get started GDS and OTA Contract Rates.
• Advantages to the XML Interface with BookingCenter.

To create or edit any letter, go to Setup | Parameters | Letters. See Add Letters and Customize and Edit Letters. To set up Automated Emails, see Auto Letters Setup

Merge Fields available for Individual Letters. See below for details on each field.

• Today's Date - Inserts the date of the current day.
• Hotel Details - Inserts Hotel details: Entered in SETUP|SETTINGS|SITE DETAILS. See Site Details
  
• Booking Details - Inserts details entered in the Booking Information for each guest. See Booking Details
• Guest Details - Inserts the data entered in Guest Information Section of the Booking Data. See Booking Details  
• Financials - Inserts financial information from the Payment Information and Folio of Booking Data See Booking Details-Folio
• Financials (Projections) - Inserts financial information for future bookings. Use for Confirmation Letters.  See Booking Details-Folio
• Financials (Taxes) - Inserts Tax information from the Payment Information and Folio of Booking Data See Booking Details-Folio
• Travel Agent - Inserts information from Agents. SETUP|RELATIONSHIPS|MY AGENTS See Agents
  
• Marketing and Policies - Inserts information from Marketing and Policies. SETUP|SETTINGS|MARKETING AND POLICIES See Marketing and Policies
• Digital Signing - Inserts the link to the Digital Signature Document. And, the signature and initials box that the guest will sign. See  eSign - Digital Document Signing
• Owners - Owner contact details and commission fields to create detailed letters for each Owne

 To see detailed descriptions of Merge Fields for IndividualLetters at Merge Fields- Individual Letters

Properties will notice that often times, when using MyCard, that the Manage Credit Card screen shows multiple authorizations, as well as the date such authorizations were acquired and settled.  Most often, this is due to a property setup to use 'Auth at Checkin' to receive an authorization for the remainder of the 'projected income' amount plus a 'one time auth' plus a 'nightly auth fee' as detailed in the MyCard section of the MyPMS Manual.

If the property then posts additional charges that makes the necessary payment greater than intially predicted (ie, what was 'auth'ed at checkin), then MyCard will go retrieve an additional authorizations to cover this increased amount(s).  MyCard does this 'in the background', but displays the authorization details in the Manage Credit Cards screen.  If your guest is watching their credit card statement online during their stay, they will see these authorizations as 'pending' and might get concerned that these are 'charges'. Tell them not to worry - when you pay the folio at checkout, in a single payment, these auths all get combined into that single payment and the card holder will see a single transaction on their bill.

This happens when you settle the batch.  The multiple auths all get settled from the merchant processor, to the card holder, as a single transaction.  Thus, if you have an auth for $150, and another auth for $45 that was created when a single payment of $195 was paid to a folio, then the batch report will show these 2 authorizations settling, but the card holder will see a single transaction from your property for $195 on their credit card statement.

See our online manual for detailed instructions, examples and tips on  MyPMS MyCard

Visit youtube.com/bookingcenter to subscribe.

Front Desk Functions

MyPMS: Night Audit Screen

Folio Functions

MyPMS: Add Deposit

MyPMS: Give Refund

Managing Bookings

MyPMS Moving a Booking Between Rooms or Types

MyPMS Overbooked Guests and Unassigned Rooms

MyPMS - Room Assignments and Availability Optimization

Managing Rates

MyPMS: Add Rates

Manage Rates

Managing GDS, Agents and OTA Channels

 Webinar: OTA Contract Rates

 Webinar: Managing Agent Allocations May 2014

Using the Expedia Interface with BookingCenter MyPMS

BookingCenter: Using Booking.com

Creating and Editing Letters

• Default Letters

• eSign - Digital Document Signing

• Add or Edit Letters

• Add or Edit SMS Letters

• Add Group Letters

• Customize Letters

• Letter Templates

• Auto Booking Confirmation Letters

Letters: How do I Print All Registration Cards For My Arrivals

Letters: BC and BCC Email from MyPMS Letters and Booking Confirmations

Letters: How do I send a confirmation letter to my guests?

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?

How can I request a customized report?

User Roles: System Access and Reports

Daily Transactions and Credit Card Deposit Matching

How can I run a tax report?

Managing Gift Certificates On a Daily Basis

How can I get a Total Revenue/Income Report for a Day?

Travel Agent Commission Report

Understanding the Occupancy Forecast Report

Undertstanding the Revenue Report?

Understanding the Bookings Report

User Manual:

Reports

Video Tutorial:

Coming soon....

Related Articles:

Managing Rates and Availability to your Front Desk, Website, GDS and Global Booking Networks via MyPMS

• Soft Allocations only guarantee rate for the type. This is useful if providing a group booking discount but not guaranteeing availability.
• Hard Allocations guarantee both rate and availability for the group booking. Any hard allocations are immediately deducted from the type availability and reserved for the group. Hard Allocations may only allocate up to the maximum # of rooms that belong to the type. Hard Allocations cannot over allocate beyond the maximum count for the type and cannot be used to push a property into an overbooking scenario.

Because a group booking isn't allowed to overbook a property,  you may find a scenario in which the Room Type has been overbooked by staff. If this happens while you are editing the current availability and the Room Type shows –X and you get the error message "No. of rooms allocated exceeds available no. of rooms for the selected room type(s) for at least one of the days", See Rooms Allocated Exceed Available Rooms

Related Articles

Editing a Release Date to soft allocation

To place a room(s) "Out of Order", go the BOOKINGS|TAPE CHART.

• Click on the Room in the left hand column and a pop up box will appear. Click on Mark Out of Order.
• Another pop-up box will appear. Choose the date range and enter a Reason if needed.
• Click Save

To "Make a Room Available", go the BOOKINGS|TAPE CHART. 

• Click on the Out of Order Room in the Tape Chart and a pop up box will appear.
• Click on "Make Room Available" and the Out of order status will be removed from the Room and Tape Chart.

Related Articles:

Blocking out rooms for a specific time period

Out of Order (OOO) status will not release from a room

Reports: Why do some rooms not show on the Out of Order Report?

• Availability and booking interface between BookingCenter's system and a customer's website application presented as a web service using SOAP.
• SOAP messages using the OTA schemas based on the OTA 2008B Specification from http://www.opentravel.org/  with online documentation is available at http://opentravelmodel.net/pubs/specifications/Specifications.html.

Platform support

• Our SOAP WSDLs are compatible with Microsoft's .NET platform and NuSOAP (the PHP variant for SOAP). Options exist for other development platforms, but we support these.
• No restrictions on server implementation, as it has no impact on client.
• SSL security certificate needs to be mainatined by the XML developer, as the 'host' website where shopping and transactions occur is the website serving the web pages and not BookingCenter's secure server. The communication between the XML developer and BookingCenter, however, does take place over secure SSL communication.

Service Definition

• The XML Service supports multiple search criteria such as availability, rates, rooms, packages, amenities, activities, etc.
• Availability is data is taken from data coming from any Desktop Pro, MyPMS, or Management Tool customers.

References

• http://www.opentravel.org/
• http://ws.apache.org/axis/
• http://ws.apache.org/wss4j/
• Our KnowledgeBase area for XML developers: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/List/Index/8/xml-team

Support

We have a series of knowledgeBase articles at: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/List/Index/8/xml-team that can help you get going and 'scope' out the development of an XML web services project using BookingCenter.  BookingCenter will only provide general support for a webmaster/developer who attempts the XML web service for a customer. But BookingCenter can be hired to develop a custom 'Booking Engine' or other application. Just contact us at: http://www.bookingcenter.com/contact to request a quote after you send us a 'wire frame' and/or diagram of your intended screens and detailed functionality.  We need a detailed description of what you want prior to quoting a price or time estimate.

In order to examine the BookingCenter API documents, you will need to download the NDA (non disclosure, available at: http://files.bookingcenter.com/API_use_NDA.pdf, sign it and email it to info@bookingcenter.com or fax it to us at +1-718-228-5959 (please append a note telling us which BookingCenter customer you are working with). We will then send the appropriate documentation, login and info for you to test your code against our 'Test System' (if your customer is there), and then release to our production systems once readied. 

For Desktop users, choose Parameters| Internet Configurations | Online Config and then check the box that states "Display Individual Type calendars" and then do a Full Update to enable the feature.  

For MyPMS and Management Tool users, from the Setup area, choose the Settings tab; then the Booking Engine Settings; and enable the Show Room Type Calendars = YES. 

Once saved, look at your basic 'enquiry' link such as:https://requests.bookingcenter.com/enquiry.phtml?site=<SiteID>.  There is a drop down to allow users to select the specific Room Type allocated.

To use the MISC Inventory Items feature Effectively
Setup up:
1. MISCTX  (ID)  Misc. Taxable (description)  set to "misc"
2. MISCNTX   (ID) Misc. Non Taxable  (description) set to "misc"

This way the Property can charge an extra Item to a Guest without entering it into Parameters first - they can do so 'on-the-fly'!

All items where the description will not change should be set to stock or service in the Inventory Item setup.

BookingCenter supports this via a field called a 'CRM_GuestID' in the ‘Request Server API’ (available upon request to business partners) that passes the value generated by a remote CRM system via either a POST or GET command. Then the Central Reservation System adds a new field to the ‘Guest File’ that is picked up for each booking/modification/cancellation that occurs via an online booking, OTA, or GDS booking.

The RESNUM ('Booking ID')+ 'CRM_GuestID' syntax described in the Central Reservation System API allows ta business partners to track the CRM identifier to a booking/modification/cancellation event.

The email is sent to the main email address of the property, as set under Setup | Settings | Site Detail.  This is a good email to have your staff, or accountant, look at each day to make sure all rates were charged correctly to each in-house Guest.

If there were manually charged RENT charge, see this article to explain the effects of the manual 'Add Charge' of RENT on Night Audit: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/348

To make sure that the Night Auditor never forgets to 'Charge Folios' see this article above to to make that a requirement.

When your property decides to interface your OTA (Online Travel Agent) extranet with their BookingCenter PMS system, there are several components of your OTA profile that will continue to be managed through your extranet and others components that will now be managed through your PMS system.  

This following list describes what components are managed where in order to help you manage both sides of your OTA connection:

BookingCenter:

1.  Room Types

2.  Rooms Allocated to Room Type

3.  Rates Allocated to Room Type

4.  Availability

5.  Length of Stay 

6.  Closed to Arrivals

7.  Room Types/Rates allocated to Promotions

OTA Extranet:

1.  Images

2.  Policies

3.  Marketing Information

4.  Cancellation Policies

5.  Restrictions for Rooms/Rates

6.  Taxes

7.  Create Promotions (NOT in the Set-up Wizard but directly with your Market Manager)

8.  Create New Room Descriptions

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 connection.  

1.)  The two primary parties in any OTA Contract Rate is:  a.) the property (you)  and b.) the OTA (Booking.com, Expedia, Airbnb, Priceline, Hotwire).  Because the contract is between the two of you, the roll BookingCenter plays is simply being the connection between your PMS software and the OTA extranet (the managing site for any OTA).  

2.)  Proper Communication Channels:  Because the contract is between the two of you, we do not interfere in the enrollment process or the maintenance process between you and your designated Market Manager.  We do not reach out directly to the OTA on your behalf, as they will not want to hear from us.  We will rely on you to relay any communication that we need to know from your Market Manager to us.  We will also ask you to relay questions we may have as part of trouble-shooting or clarification back to your Market Manager.

3.)  Limited Information:  Because we are a third party, we will not have access to your extranet or some of the settings you have with your OTA.  We cannot always see what you see, and so we will rely on you to communicate in detail what problems you are having.  Include the guest's name, date of check-in, room/rate, promotional program if there is one, etc.  The more details we receive from you, the more we can research effectively on our side of the relationship.

4.)  Who to Contact When:  Someitmes it is difficult to know what side of the relationship (the OTA or your BookingCenter software) the problems lies on.  When in doubt, contact both sides with the details of the issue:  us and your OTA Market Manager.  

For the Property Management System, however, there is no limit to as to how far ahead a booking can be entered. As long as you have entered rates into the future, the booking can occur.  But the Book by Inquiry method is the only way to way to 'book ahead' greater than 18 momths in the future in MyPMS.  The Tape Chart and Availability Chart is only available for rates up to 18 months in advance.

For example, if you have a rate set for as far as Dec 1, 2135, you will be able to make a booking today for any date up to a departure of to 2135 via the Book by Inquiry method.  If you have not bothered to enter in Rates for the future, BookingCenter creates them for 365 days in the future automatically, based on the default values in the 'Default Rates'.

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/

What is EMV "chip and pin" and what does it mean for MyCard?

A regulatory change that occurred in North America where the liability for fraudulent credits cards containing a 'chip' shifted with the advent of the 'EMV' change.  EMV is the global standard for smart card payments and acceptance devices, named after the developers: Europay, MasterCard, and Visa. EMV microchip-enabled cards provide stronger security and other capabilities not possible with traditional magnetic stripe cards.  Credit card companies are already issuing EMV/chip cards. A special card reader is required to read these EMV chips, but you can still swipe the cards through the same magnetic stripe readers you're using today. However, to encourage businesses to adopt the more secure technology of EMV/chip cards, a liability shift went into effect. Prior to EMV, if you swipe a counterfeit or stolen card, the bank assumed the loss. With the liability shift, if you swipe a counterfeit or stolen EMV/chip card with a magnetic stripe reader, you could be liable for that charge. Liability is with whichever party is the least EMV-compliant in a fraudulent transaction. Thus, depending on how the card was swiped/dipped (pin & chip)/tapped (NFC or 'Apple Pay')/keyed-in, the liability for approving an authorization could be with either the merchant bank or the merchant.  

Credit cards processed via MyCard (the payment gateway used within MyPMS - More details) have - and will - continue to work after the 'EMV Liabiity Shift' just like computers did after Y2K - don't get alarmed.

BookingCenter provides details on how you can enroll and sign up to receive en EMV terminal on this page: https://www.bookingcenter.com/interfaces-and-modules/mycard/

What should a MyPMS customer do?

Because there are many thousands of credit-card accepting facilities that do not have EMV-certified hardware and software, the 'liability shift' in North America did not upset the relationship between merchant and merchant provider.  Also, few BookingCenter customers see 'pin and chip' credit cards that present fraud.  For any manually keyed-in transaction, online booking, or card present transactions with a 'swipe' track and no 'pin & chip' (the vast majority of transactions right now), there is no change required in your use of MyPMS or liability shift.  Just keep doing things as traditional.

For card holders who come to your property and present a 'pin & chip' credit card, if you swipe the card and that credit card is found fraudulent, the new 'liability shift' means that the property owner ('merchant') may be liable for fraud costs.  Because the card holder possessed a 'pin & chip' credit card, the 'liability shift' governing 'card present' payments (i.e., entered via a swipe or manual entry) will no longer protect the merchant who doesn't use an EMV device to authorize 'pin & chip' cards.  

Option 1 : For those concerned with the 'pin & chip' credit card 'liability shift' (i.e., you have exposure to guests who present fraudulent cards), you should visit this page and get an EMV device so you no longer 'swipe' chip cards.  This is the best and easiest path to avoid fraud chargebacks, as MyPMS has robust support for EMV devices we support, as we detail here.

Option 2:  An alternative is to never worry about the EMV 'liability shift', and continue to run all credit cards as you have done in the past, swiping the 'pin & chip' credit cards for your 'card present' discount rates, which will continue to work. If you process payment prior to arrival, or via online, then this issue doesn't affect your business at all, since all your card transactions are 'offline'/ 'card not present'.  The liability to this strategy is that if you were to swipe a 'pin & chip' credit card, and it was later found to be fraudulent, you might find your merchant processor won't protect you for fraud costs. Ask your merchant account rep to know more about that situation.

Option 3: If you don't want an EMV device from BookingCenter, you may also request an EMV reader from your merchant provider in order to process 'pin & chip' card present transactions.  This would mean posting an 'offline' credit card 'receipt type' in MyPMS, as explained in the article here, as these 'offline' transactions won't process within our MyPMS system. Such an approach would be a mix of processes for your front desk:

1. The MyCard traditional technique (see these movies for understanding of how MyCard works) for all transactions except card present transactions where a 'pin and chip' card was presented.
2. For situations where a 'pin and chip' card is presented by a guest, the card would be 'dipped' into the EMV device then manually entered onto the folio as an 'offline' payment.  View an article describing this process here.

This would be 'best practices' behavior in avoiding any fraudulent 'pin and chip' transactions.  But it is a mix of processes, which can cause errors when staff is trained on exceptions. We have a more detailed article on using EMV terminals with MyPMS here.

If you want to order an EMV reader...

Any of the EMV devices listed at: http://www.bookingcenter.com/point-of-sale-hardware-and-forms/ are EMV ready now with BookingCenter. Read the details to make sure the one you choose supports the method for connecting (either ethernet cable or wi-fi) and also whether or not you wish to use NFC (which is what ApplePay, GooglePay, SamsungPay are, for example).  

If your merchant banker can provide one of these devices for you to use for your 'EMV' transactions, then we will be able to install our BookingCenter app onto the devices listed on the page at: http://www.bookingcenter.com/point-of-sale-hardware-and-forms/ to make integrated EMV-approved transactions.  No additional device will need to be purchased, as the PAX devices listed at the URL above will all work.  BookingCenter is giving away basic EMV devices for free if you sign up at this page.

What if my merchant processor doesn't have a certified EMV app with Does BookingCenter, can you build one?

BookingCenter spent years designing and building EMV apps with PAX devices and the TSYS and Global payment processing platforms.  We likely won’t create an EMV app with other merchant processors for some time, as the effort is intense. Each EMV certification takes year(s) to gain, and then hundreds of hours per year to re-certify as standards evolve.

At the moment, Global and TSYS are the only large platforms we’re certifying EMV apps with, as there is no down side to our customers (except having to switch accounts).

If you want to stay with your existing processor, I’d recommend avoiding the EMV terminal and stay with the e-commerce and ‘card present’/swipe transactions we offer via the many processor connections. While this does provide a bit of opportunity for illicit users who attempt charge backs when using their ‘chip cards’ in a swiped transaction, in our experience, the risks are either non-existent (most hotels who swipe ‘chip cards’ have no charge backs) or very small (most people are decent and don’t lie).

EMV is a complex subject and there has been much written about it.  There is a good overview with common questions and answers presented here: http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/emv-faq-chip-cards-answers-1264.php.

Why don't we just become an Apple 'identified developer'?  Because Apple sant hundreds of dollars per year to include the app in their 'app store' and the Desktop model is dying, so the cost isn't worth the reward.  Not to mention, we all pay Apple a lot of money each year as it is :-)

This new security feature is called GateKeeper, and it doesn’t mean you can’t run BookingCenter (or any unverified app) on the Mac, you just have to either temporarily skirt the security blanket of GateKeeper, or turn off the app limitations entirely.  There are instructions for doing so at: http://osxdaily.com/2012/07/27/app-cant-be-opened-because-it-is-from-an-unidentified-developer/

Note, this only affects Mountain Lion and later versions of OS X.

If you were to send an email to that 'alias' address, Booking.com routes it to the actual email address of the guest (such as me@gmail.com).

Booking.com claims they did this because scammers are increasingly trying to find ways to gain access to their 'platform' and this will help to protect travelers (and partners, such as BookingCenter) from email-based attacks. Regular email traffic between partner and guest is still possible. The difference is that the identity of the partner (BookingCenter) and guest (the traveler), will be protected.

We know that email addresses to guests are very important for marketing and follow-up purposes.  And systems such as BookingCenter often use email as a unique identifier.  The actual email can still be obtained from the guest upon check-in/out, so train your staff to do so.

The email address remains valid until 2-months after checkout. For example, the alias email address for a booking made now (say in May, 2015) for a December checkout, will still be active until February, 2016.  After that date, though, sending an email to an expired 'alias' will not go anywhere.

Change is constant in our world.  Here's hoping this change from Booking.com will make good sense.

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 group without having to contact the property directly.

The Group Booking Engine provides Rooming Lists, individual payment options and group booking details to give guests the information they need to choose a room and complete payment. Guests can select the Room type they want from availability based on the hard allocation in the Group Booking in MyPMS.

All bookings made on the group booking engine are automatically updated and managed in MyPMS giving the Group Booking Engine complete control without the time commitment of taking individual bookings.

The group booking engine can also be customized to your property by adding a logo banner, displaying your marketing policies and room type images.

Note: The Group Booking Engine is available to MyPMS customers who currently use the BookingEngine.

Features and Benefits

• Full availability control and guest management in MyPMS
• Secure guest access with User ID and Password
• Availability and rates based on group booking allocation
• Seamless integration of rates and availability with MyPMS
• Customized banner and Room Type images
• Display Deposit, Confirmation, and Cancellation Policy

How does the Group Booking Engine work?

• First, create a Group Booking in the Group Booking Wizard in MyPMS. The confirmation # of the booking will become the User ID.
• Open the Group Booking and go to the Booking Data Tab.
• In the Booking Information section, create a password and enter it in the password field and click Save. (See below)
• The Group Booking can now be accessed through the Group Booking Engine, https://groups.bookingcenter.com/ using the Confirmation # as a User ID and the password you created for the Group. The User ID and password is the same for all guests logging into the Group Booking.
• Give the Group Contact the User ID and password and direct them to https://groups.bookingcenter.com/ to log in and start making bookings.
• To easily email the USER ID and Password to the Group Contact, add the USER ID and Password to the Group Confirmation Letter using merge fields. 

NOTE:

• Group ID: is auto set via the system, it is the Group Booking ID. This field is not editable.
• Password: is set via the property o teh Group Data page. Guests cannot change this field, but it be changed at any time.

Customize the Group Booking Engine

There are several settings in the Setup Area of MyPMS that are used to customize the group booking engine to your property. You may already have some or all of these set up for your website booking engine. The booking engine settings that are already enabled will automatically be used on your group booking engine.

These settings are all located in SETUP in MyPMS.

• Email Notifications and Guest confirmations of bookings
• Deposit Policy and terms
• Deposit, Confirmation, and Cancellation Policy Message
• Customized logo/banner
• Room Type images

Go to Group Booking Engine in the Online Manual for Step-by-step instructions.

Group Booking Engine Overview and Instructions for Guests

After the group booking is created. Give the Group contact the User ID (Confirmation #) and password and ask them to log in at https://groups.bookingcenter.com/

Note: If the Group check-in date is in the past, or the group has been cancelled, then the system will not allow anyone to log in.

Once logged in, the guest will be logged in to the Group Booking Engine and the Add Booking Tab.

The Group Booking Engine has four Tabs:

Add Booking

• Arrival and Departure Date cannot be changed in the booking engine. If a guest has different booking dates than the group, they will need to call the hotel to make their reservation for the different dates.
• Choose # of guests
• Choose the room type from the drop down menu. (These have already been allocated in the Group Booking)
• Enter First and Last Name and Email Address
• Choose method of payment from the drop down list.
• If Credit card is chosen, then enter the credit card number and expiration date.
• The last step is to agree to the terms and conditions if present and click Complete Booking.
• The booking will now display in the Rooming List.

Rooming List – This list displays the bookings that have already been booked as part of the group.

Group Information – This page shows basic information about the group, i.e. check in and checkout dates, etc.

Property Information – Basic contact property Information, phone, address, Address of the property

To Customize a Group Letter with the USER ID and PASSWORD

After the group booking is created and assigned a password, you can then easily give the guest the login information by using a merge field in a custom Letter. 

• To create a Custom Letter for a Group Booking, see Add or Edit Letters
• To insert User ID (Confirmation #) and Password merge fields, See Merge Fields - Group Letters
• To enter the Password for the Group Booking, see Group Bookings - Create Password

Sample Group Booking Engine Letter using Merge Fields for USER ID and PASSWORD. The following example shows how the Letter looks in the Template Editor with merge fields inserted for the User ID and Password. Please feel free to copy and paste this into your Group Booking Letter.

It has been common for hotels to use a gmail address, such as 'myhotel@gmail.com' as the From: on the email setting in BookingCenter.  But the SPAM avoidance of today's systems won't guarantee that BookingCenter is authenticated to send email for your specific Gmail account. What is BEST- and works in all email situations - is for you to use your own domain, such as myhotel.com, and SPF sign that domain so BookingCenter is authenticated to send emails for your domain 'myhotel.com'.  That way, you use an email such as 'Bookings@MyHotel.com' as the From: to send confirmation/self check-in/etc emails and the SPF record has been validated.  

If you wish to use a commercial email service (such as Google offers) for reciving and replying to emails - great.  You can easily forward all email from 'myhotel.com' to your gmail: myhotel@gmail.com to avoid having to change anything in your operations - all email will still be managed by your basic, free Gmail email address.  You just use your domain name to validate (via SPF)  that third party systems - such as BookingCenter - can send emails under your domain name and therefore the emails are receved by all your intended recipients. And it does look better to guests,that your enails come from @myhotel.com (such as bookings@myhotel.com).

Regardless, once you have set the SPF record (as detailed below), you must make sure the email used by MyPMS (set in the Setup Area | Site Settings area - 'email') uses your domain name, such as bookings@myhotel.com.  The domain name used must match the domain name with the SPF record so that BookingCenter is authenticated to send email on its behalf. 

For properties that choose this recommendation and use their domain-based email, and have SPF enabled with a hard fail condition, we recommend you add an SPF record for the BookingCenter designated senders of _spf.bookingcenter.com

A sample SPF record, if you didn't already have one defined, would look like this:

v=spf1 mx a include:_spf.bookingcenter.com -all

If you already have an SPF record, then simply add "include:_spf.bookingcenter.com" to the record at the end of your current record and save it. This would maintain the ability of your current provider to send email for your domain and add the 'net block' of BookingCenter to also send email for your domain.

Breaking this down, this defines allowed senders as any of the MX records (inbound mail servers) for your domain, as well as the IP address of the root A record of your domain, and any BookingCenter server we designate as our defined senders.

If you aren't familiar with SPF, we recommend you use a generator tool like https://www.spf-record.com/generator that can pull your existing SPF record and allow you to make modifications. If you have an existing SPF record and aren't what to change, you can open a support ticket providing the domain in question and our support team can assist you in determining what to add to the record.  Please be aware BookingCenter doesn't control the DNS for your domain, and cannot make those changes for you.

For SPF authentication to pass, all these conditions must be met:

1. you have exactly 1 SPF record on your domain;
2. the record's syntax is correct;
3. the total number of DNS lookups can't exceed 10. 

Please look in your DNS entry to make sure there is only 1 TXT record, it is important that you don't have 2 SPF records.

You may have a situation where you are SPF approving another service to send emails from your domain, such as 'outlook.com' in which case the 1 TXT file on your DNS will have TWO SPF records:

• one for Outlook (which might look like: v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com -all)
• and one for BookingCenter (which should be v=spf1 mx a include:_spf.bookingcenter.com -all)

In such a case, the SPF record might look like this : v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com include:_spf.bookingcenter.com -all which will allow BOTH Outlook and BookingCenter to be supported via the SPF record.

MyPMS currently does not support DKIM signing of emails.

Updating your SPF records involve changing your DNS settings. Depending on the company that hosts, or is the registrar for your website (i.e. GoDaddy, 1&1, etc), the steps below may differ somewhat, but are consistent.

1. Login to your Domain and go to your DNS Records
2. Click ‘Add a DNS Record’
   1. Often you will be presented with a list, such as the first screen shot 
3. Choose a TXT record 
4. In the most DNS systems, enter the following:
   1. The Host Name will be blank
   2. The value will be: v=spf1 mx a include:_spf.bookingcenter.com -all
   3. TTL: We recommend an hour (3600 seconds)
   4. Click ‘Save’
5. We would recommend waiting about an hour and then you can check your SPF and DNS records at: https://mxtoolbox.com/dnscheck.aspx.

 
Some additional recommendations

1. You can only have ONE SPF record. SPF supports multiple entries, but you can only have one (single) SPF record.
2. You can check your existing SPF and DNS records at: https://mxtoolbox.com/dnscheck.aspx. Simply enter your domain (i.e. bookingcenter.com) and go to SPF Record Look-up. This screen will show you if the record is updated correctly (in green) or if there is a problem it will show in red and tell you the issue(s) that need to be corrected.

There are also several ways to customize the Tape Chart to fit your property needs.

Follow these step-by-step instructions on how to use these settings to customize your Tape Chart.

• Order of Room Types & Rooms: Choose the order of Room Types and Rooms om the Tape Chart.
• Default # of Days: Choose the number days in the default Tape Chart View. This means it will automatically appear with the set number of days when opened. This can always be changed manually in Tape Chart.
• Date Bar Repeat: Choose the number of rows to view your rooms on the Tape Chart.
• Room Type Images: Add Thumbnail Images that will appear in the Room pop out on the Tape Chart.
• Booking Flag: Add a Flag to booking by selecting one of your flagged Guest types in the Booking Details. It will appear on the Tape Chart with a red outline around the Guest Booking.
• Group Icons: Add an icon to each Group Booking and each booking in the Group will have the icon appear on the Tape Chart.

The Tape Chart has many functions available for managing bookings and availability that you may want to become familiar with. For details and instructions, see Tape Chart Management

If you desire to use a PMS that seamlessly interface to Sabre/SynXis, please contact BookingCenter to take advantage of excellent service and long history of PMS services to hotels.

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.

If you DO have an account with Expedia go to Expedia | Activate Connection

For important information on setting up and managing your Expedia connection, see Expedia | Manage Connection

 How do I know when my Expedia Direct Connection is live?

After BookingCenter has completed the mapping of your Room Types, we will confirm the connection with Expedia. You will then receive a confirmation email from Expedia. In this confirmation email, you will be asked to log into the extranet to activate the direct connection. When you click this button and activate the connection, you will be LIVE on Expedia and can receive bookings. BookingCenter will also receive notification that the connection has been activated by you and update all rates and availability. If there are any issues, please let us know by updating your support ticket. 

How do I change Property Information, Images, Room Type Descriptions and Amenities?

All changes to Property and Room Type information such as descriptions, images, amenities, etc. are made in the Expedia Partner Central extranet. You have complete control over this in your Extranet. If you need help with making these changes, please contact your Expedia Market Manager. Remember, BookingCenter sends ONLY Availability, Rates and Restrictions to your Expedia Extranet. 

How do I find Expedia bookings in MyPMS?

All Expedia bookings will come in to your BookingCenter PMS with the agent code of EXPDIRHC=Expedia Hotel Connect, EXPDIRHC= Expedia Collect or EXPDIRPK= Expedia Packages, depending on the program you are signed up for. All Expedia bookings will come in with EXPDIR as the Source and an "E", for Expedia, at the end of the booking confirmation #, I.e. 626310332E

• The booking will be automatically integrated into your PMS and appear on the Tape Chart as an "Unconfirmed" booking.
• You can also see all online bookings that have integrated into your PMS in SETUP | BOOKINGS | ONLINE BOOKINGS. For instructions see Online Bookings.
• To locate an online booking at the front desk, go to BOOKINGS | SEARCH BOOKINGS and search by Source. For an example, see Search Bookings

 How do I know when a Expedia booking is made?

When a booking is made on Expedia, you will receive an email notification from Expedia and it will automatically integrate into your PMS system and appear on the Tape Chart as and "unconfirmed" booking in Red. You can also see all bookings made in SETUP | BOOKINGS | ONLINE BOOKINGS. See Online Bookings

How do I add or remove a Room Type?

Easily add/remove room types by making the changes in Expedia Partner Central and then notifying BookingCenter of the changes. See Expedia | Add or Remove Room Types

How do I make sure that my room types in MyPMS are mapped to my Expedia extranet?

Once we receive noification of your activation request, BookingCenter will complete the mapping for you! All you need to do is make sure that you have the Room Types setup in Expedia Partner Central extranet and we will map them in MyPMS to channels EXPDIRHC=Expedia Hotel Connect, EXPDIRHC= Expedia Collect, and EXPDIRPK= Expedia Packages. See Expedia | Agent Allocations

How will I be able to see what is mapped to the Expedia Extranet

Go to SETUP | RELATIONSHIPS | AGENT RELATIONSHIPS. Locate Agent BKGDIR. Click on the number "X of X"  in the Allocations column and this will open a window with the Room Type/Rate Plans currently allocated to Expedia See Agent Relationships

How do I know what Rates are being sent to Expedia?

All your Room Types will be mapped to the Standard Rate Plan for each Room Type you have allocated in MyPMS under SETUP | RATES | ROOM TYPES, unless you specify otherwise.  All Room Type/Rate Plan allocation changes must be done by BookingCenter. If you need to change a Room Type/Rate Plan, then please submit a support ticket with the requested change.  

How do I make Rate changes?

There are two ways to change rates. Rate changes made in the property management system will be sent to ALL channels the Room Type/Rate Plan is allocated. Changes made in the Expedia extranet will apply ONLY to the Expedia.

1. BookingCenter property management system: Rate changes made in SETUP | RATES | MANAGE RATES will automatically update to Expedia and can be seen in your Extranet. See Manage Rates
2. Expedia Partner Central extranet: Changes to rates can be made in the Expedia extranet and will over ride any rate changes made in the property management system.

How do I manage availability?

There are two ways to manage availability. Availability changes made in the property management system will be sent to ALL channels the Room Type/Rate Plan is allocated. Changes made in the Expedia extranet will apply ONLY to the Expedia channel.

1. BookingCenter property management system: Any changes made to availability in the property mangement system will automatically update to all channels including Expedia. This includes Closed to Arrival on Rates, Out of Order Rooms, etc. See Manage Availability
2. Expedia Partner Central extranet: Changes to availability can be made in the Expedia extranet and will over ride any rates set in the property management system.

Where do I make changes to Restrictions: Closed to Arrival, Min. LOS and Max LOS.

There are two ways to change restrictions: Restriction changes made in the property management system will be sent to ALL channels the Room Type/Rate Plan is allocated. Changes made in the Expedia extranet will apply ONLY to the Expedia channel.

1. BookingCenter property management system: Rate changes made in SETUP | RATES | MANAGE RATES will automatically update to Expedia and can be seen in your Extranet. See Rate Restrictions and Manage Rates
2. Expedia Partner Central extranet: Changes to rates can be made in the the extranet and will over ride any rate changes made in the property management system.

How do I add a promotion?

Contact your Expedia market manager and set up the promotion in your Extranet. Please tell your Expedia Market Manager that the promotion must be setup in "Instant Promo Mapping".  This setting was designed to be for short-term promotions for properties who wanted to offer promotions with short notice and NOT require extra mapping from the Channel Manager (in your case, BookingCenter). For important information and more details on Promotions, see Expedia Direct | Create Promotions

Setup and Activation

• If you DO NOT have an account with Expedia, go to Expedia | New Account Setup.

• If you DO have an account with Expedia go to Expedia | Activate Connection

Managing your Expedia Connection

• For important information on bookings, availability and rates with your Expedia Connection. See Expedia Direct | Manage Connection

• Expedia Direct | FAQ - Activation, Mapping and Rates

• Online Bookings: Booking Cancellations and Modications

• Online Bookings | Source of Booking

• Rate Loading and Managing Rates to the GDS and OTA Contract Rates

Online Manual for step-by-step instructions

• Expedia | EQC Connection

• Expedia | Add or Remove Room Types

• Expedia | Agent Allocations

• Expedia Programs

• Expedia | Create Promotions

Troubleshooting

• Online Bookings: What is the best way to cancel or modify a GDS Booking

• Rate Loading and Managing Rates to the GDS and OTA Channels

• What is the difference between a "stay through" restrictions and an "arrival based/day of arrival" restriction?

1. The site displays various currencies,
2. The site allows you to change between tax inclusive and tax exclusive, and
3. The site will sometimes display rates above the standard (double) occupancy.
   1. For example, when searching for Room Type ABC, the site will display 4 guests; where the standard occupancy is 2, but can accommodate four. When it does this, the rate will show the total for all four guests (your base double occupancy price + the additional fee for each guest).

In summary, we have found that many sites selling on Mr and Mrs Smith in Europe are sending rates in Euros with ‘tax included’. As such, if you are searching for the property on the Mr and Mrs Smith retail site, be sure to check currency as Euros with ‘tax included’. When you do this, you will see the correct rates.

If there are any discrepancies with your rates on the site, please contact our support department and we can assist.

There are a number of properties outside the United States that do, or wish to, sell in US dollars. For example, you can sell and are set-up for USD within BookingCenter, but are located in Argentina. Some travel sites allow this, but Booking.com does not.

Booking.com has a policy/requirement that properties sell in their local currency. That said, BookingCenter has outlined steps below to accommodate for this policy. There are two ways to do this, which include:

1. Create a new rate plan for the Booking.com channel/agent (BKGDIR). Note that this rate plan will be in your local currency (i.e. non-USD).
   1. As the currency fluctuates, you please be sure to update your rates.
   2. Steps can be found at: https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Add+Single+Rate
   3. When complete, please work with the Support Team to allocate this new rate plan to the Booking.com agent, or

1. Use Rate Loading. Details can be found at: https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Rate+Loading
   1. This will allow you to increase or decrease your rates by a set percentage. If the exchange rate was USD 1.00 to GBP 1.43, you would use rate loading at 143; or 143%
   2. As the currency fluctuates, you please be sure to update this percentage.

Option #1 is the recommended strategy.

The key operational challenge with this is changing your rates “back” to USD after the reservation imports into BookingCenter. When this is done, all reports and details will be correct.

Note: The one market where this does not apply is Mexico. Booking.com does allow properties to sell in USD in Mexico. Booking.com has said they are exploring options to expand this strategy outside Mexico, but nothing has been confirmed to date.

If you have any questions about the above process, please contact our Support Department.

The definitions are as follows:

• "Arrival based/day of arrival" minimum length of stay
  • The minimum length of stay applies to the Arrival Date.
  • Example: A three-night minLOS is set for August 2nd; but has a one-night minLOS on August 1st and August 3rd. Any guest whose stay starts on August 2nd, will be required to stay at least 3 nights. If the guest made the reservation on August 1st or August 3rd, they could book for just one night.

• "Stay Through" minimum length of stay
  • Properties set a policy on minimum stay at any given period. This refers to the check-in date and check-out date, which must fall within a given period.
  • Example: A three-night minLOS is set for August 16th. Any guest whose stay includes that day (August 16th) must stay at least 3 nights.
    Currently, Expedia, Booking.com, and the GDS/IDS support "arrival based/day of arrival" minimum length of stay.

The BookingCenter MyPMS product and the BookingCenter booking engine utilizes "stay through" minimum length of stay.

In some cases, properties would create a new rate plan within BookingCenter for the GDS/IDS and OTA channels if they did not want day of arrival restrictions.

If you have any questions about the above process, please contact our Support Department.

Get to know the layout of the PBX to server to LAN lines. Does it have two DB9 (typical serial PC port connectors)? Usually, older PBX systems will be configured with a DB25 connector and this needs to be converted to a DB9 or a USB on a new PC.

Find out PBX type, speed, and port (port it will connect to the PC), (baudRate, DataBits, StopBits, Parity)- these are the preferred ways of sending data for the PBX that will be known the manufacturer of the PBX or the Telecom representative.

Purchase a Call Accounting package from BookingCenter.

Connecting the PBX to the Call Accounting PC

Cables

On a typical DB25, the pins used are pin

2 (transmit), 3 (receive), and 7 (ground). On DB9, the pins used are pin 3 (transmit), 2 (receive), and 5 (ground).

If connecting to the PC's DB9, get a straight-through cable or DB25 to DB9 converter that converts the DB25 pins 2 (transmit), 3 (receive), and 7 (ground) to the appropriate DB9 pins 3 (transmit), 2 (receive), and 5 (ground). Note, you will NOT need a null modem if the card on the PBX was wired correct. If the card was 'pinned' like a PC, you will need a NULL MODEM. However, if the talcum folks did things right, the Null Modem is NOT required.

Settings

Find out the PBX data speed and type

If 300 characters looks like garbage, the baud is set too fast. 300 is the preferred way for most Call Accounting systems to get SMDR.

• 8, none, 1 is most common
• 7, even, 2 is 2nd most common
• speed 1200 is most common, 300 is 2nd most common

How to see if the PC is getting data?

There is a serial port tester available from Radio Shack can make troubleshooting easier. It costs $14 - it will show the transmit (pin 2) and receiving (pin 5) Pins 2 and 5 are the key points. On most computers, the Top Port is COMM Port 1, Bottom Port is COMM Port 2. USB ports are usually configured as COMM 3 and 4, and we have had luck getting USB to DB9/25 connectors to work out OK.

The best way to do this is to use a port viewer to see if the PC Port is actually getting SMDR. The common 'port analyzer' tool on Windows is called Hyperterminal.

Access Hyperterminal at: Programs -> Accessories -> Communications

Open and choose New Connection. Name the connection whatever you like, click Connect Using and choose the port to be monitored to see SMDR coming from the PBX. If you can see SMDR coming INTO the computer via Hyperterminal, then the Call Accounting should take over from there.

Setting Phone Fees/Costs

Find out the rates to be charged for connection and minutes, do so for local, toll, long distance, and international. Make a list of all rooms and the corresponding extension. Make a list of all Administrator phones and find out if the property wants them costed to a cost center. Usually, Admin calls will NOT be posted to the PMS.

Setup Metropolis Steps

Install Metropolis. Use the Setup | Installation Wizard. Choose the following:

Register: enter data exactly according to the email/fax Product Registration received from Metropolis. Keep this record for use in case you need to re-install it!

Communications: PBX communications (PBX hookup) receive from the COM Port the PBX is attached to - use the default rates or the help above.

Hotel Identifier needs to be placed on the PMS Codes area of the Setup: you will need this code provided by BookingCenter support if you are using MyPMS. The Hotel Identifier is irrelevant if using the Desktop PMS.

Send to:

• For BookingCenter Desktop PMS choose Call by Call. Use the default NAME for the file, which is transmit.out and choose the HOBIC II post format with Block Check as YES.
• For MyPMS, choose the setting that states IP Port and choose port 3000 and the IP address of 64.84.18.210 and use the Port and 'Identifier' that BookingCenter provided to you.

Post Format - for both Desktop and MyPMS, use HOBIC 2001 and choose YES to Block Check.

DataSpy lets you see what Metropolis sees - basically, SMDR coming into the computer. Use the Data Spy to verify that data is actually coming in.

PBX: choose your PBX from the list. Use the basic Mitel for all Mitel brands (the MOST common in the USA)

Departments - this is where the setup of special Guests and Admin extensions occur. Keep all Non-guest extensions as Administration and all Guests extensions as Guests.

EXTENSIONS - extensions don't need to be set for each room. All non-defined calls will default to Guest calls. Make sure you define all extensions for ADMINISTARTION and they will be ignored.

Rates - choose the Admin and usually do NOT cost those calls. Choose the Guest rates and make the rate plan and % increase and the surcharge (charge placed on each call) as the manager directs.

Turn ON Persistent Connection (PMS Setup--Under Misc Tab, choose ON the PMS uses a persistent internet connection) You may want to set the following:

• Alarms - to notify the property of failures, like the PMS not polling for awhile or a 911 call placed form a room.
• Maps & Country - to set the system so it knows where you are and a visual depiction of WHERE calls are placed to.

We recommend setting up Metropolis to run as background application. This way, Metropolis will always be running regardless of whether or not a user remembers to launch it or the /Startup Items/ loads. Download the instructions for doing this here. The recent version will minimize itself after 10 minutes of inactivity.

If you need to setup multiple extensions in a single room, BookingCenter only allows one phone extension per room, but Metropolis allows you to 'map' additional extensions to the individual extension BookingCenter is polling for.

In ProfitWatch, under Setup | Property Management , choose translate extensions and map the proper extension. For example, if both phone extensions 220 and 7220 are in room 220, you would choose 7220 to 'map' to 220 and all calls from either extension 220 or 7220 would both be posted to the Account in the 'Active' Room 220.

If you get in trouble, call the Metropolis Support line ((858) 488-4600) and they will help you through anything.

Setup Cash Plus

One of the reasons we like Hansen Software's Cash Plus system (besides being cheaper) is that they setup the system for you! All you need to do is tell them the Hotel Identifier (a 3 - digit code BookingCenter will provide for you) and the IP address and port (again, BookingCenter will provide for you) and they will get the system setup - per your desires - and tested for you. As simple as that!

Setup BookingCenter for Call Accounting

For BookingCenter Desktop PMS you need to configure BookingCenter to post Calls to the bookings and to poll the Call Accounting software.

1. Post Calls
   Desktop PMS: Create an Inventory Item called CALLS from the Parameters | Inventory | Item Details. Get more info in the BookingCenter Reference Manual Chapter 4, Configuring the Inventory System
   MyPMS: The posting category (Phone Call) will have been created by BookingCenter for you.
2. Configure the Call Accounting software with BookingCenter.

Desktop PMS Users ONLY!

• Go to Parameters | Call Accounting
• Go to the machine that will be the Call Accounting polling PC - preferably the one that is connected to the PBX via the cable.
• Choose Set Manager to make this machine the manager
• Make sure there is an Inventory Group and Item called "Calls" (or something similar) setup in BookingCenter already. Assign this Inventory Item to the section called Call Item. It must be entered exactly as it was in the Inventory section.
• Choose a % markup if desired (usually not done, as the Call Accounting system is best at costing the call)
  • Metropolis Users: Choose the HOBIC spec for Metropolis Set the folder where Metropolis is sending the transmit.out file - usually C:\ProfitWatch Re-logon to initiate the auto-polling interval once it's been set at the Call Manager computer.

All calls placed to an active booking in a room with an extension will now be added to the Account section of the Active Booking Detail.

For MyPMS users, contact http://support.bookingcenter.com/ and we will set up your account to accept posted calls.

Troubles with Automatic Call Accounting Polling

Desktop BookingCenter: If you receive an error when launching the Call Accounting BookingCenter Management computer that tells you the preferences file (.prf) can't be loaded, then the problem can be solved. This will happen if the .df1 (your BookingCenter datafile) is NOT inside the / BookingCenter / folder and you are trying to keep the Call Accounting system polling correctly.

How to solve the problem? Simply make sure the BookingCenter application and your datafile are all inside the / BookingCenter / folder computer and that the Parameter | Call Accounting | Call Folder is set and the computer is set to be the "Call Manager" computer. Then restart BookingCenter and the .prf error message should have gone away and the Call Accounting polling will begin working again.

MyPMS: If calls are not posting to the correct rooms, and instead are posting to the House Account, there is likely a setup error in the 'Room' setup. Simply go to Setup | Rooms | and find the correct Room Type that the Room belongs to. Choose that Room Type and then the actual Room where calls are not posting automatically. The Room's 'CRS Code' must match the extension number that the Call Accounting system is using. If the CRS code and the phone extension are not identical, the call gets posted to the House Account for manual intervention.

• To turn on a Call Simulator, after its registered, do the following: Alter the registration data by a single field value, and then the simulator option will be viewable. Once the simulations are done, then simply re-register properly and all data will have been preserved.
• To turn on a Call Simulator, before it's registered, do the following: choose the default position for the 'demo mode' and turn on calls so you can test them against the PMS interface.

Still having troubles? Contact http://support.bookingcenter.com/ and we will help you with accepting posted calls.

Need to Re-install the Call Accounting program?

If you need to re-install the Call Accounting software your property is using, download it from the appropiate website (www.Metropolis.com). Use the registration info you were given when you purchased the Call Accounting program to re-install it. If you have LOST the registration info, you can contact Metropolis or CommSoft to get it.

It's best to try and NOT re-format a hard drive BEFORE making a backup of your data. Simply follow the instructions below, if you are using Metropolis ProfitWatch .

For Metropolis

• Launch ProfitWatch
• Choose the Maintenance menu.and click "Create Rescue Disk". Put a blank floppy in the floppy drive.and it wil create a file ~ 1/2 megabyte in size. Store this rescue disk somewhere safe, because it can reinstall ALL of your ProfitWatch settings in a matter of minutes if you ever need it again.
• On the destination computer, after it is ready, install a new Metropolis from the website.
• Launch the new ProfitWatch.
• Choose the Maintenance menu and choose "Restore from Rescue Disk".
• Place the floppy/stick drive with the Rescue Disc into the computer and ProfitWatch will copy all configuration files into the new installation. Note - your Support ID MUST be valid for this to work. If your Support is expired, contact Metropolis to re-register yourself. BookingCenter can not create a new support registration for you - only Metropolis can.
• Now ProfitWatch is up & running again. Simple!

For advanced users who REALLY want to keep a record of all the old, billed calls that were stored in Metropolis, you can copy the entire 'Call History' from the old system before loosing it. This is usually not required and do this only as a last resort, realizing that it can become a painful Exercise!!! The file is called 'watch.db' and can be copied to the new installation of /ProfitWatch/ once the new version is up & running. Choose 'Clear PMS buffer' so that any old sued PMS calls do not transfer once again.

To auto-backup ProfitWatch and it's settings, understand that ProfitWatch backs up automatically each night at midnight. In the /ProfitWatch/Backlup you will see 3 folders.

• Daily - each day the Rescue Disk is stored here.
• Weekly - on Monday the Rescue Disk is stored here.
• Monthly - once a monthly Rescue Disk is stored here.

If you add to your backup routine the copying of these files, you will be ready if an emergency event occurs.

There are two work-arounds if you find yourself in this rare situation:

1. Break apart an extended stay duration booking into multiple bookings that are 99 days or less.
2. Pay the amex on a house account folio and then use a "transfer receipt type" to move the balance.  

Neither of these options are pretty, but are the only workarounds for extended stay hotels who accept AX. 

If you wish to disable this feature, please login to your Booking.com extranet and you will be able to edit this under the Payment and Cancellation Policies under the ‘Property Info’ tab.

Simply un-check the box that states 'Allow domestic customers to book without credit card details'.

When this is done, reservations will only be allowed with credit card information.

The Travelzoo Hotel Platform was introduced to complement their current product mix, and more importantly to further support their hotel partners throughout the year. They recently launched the new Travelzoo website at the end of last year and have gotten great feedback from members and clients alike. The Hotel Platform is risk-free without any up-front cost and is a curated platform, with only selected hotels invited to participate.

Here are some highlights to the invitation-only Hotel Platform

-       Competitive Commission Structure  

-       One-time set up

-       Easy Connection via BookingCenter

-       Fenced in member only opportunities

-       Capture demand for everyday bookings and stimulate demand with limited time promotions.

-       Prominent positioning 365 days a year

To enrol with Travelzoo, please reach out to your Travelzoo rep, Melissa Fitzgerald, via phone at: 415-343-4562 or via email at: mfitzgerald@travelzoo.com. 

We will work with our distribution partners to have this mapped for you. When the mapping is complete, an official activation notice will be sent.

Typical turnaround on mapping is between 5 to 10 business days.

If you have any questions about the above process, please contact our Support Department.

Also, you can 'View Tickets' you've already created, and open or review those tickets that are 'closed'.  You can always find articles in the KnowledgeBase that will help improve use of the BookingCenter tools and services. This area is managed 24 x 7.  

There are times when a property wishes to have multiple Users attached to their 'company' so that multiple users gain access to the 'tickets' raised.  To do this, have your new user visit: https://support.bookingcenter.com/ and click 'subscribe' to subscribe to the Support Area.  If they use the domain name of your property (such as me@myhotel.com where 'myhotel.com' is your host/domain name) when subscribing, our system will automatically attach them to your property, so they are added as a User who can login and view tickets for your property.  If they 'subscribe' with a different email address, such as me@gmail.com' then the system will not know they are suppord to be associated to your property, and you must enter a ticket and ask us to attach that specific user to your property account. Just send us the email they used to subscibe in a Ticket and we will then manually attach them to your propty profile in the Support Area.

There is no simple reversal.  Here is what we recommend:

Create a new reservation for a guest called 'Direct Bill Charges For <Company>', assign the Company to the booking, save it, and then cancel it immediately. Use this cancelled booking only for its folio to record charges and payments to balance out mistakes. 

For example, if you had paid 10 folios via the AR Accounts area using a Visa card ending in xxxx-1234 with a payment of $1,000, and you wish to credit the card back the $1,000 and accept payment with a check, then this is what you would do:

On the folio of the 'Direct Bill Charges For <Company>' booking created (and cancelled) from above, apply a negative $1,000 (-1,000) Payment using the Visa card ending in xxxx-1234 to the folio of the cancelled booking.  This will show the folio as 'out of balance'.  Now apply another Payment to the folio for the check you received for $1,000. This balances the folio; gets the $1,000 credit back to the card holder; and correctly records the $1,000 check received from the Company. 

We advise using a Description when posting the check Payment to reference either the original Folios paid off incorrectly or the AR Payment such as: "Incorrect AR Payment-<Company> transaction from Jan 2, 2017".  This way, your accounting team will know you made the check Payment to reverse the incorrect AR Visa Payment for the specific Company on the specific Date.  The accounting staff can run a Transaction report to balance these 2 events out.

While this solution is not as elegant as we desire, it does fix any Payment mistakes made to an AR Account. Expect the ability to Reverse a Direct Bill Payment in the near term.  If you have made mistakes wwith Direct Bill (DB:) Charges on a Folio, see this article: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/324.

Open Terminal, the app found in your Applications | Utilities folder that ships with all versions of Mac OS.

Run the following 2 commands using terminal (we recommend copying/pasting from below):

1.   cd /Applications/BookingCenter

--> this puts your Terminal session inside the BookingCenter folder, whihc shoudl be installed in your /Applications/ folder.

  2.  xattr -r -d com.apple.quarantine BookingCenter.app/

--> This command edits the 'quarantine' from the files inside the BookingCenter folder.

After you have done these 2 commands, the BookingCenter Desktop aplication should open without issues.  If you cannot use Terminal due to your access level restrictions on the Mac OS X you are using, then get an administrator to assist with the 2 commands above for you.

1) need to be setup with MyCard to accept Discover cards.  Learn more about MyCard at: http://www.bookingcenter.com/interfaces-and-modules/mycard/.  We can turn on UnionPay for you if you request us to do so.

2) the UnionPay card would need to be set as credit card or debit card with no PIN requirement.  Only the Chinese card-issuing bank for the consumer would know whether this consideration was met.  UnionPay is ususally setup to work as a credit card, but it can require a PIN in order to process a debit payment.  In such cases, BookingCenter can not support the transaction.  

Thus, if your property is setup to accept Discover cards, and a guest with a UnionPay card shows up, swipe it or manually enter it as any other credit card. If it works, you can be assured that the transaction will go through and fund normally as if it was a Discover transaction.  If it does not go through, and you get an error response, then the guest may have insufficient funds or the transaction requires a PIN entry that BookingCenter can't support for UnionPay at this time.

You can usually find your Booking Number on your Confirmation Letter.  

The Booking Number is important to let the staff know how to respond to your Request.  If you are staying at the propety (ie, you are 'in house') then the Room number is usually sufficient.

The following are the specific Restriction Messages.  Use this for reference when deciding how you want to display restriction messages in the XML client app:

PROMO CODE HAS NO ALLOCATIONS >>> Sorry, no more rooms are available to this agent/special for these dates.

NO AVAILABILITY FOR ANY TYPES >>> Sorry, no rooms are available between Thu 22-Mar-2018 and Sun 25-Mar-2018 suitable for 1 Guests.

MAX GUESTS EXCEEDED FOR ALL TYPES >>> Sorry, no rooms are available between Wed 14-Mar-2018 and Thu 15-Mar-2018 suitable for 10 Guests.

IF A TYPE HAS NON CONTIGUOUS ROOMS >>> ATTIC Rack Rates unavailable

RESTRICTIONS:

CLOSED >>> we are still showing the results screen but next to the Rate description it says "unavailable" and Rate Plans says "Closed"

CLOSED TO ARRIVALS >>> we are still showing the results screen but next to the Rate description it says "unavailable" and Rate Plans says "Closed to arrival on Wed 14-Mar-2018"

MIN LOS >>> we are still showing the results screen but next to the Rate description it says "unavailable" and Rate Plans says "Minimum Stay is 3 Nights"

MAX LOS >>> we are still showing the results screen but next to the Rate description it says "unavailable" and Rate Plans says "Maximum Stay is 3 Nights"

Best apporach: Create a rate plan you call 'comp' or 'free', make it $0,  and assign this $0 value Rate to the day(s) you wish to comp a booking.  This way, one can run a number of Reports and find out  'how many?' comp rates were given over a time period by searching via Rate.  How to make a Rate?  See: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/542

Another approach is to simply make a Manual entry for the Rate you have assigned and make the value $0.  This works, as well, but requires manual intervention as well as makes identifying 'how many?' comp rates were given over a time period.

It may be a good idea to also use a Guest Type code for the types of 'comp rooms' being given, such as 'owners' or 'employees' so one can differentiate betwen the comp rooms given over a time period.

There have been some managers who wish these 'comp rooms' to not have any implication on ADR or REVPAR.  In this case, it is important to keep the Rates as normal, but issue a Payment on the Folio that 'writes off' or 'comps' the cost of the booking as a business loss.  This requires giving staff the ability to choose a Payment method on Folios that could possibly be mis-used, so proceeed with caution with this apporoach.

There are times in which a property will 'add up all taxes' (ie, bundling) and get a rounding that is different than if they apply the taxes discreetly.  If a property wishes to have simple taxes (such as one tax applied for 17%) then rounding may occur differently than if they apply the taxes discreetly.

If a Site is using MyCard (TSYS, Vital, Visanet, or Authorizenet) as payment gateway, and the Site is set to take 'Online Deposits' (ie, some money is needed before confirming a booking) and a specific Booking cannot authorize the amount required by the Deposit, then the developer needs to know what can happen.

The basic response codes from a credit card attempted authorization will show the Booking ID that has been 'saved' in INCOMPLETE status and the message "Failute to obtain authorization".

Note that the booking is now holding inventory, as it's a real booking with a Booking ID.  But it's going to stay in Status= INCOMPLETE for 15 minutes to give the XML developer time to provide a valid card in order to obtain the authorization for the deposit amount.  If the 15 minutes passes and there is no authorization posted to the booking, the booking will be cancelled and the inventory 'freed up'. The Room could then be-rebooked.

The method to update the Booking in Status= INCOMPLETE is to send the 'Update Authorization' message and get a verification that the authorization is now saved.  The booking then gets updated to become Status=CONFIRMED and the deposit amount is posted against the Booking in BookingCenter.

If the XML developer does not update the booking as described above, the booking information will be saved but as a CANCELLED booking.

Instead, you may want to market a name such as: www.myconcierge.com so that it re-directs automatically to https://Hotel.BookingCenter.com/demo.

Or if you are in need of a temporary website for your domain while you build out a new hotel website (or need to get a new merchant account established with pictures of your property and policies showing what you are representing), you can use our Booking Engine #02 template that can work as a temporary web site hosted at: https://book.bookingcenter.com/02/?site=MYPMSDO where you replace the Site ID: MYPMSDO with your BookingCenter Site ID. 

To do this, you will need access to your website hosting platform (often referred to as a 'dashboard') and have someone place a 301 Re-Direct at the root level of the new domain name you wish to use.  If this will become a permanent change, so we recommend the 301.  Directions for actually issuing a 301 Re-Direct this can be found anywhere on the internet, such as here.  If it is temporary, such as using our Booking Engine template 02 for your 'website', do not use a 301, rather use a 302 re-direct for short term purposes.

Here's a basic example of how to do it: 

• If using Apache, it is be done in the .htaccess file at the root of the www.myconcierge.com  server `Redirect 301 / https://Hotel.BookingCenter.com/demo.`
• If using nginx it's done in the server block ```server { listen 80; www.myconcierge.com; return 301 $scheme://Hotel.BookingCenter.com/demo$request_uri; }``` 

All you need to know is the 'Concierge' URL of your particular MyGuest implementation, and voila!  A user who types in www.myconcierge.com will be sent to: https://Hotel.BookingCenter.com/demo or a user who visits will be re-directed to this page.

* Note that the 4 images that the #02 Booking Engine template uses are the ones on the 'Images' page in the Setup area called: Property, Restaurant, Conference, and Exterior.  Don't worry that the image you wish to place isn't actually a 'restaurant', just use these image locations to put the image you want in the 4 spots on that #02 template.  We have more detail on how the Booking Engine templates work - and be customized - are at: https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Booking+Engine.

What Is ADA Compliance?

The Americans with Disabilities Act (also known as ADA) is a comprehensive civil rights law that was enacted to protect individuals with disabilities from discrimination. In 2010, Title III was added to the ADA to ensure that standards would also apply to website accessibility.  The ADA uses The World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.0 AA) as the guideline for accessibility. To test your website pages for errors, use http://wave.webaim.org/

Please note that BookingCenter only providex ADA Compliance on your Booking Engine, not your website. Please consult your website designer for ADA Compliance testing and for any necessary updates that need to be made.

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 <potential> anomalous bookings.  When an online booking goes into an OVER Room, it's because the booking was received for a Room Type which could not be placed into a single Room for the entire stay.  This article explains how you can better manage these OVER bookings and prepare for them.  Strategies to PREVENT OVER Bookings can be read in this article; a good summary of how OVER is applied to Rates, Room, and Room Types as OVER Bookings can be read in this article.

EMAIL Notice of an OVER issue

Every new booking that occurs online sends an email to the email address you have in the 'Site Settings' section of your Members/Setup area.  If a booking was saved with OVER applied to the Rates, Room, and/or Room Types, this email will alert you to this fact and you shoud take action as described in the articles linked (below).

Use the "Arrivals with Unassigned Rooms" Front Desk widget for MyPMS.

This widget will show you all bookings with arrival dates over the next 7 days that have no Room assignemnt, including an OVER assigned to the Room or Room Type.  This 'widget' functions as a way to keep visble arriving bookings that need Room assignments and links directly to them.  

Front Desk widgets can be used to bring common reports to your Front Desk area so that they are more visible than ‘requesting' a report. The ‘widgets’ are interactive, and graphically more interesting than reports, thus staff is more likely to pay attention to them. ’Widgets’ are added to your specific MyPMS system via the Front Desk Layout section of the Admin Tab  .Learn more about how to use Front Desk widgets in the documentation area.

-----------------------More Info ----------------------

We have additional info on strategies to PREVENT OVER Bookings in this article.

We have info on OVER as applied to Rates, Room, and Room Types as OVER Bookings in this article.

We explain how you can better manage - and prepare for - OVER bookings that come from Network sources (OTAs, GDS, etc) in this article.

BookingCenter has a system for managing access to customer's XML data - what we call credentials, with details found in this article - for both reading and writing data.  Because our customer is the PMS user, and not the 'Owner' of a specific Unit, the credentials provided to a developer must be provided by the PMS owner.  BookingCenter is not liable for sharing these credentials, which could have un-intended consequences for the PMS owner.  The PMS owner needs to know that sharing these credentials offers the developer access to data in their PMS and the ability to alter that data.  Proceed with caution.

When saving a Booking to an Owner's Unit Type, there are considerations that must be planned for:

1. Will the system automatically save a Booking to a specific Unit, or just to a Unit allocated to a Type?  See this article for details on this topic.
2. How will the developer choose which Type from an Agent query to save the booking against?  The answer to this question is based on the business goals leading the developer to make the XML solution in the first place.  But consider that trying to Save a Booking without first querying availability could result in a "No Rooms Available" Message when attempting the save procedure.  See this article for a discussion on this topic.
3. Will the Owner and/or Agent login to view their bookings via the Owners Area or Agents Area?  If so, the booking must be set correctly with the Owner and/or Agent login IDs to view their booking(s) in these areas.  When setting the Agent ID, the developer must use the correct Agent ID and it is not the one that the Agent uses to login to the Agents Area.  Rather, it is the Agent as entered in the PMS.  
   
   As an example, if the Agent is 'DEMO' and the Site is 'BCDEMO' then this agent would login to the Agents Area as BCDEMODEMO.  But the developer of the XML needs to use the correct terms for the OTA XML code, which in this example is as follows:
   
   <BasicPropertyInfo AgentCode="DEMO" HotelCode="BCDEMO" ChainCode="BC"/>.
4. Can an Owner and/or Agent make bookings via the Owners Area or Agents Area while the XML service and/or the Channel Manger is also making bookings, thus bookings are entered via multiple sources?  The answer here is YES.  If an Owner and/or Agent were to make a booking via the Members/Owners/Agents Area, that booking will save and occupy availability.  If one were to attempt to insert a booking via the XML service, for same dates and times, an ERROR will return that there is no availability.  So, the two methods (manually via the Members/Agents/Owners Area and also via the XML service/Channel Manager) can be used concurrently, but there can only be one that makes a booking for a specific unit for the specific date.  
   
   It is our recommendation that an XML developer always first query availability before attempting to save a new booking to avoid a "No Rooms Available" Message when attempting the save procedure.
   
   

5. Assuming the PMS ownership provides agreement to the Owner for using the APIs (we provide on our API documentation pages), the two messages the developer(s) will need to develop, at minimum, are:

   1) Connect to the PMS to save a new booking that occurred in an outside system using the OTA_HotelRes (ie, 'new booking’) message.

   2) If a modification occurs to an existing booking in the outside system, or a cancellation occurs to an existing booking in the outside system, then use the OTA_HotelResCancel (Cancel a booking) to cancel the existing one that was placed into BookingCenter prior.  If only a cancellation event, this is all the the developer is required to do. If the goal was to insert a ‘modified’ booking to one placed into BookingCenter prior, then the developer will then save the modified booking information as a 'new booking’ and place the ‘CRS_Confirmation number’ from the outside system with this new booking.

   The BookingCenter will always return a OTA_HotelRes (ie, 'new booking’) message with a BookingCenter-generated Confirmation Number and always return a cancellation number from an OTA_HotelResCancel (Cancel a booking) message. It is best practices that these reference numbers are stored in a mapping file the developer manages to record the booking RefNumbers returned by BookingCenter (the ‘confirmation number’ and/or ‘cancellation number') in order to use that for cancelling later (if needed).  In addition, it is recommended that the outside system RefNumber saved when the booking was originally saved is placed into the BookingCenter booking as the ‘CRS_Confirmation number’ so that the ‘confirmation number’ of the outside system is linked with the ‘confirmation number’ stored in BookingCenter.  

BookingCenter does not support an XML developer in these situations who is not part of an Owner Channel Program.  If an XML developer is not sure how to achieve their desired results, BookingCenter provides hourly rate consultation to achieve these goals.  Contact the Sales Department (sales@bookingcenter.com or +1-707-874-3922 ext 201) if you need assistance in developing an XML solution for an Owner(s) of Unit(s).

BookingCenter has no personal data on you, but you did book with a BookingCenter customer in: (whatever date was the booking and the property name and city/state/country). 

You can read about our Privacy Policy, data retention, storage, and conformance to California and the EU's GDPR Policy at: https://www.bookingcenter.com/privacypolicy/ 

Let us know how else we can assist.

It is then the Property's duty to remove the Guest's data as detailed in the Privacy Page.

When any activity occurs on that web service, the Log entry on the booking will reference "mybooking", meaning someone was provided the RUID to access their booking online, and did something to be logged.  Since we don't know for sure who the Guest was, we Log it as "mybooking".

Properties do not have to use the "mybooking" web service. The only way a guest can access that area is to have the RUID, which would be sent via a Letter as an email or SMS.  An RUID to a booking should not be used if you don't have a way to manage the area properly with clear business rules, as guests can interact with their bookings via that secure link.

Learn more about mybookings here.

• Cancellation Number: (you can define your own number or let the system auto-generate one)
• Cancellation Fee: (you can set a fee, thought this has no bearing on any PMS product.
• Message: You can save a message about the cabncellation, such as: "guest cancelled by phone call".
• Phone: You can place a phoine number to call someone back or refer to the person recording teh cancellation.
• Cancelled By: Insert a valid PMS user name to record who did the cancellation.  If you have no idea whu to place here, use 'xml' so it's clear.

If a developer wished to MODIFY an existing booking, then they have two choices:

1. Either send the Rate and Availaility query to find out rate and avail for the new desired dates, and then cancel the existing booking make a New Booking.  This assures they get the rates desired for the modification, but doesn't guarantee accurate availability, based on the cancellation they are about to perform.  It could be a false positive.  
   
   For example, if there was no availabiity for a date range because the existing booking is still blocking the availability, the developer could receive a false positive that the modification wasn't possible due to no availability.
   
   
2. Or the developer could  and then send the Rate and Availaility query to find out rate and avail for the new desired dates, and make a New Booking.  This assures they get the accurate availability, based on the cancellation, but they won't know the actual rates for the modification until after they cancelled the booking. 
   
   Thus they could have cancelled a booking they wanted to save because it was priced better.  There is no perfect solution to this dilema, so choose your preferred option, but there is no solution for a direct 'modification' message.

However, since most developers would use Inventory Items already set in the PMS (with proper description, cost, etc) this should not be a limitation.  See this article for details on Items that a property has decided are 'Live' and which are set 'Not Live' to sell online.

However, where a developer would prefer to build Packages and Items 'on the fly', we recommend using MyGuest.  With this product, you can place as many 'Guest requests' as needed, and with whatever notes describing the Item(s) desired.  Because each MyGuest Request is saved with the Booking ID, these Requests are linked from the Booking, and in front of staff on the Front Desk, these 'Requests' make ideal places for getting creative with extended info about Item(s) placed onto a Folio.

If you look at the MyGuest Pubic API, it shows a Notes:  element that would be used.  Anything you place here is free form text, thus flexible and availale for staff for tracking and reporting purposes.  In addition, you can use the Request ID to 'consume via the API' tho constantly update the Request with additional details as the Item is sold, altered, deleted, and ultimately delivered to a Guest.  

{
  "hotel_id": 2,
  "room": "32",
  "booking_id": "1332025-4X",
  "guest": {
    "email": "joeb@banks.com",
    "name": "Joe Banks",
    "phone": "7075551414"
  },
  "guest_notify": false,
  "form_category": "Treatment",
  "form_name": "Spa Menu",
  "form_fields": {
    "Notes": "We'd like hot towels and a room to meditate in, which will need to be large as we bring our dogs and cats on meditation retreats with us. ",
    "swedish1": 2,
    "pregnancy2": 1
  }
}

1. If the Cleaning fee is for tracking purposes only, and is already embedded into the Rate, then the easiest way is to use the 'Include Items' approach that is defined here.  This assumes the Rate has the price for the ‘fee’ built-in, and there is no need to make a specific Folio Charge. Basically, you wish to have a simple way to track Cleaning fees or a Meal Plan for specific bookings.  
2. If the need for price variation exists, ie, in one Room you want a $35 cleaning fee applied to the Rate, but another Room requires a $65 cleaning fee AND/OR you want the fee added as a Folio Charge to the booking, then you have two choices: 
   1. Use the Item Included Rate that is available for an Item to be added to a Rate and tracked with and/or without Costs and Taxes.  This is availale to all MyPMS and Channel Manager customers and is free, fast, and easy to setup.
   2. Use the Package Module to include multiple Item(s) in a Rate, dynamically priced with each Item taxed propertly and in the right recurring amount, based on the booking duration. This is a more comprehensive approach, but requires the purchase of the Package Module to enact.

In the case of the Package approach, the steps are as follows:

1. Make sure you have purchased the Package Module for your property.    Contact us if you need this for your property.
2. Figure out the Items you are going to need included in your Packages.  See: Adding and Managing Items for help doing this.
3. Build the Package Rate you need for each unique Item you want, making sure to get the descriptions, "from" "to:" (when it's available) and other aspects of the Package correct.  This is when you will add the Items you created in Step 2 above.  Make sure to get the price correct when you add Item(s) to the Package.
4. Once you have the Packages built correctly, you need to need to allocate them to where you want them booked, and with the correct Room Types you want them made available.  See: Allocating Packages for details on doing this.  You llikely will want your website (usuallly Agent: BC) and front desk (Agent: MYPMS) as places these Packages can be booked.
5. Make some test bookings and watch how the Items that were included in the Package get posted to the Folio and affect the Rate.  You can cancel your bookings after fine-tuning this.

For more help understanding Packages, see the "Packages - Top Help Articles" page.

The question of which device to get is based on pesonal preferences and how you will use it.  For example, if your device will always be at the 'front desk' of a hotel, one that is wired with an ethernet cable is probably fine and it prevents any issues with wireless networks.

But if you will be traveling with your EMV device, such as bringing it home in the evenings, or to your 'off season' house to manage payments remotely via EMV, then you may wish for a wireless one that has good battery power so it can run in more places.

Keep in mind, every time you change networks, the EMV device will have to be powered down and then up to obtain a new network address.

If you are going to manage a wireless network using a mobile tablet/phone's 'hot spot' and connect your EMV device that way, you are going to have to become proficient in managing your tether to accept DHCP connections from your 'hot spot'.  Do some research before attempting this, as DHCP (required for connecting an EMV device to a 'hot spot') will operate differently on different tethering operating systems (iOS and Android) and differing devices.

The example below is based on an occupancy tax rate that is 11% from June 1^st to September 30^th and is 8% from October 1^st to May 31^st.

As taxes will only apply when a guest stays at the property and MyPMS will post taxes during the Night Audit process, we recommend the following solution.

In your cancellation and deposit policy, enter in what your taxes rates are for your various seasons. Given the example above, this would include: Please note that our occupancy tax rate is 11% from June 1^st to September 30^th and is 8% from October 1^st to May 31^st.

This will ensure that all confirmation notices clearly display the tax rates for the guests given their specific stay dates.

2. Update the taxes within BookingCenter on the dates these taxes change. So on June 1st, update the occupancy tax rate to 11%. All guests that stay starting on June 1st will correctly have the occupancy tax post at 11%; with no changes needed at the folio level.

The same logic will apply on October 1st. On this date, go back in the tax settings of MyPMS and change the occupancy tax rate to 8%.

Based on this all taxes will correctly post based on the guest stay. This approach will not require any adjustments or manual updates to any reservations.

1) Connect to the ‘PMS/CRS’ and retrieve hotel rates and availability, with specifics for finding which rates are Packages, what Items they include, and Quantity and Price.  To learn about rates and availabiity for an XML developer, we recommend reviewing the KnowledgeBase articles here.

OTA_ HotelAvailRQ/RS-

As summarized at: https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/APIs+and+Web+Services+Available+From+BookingCenter this message provides an array with Type and Rate availability, and you could parse the array to get the ‘lowest’ available rate, or whatever hierarchy desired to offer a Guest. The credentials (User ID and password or API key) enable this API call to return what is needed when formatting this message for showing by date or Type.  

2) Save the Booking, what we call the NewBooking message

OTA_HotelRes

This is the message that sends a 'payload' of all data needed to save a booking.  As we explain at: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/667 when querying and selling Packages, understanding the way your API calls for Inventory Items (which constitute the ‘parts’ of a package), and then saving them with a booking, is critical. 

If the BookingCenter customer is using a Payment Gateway, then you can request the server 'process' the deposit amount (payment) as part of saving the Booking.  The deposit policy for the specific Rate & Availability will be sent with the OTA_ HotelAvail so doesn't have to be cal;culated by teh developer.  If a deposit/payment is requested by the developer, if we get an authorization, then the server sends back the Booking ID (reference number) and you can be assured the 'payment' was saved with the Booking. The payment will be qued for the next merchnat account 'Batch' and assocaited to the booking.  See: Point of Sale/MyCard (credit cards, hardware, etc.) part of the XML KnowledgeBase to understand the settings for requesting a payment or saving an 'offline' payment a developer may make, and to understand errors with failed deposits/payments.

Here are a few common questions when managing these types of bookings:

• Rates - We have a KnowledgeBase article here detailing Rates, with a focus on the Daily, Weekly, and Monthly Rates.

• Direct Bills and managing Company accounts paying Long Term Stay guests can be read here.

• Extending Long term stays, pre-charging rent and tax exempt booking status for Long Term Stay guests should be read here. 

• Read about the In-House Guest Ledger report that identify Long Term Stay and Extended Stay guests needing additional payments. 

Ask us for any further assistance understanding managing the unique needs of Long Term Stay guests.

If you want EMV, and also want to keep accepting ‘advanced payments’, but can’t make the concessions that the TSYS/Global under-writing process demands, then we have found that there are numerous ISO (independent sales reps who sell merchant accounts) that have lees stringent under-writing rules that will board a new hotel without concern for the ‘advanced payments’ policy.  In this case, we use a separate merchant provider for ‘advanced payments’ (which are e-commerce transactions) and the EMV device from TSYS/Global for ‘card present’ payments on-site at the hotel.  

BookingCenter was designed to work this way with payments, and it isn’t noticeable to you staff.  Staff process payments in one of these ways:

• Guest is present and the EMV device is used for tap/dip/swipe onto the Folio.
• Guest is phoning/faxing/emailing and they manually process the payment using the ‘Apply Payment’ button on a Folio,
• Guest books online, or via a Kiosk, and that transaction uses the Traditional MyCard. transaction

All 3 scenarios batch in a single batch report, with the EMV transactions noted as ‘EMV’; the funds merge into a single checking account; and your staff is only adding ‘Payments’ to Folios - whether credits or debits.

There are two ‘down sides’ to this scenario:

1. You are forced to deal with 2 merchant account vendors and thus 2 reps for your payment service.
2. You need to signup 2 merchant accounts with BookingCenter, each one costing a $300 one-time fee. For ongoing fees, we charge $25/mo for the first gateway, the second one only $15/mo to cover PCI costs, for a total of $40/mo for the combined service.

While working this way is not ideal, during the COVID-19 time, we have found this to be necessary for boarding new merchants who require advanced deposits and EMV, and can’t pass through the TSYS/Global under-writing process with those policies intact.  

Contact Us is we can assist with this decision or designing the right payment solution to work with your PMS, online bookings, and Self Check-in process.

BookingCenter will send an update to Airbnb, possibly closing out the room, but because you allowed 'Reservation Requests' that booking will still be valid for the 24 hours.  And thus, if the booking is confirmed by the Guest, you can now have a double booking if that room was booked via another channel.

If you wish to avoid this fate, disable reservation requests, and only accept instant bookings from Airbnb.

Restart the Computers

Often a simple restart of each comnputer will solve any issue.

Restart the internet modem you're connected to.

Find your internet device, either wi-fi or the ADSL/cable modem router your Internet Service Provider (ISP) provides to you, and shut it down for 10 seconds. Then restart it and wait a few minutes till you can conect again.

Try a different connection

Try from your mobile phone or another device connected to the internet through a different connection. Does this resolve the issue?  If the mobile network is loading MyPMS fine, then it's possible your internet service provider is having a 'slow down' or your router needs to be re-set (simply power cycle the router for 10 seconds as above) or replaced (your internet service provider can run some tests on it.

Perform a Speed Test 

For a person who understands network routing, from yuor location, using your wire;ess and/or wired devices, perform a speed test at http://www.speedtest.net whihc including latency, upload and download speeds.  Often times you can use this camparison to guage the varaible perfomance of your Internet Service Provider (ISP).

These are tools any of your users can try. If the problems persist, Google "internet technician help in my area" and find a Local technician who can assess and help find a faster internet solution.

The most common approach to including a ‘pre-arrival’ survey is to setup an Auto Letter to go to all arriving Guests via either email and/or SMS (1 day prior to arrival, for example). The Letters area provides easy formatting tools, so making complicated surveys using checkboxes, radial buttons, etc are all supported as it is an HTML editor. Learn more about setting up and scheduling Auto Letters here.

For properties using Self Check-in, the eSign document is a reliable method to include a survey, or any details that you want a Guest to sign or initial as proof of acceptance.  The eSign can be made required prior to allowing Self Check-in, and if used in conjunction with an Auto Letter (see below), can be sent to all arriving guests at a per-determined time via either email and/or SMS.

The most elegant way to survey Guests is using MyGuest. MyGuest makes creating interactive forms and menus easy.  For MyGuest customers, BookingCenter staff will assist with creating one appropriate to your needs, as we have for customers during the COVID-19 pandemic.  The beauty of this approach is that each completed ‘survey’ can be ‘linked’ to the booking automatically (viewable in the MyGuest tab of the booking), so it’s easy for your staff to see who has/not completed the Form.  And it’s interactive, so replying to a Guest who fills in your survey is easy by managing the ‘Request’ from within MyGuest.  These MyGuest Request forms can also be embedded into any Letter or eSign document, as well.

See an example of a COVID-19 health questionnaire here.

If you wish to make clear to Guests that they will have to participate in, or complete, a survey (such as a COVID-19 health survey, for example) prior to booking, then you might wish to use the Restriction Message to notify of this on the Booking Engine page.  This message is dynamic and is entered in Marketing And Policies.  Keep in mind, there is a ‘friction cost’ to providing this information during the process of selling a Guest a room, so proceed with a Booking Engine notice of health concerns warily.

1. Add a reminder to yourself (some folks use their personal calendar, others the Pass On Log - anything that will remind a staff member to do this on the 'tax change date') to make the tax chnage on teh day it occurs. For example, if the tax chnage happens in January 1, make the reminder for Jan 1.
2. Log into the Setiup area and click Setup | Tax Configuration.
3. Click Edit.
4. Enter the correct tax percentage.  As an example, if the current tax is 8%, and its rising to 8.5%, then place 8.5 here in place of 8. 
5. Click Update.

From this moment onward, that is the tax rate that will be charged.

Learn more about setting up taxes and making changes here.

To fix this so you can used a shared email address, and not be surprised at the 'name' that keeps appearing, go to that Guest associated with that email address, edit it to make the name something like 'Front Desk', and use that email for all 'internal' requests. The 'Name' is now useable for your use of assigning Requests to this shared email account.

Accessing the 'Manage Guests' area requires admin privileges, so you may need a manager do to this.

When the EMV device starts up, it 'registers' itself with BookingCenter and we DNS (serve a name) of that LAN IP address to a service we maintain so that all machines on the LAN can access the EMV device.  Simply re-starting the device can solve many problems.

If you are having trouble connecting to the device from MyPMS, go to your Setup Area | PMS | EMV device (URL) and view the field: 

This tells you that the device did register with the bookingCenter service at 5:12 pm on May 2020. If this is not the time that you last re-started the device, then it's not connecting to the BookingCenter servers.  The most likely cause is that the router is unplugged from the device - check the cable and try again.

To verify that your Mac, PC, ipad, tablet, etc is on the same LAN as the EMV device, find the LAN address used by a device behind your router (here is an instruction posted by a university for finding on various platforms) and verfiy that the LAN IP address of your PC, Mac, ipda, etc is

..is on the same subnet as the device (whihc you can find in MyPMS in the Setup Area | PMS | EMV device (URL)).  In the example above, all of your Mac, PC, iPads, tablets, etc need to have a LAN IP address in the 192.168.000.xxx range - if they don't, then the solution will likely not work.

Another common error is that the device network settings were chnaged - nearly always these need to be DHCP.  Contact your merchant account rep to see if the device's settings have changed (BookingCenter can't access that).

Static IP Address

If the EMV device is to be accessed over the public network, this is possible but the custoemr must then setup teh device with a statis IP address and pay your internet company to allocate a 'statis IP' to your device so it cane be addressed over teh public internetwork.  This dos present some security risks (hackers might try and access that device), so proceed with an installation like this with caution, as BookingCenter warns against it and accepts no responsibiioty for security violations in an installation like this.

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 and ideas to start you thinking how your Kiosk environment should work and function.  Note that harware for kiosk solutions chnages constantly (gets cooler looking and cheaper) so some simple Amazon or Google searches will get you the desired results for your property.

There are many variations, but we have found that two options are the most practical, which include a floor stand model and a table stand mount on a desk.

1. Floor Stand Model

The floor stand models are typically free-standing and a full-height tablet kiosk. These can often be bolted directly to the floor or you be used with a wheeled base. Some sample images include:

a. https://armodilo.com/digital-signage-guide/hospitality-and-tourism-tablet-and-ipad-kiosks/

b. https://www.lilitab.com/products/freestanding?variant=19634761498711

2. Table Stand/Mount (locked to a table/desk)

These table stand options allow your Kiosk iPad for counter or tabletop use. They are often configurable for 180°, 90° or 0° rotation make it ideal for sharing across a table or counter. Some sample images include:

1.      lilitab: https://www.lilitab.com/products/countertop?variant=19634770083927

1.      Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Beelta-Holders-Aluminium-Enclosure-BSC305W/dp/B07MKJGDJZ/ref=mp_s_a_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=ipad+stand+locked&qid=1593063126&sprefix=ipad+stand+lock&sr=8-4

3. Table Stand/Mount – Dual Display (front and back)

 Of the table stand “family” for counter or tabletop use, this dual display design allows for two individual iPad mounts. A sample image includes:

1.      https://www.maclocks.com/the-rise-space-dual-ipad-kiosk-dual-screen-ipad-stand.html

Printers & Security Cable Locks

 If you wish to also include a printer, there are many options that include either wired or wireless printing. Although a printer 'case' is not common, you may want to consider some additional security cable locks to ensure the printer cannot be removed. Some examples of these locks include:

•        https://www.amazon.com/AboveTEK-Universal-Security-Adhesive-Protection/dp/B073R3KG22/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=computer+hardware+lock&qid=1593067983&sr=8-1  

•        https://www.amazon.com/Kensington-K64615US-Desktop-Computer-Peripherals/dp/B0036Z9TNU/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=printer+lock&qid=1593067739&sr=8-2  

There are some more customized options that will allow you to brand a kiosk as well. If you have additional questions or need further assistance, please contact our sales department.

Vendors:

•        https://www.displays2go.com/C-27582/Tablet-iPad-Kiosk-Enclosures-Digital-Display-Use-Trade-Shows-Retailers  

•        Armodilo: https://armodilo.com/digital-signage-guide/hospitality-and-tourism-tablet-and-ipad-kiosks/ (specific to hospitality)

•        lilitab: https://www.lilitab.com/pages/lilitab-in-the-hospitality-industry (specific for hospitality) 

•        https://www.kioskgroup.com/pages/ipad-tablet-kiosks-for-restaurants-hotels

There are a few key elements that are critical to understand with the OTAs and OOO:

1.        OOO is a "Room" Setting, but the OTA sells via Room Type, and
2.        When a room is set OOO, Booking.com and Expedia get availability updates, but not specific room updates

Below is an example of where it may appear that there was an overbooking, but this was not the case. Your property has three King rooms that have the following reservations for May 1^st and May 2^nd:

Room 106 - OOO has been set for May 7th and May 8th

Room 107 - Booking on May 7th; Open of May 8th

Room 108 - Open on May 7th; Booking of May 8th

As far as the OTAs are concerned for your King room type, it will show availability (1) on both March 7th and March 8^th (as you do have availability). If a two-day booking is made at the property, you will need to make some adjustments to the room if you want the guest in the same room for the duration of the stay.

Please note that this scenario does take place regardless of setting a room OOO, but is more common now with the current situation.

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, you will have to login to the device and make sure the wi-fi is re-connected.  How will you know when it's connected?  the wi-fi signal (at top) will show in a blue color. If it's not connected, it's a grey color.

Look into your manual or work with your merchant processor to get the wi-fi set properly.

2) When not using the device, power the unit down to preserve the battery and power.

3) We do not recommend using this device for Kiosks for the reasons that both battery power and wi-fi are less reliable than A/C (active power) and ethernet plugged into the router via a cable.

Below are some 'best practices' we recommend, all easy to accomplish.

1. The best way to prevent fraudulent use of credit card data is to store the least amount needed.  While it's hard to manage a hospitality business without requiring credit cards as deposits, consider dipping/tapping all card data via an EMV device so that the data is 'tokenized' and never viewable to you or your staff.
2. Another option is to consider letting the OTA companies you work with require payment from your guests, and provide your property with a Virtual Card that will only be good from your merchant account, and only for he amount agreed between the checkin and checkout date.  These cards aren't able to be used fraudulently as a result of these built-in protections.
3. Only allow Users of your PMS to view card data who have a serious 'need to know'.  Every other User shoud only be allowed to view the 'last 4' digits and expiry to avoid temptation and falling prey to 'phishing' that compromises your card data. 
4. Make sure you set the COUNTRY (which Country is allowed)and VPN access per User to be as restrictive as possible. By setting these securely, a User account that has been compromised can be prevented from logging in.
5. Train your Users on the credit card handling procedures, as you are required to do anually when using credit card data, for PCI compliance.  Don't fall short on this!
6. Make sure your Credit Card retention policy is as restrictive as possible.
7. Train your Users to NEVER divulge their IDs and Passwords to anyone/any system that are not pre-selected and approved by you, such as https://mypms.bookingcenter.com.  Any other email, SMS, or website that asks them to input their User ID and password is a phishing ploy and they need to be aware of this.
8. There are articles for preventing from fraud from your guests once they show up at your property, such as this one from Hotel Online here.

BookingCenter track all amounts and the number of transactions sent to the EMV device. During a batch, BookingCenter compare PMS records against the EMV device's actual amounts and transaction counts. If these are off, We display a reporting error to the screen, and in an Admin Report.  The EMV device sends the transactions through to teh processor, but marks them as "bad settle" for later manual reconciliation by a Manager or Senior Night Auditor. 

If a property needs auto-bathing to occur, then they should use Traditonal MyCard as 'auto batching' as part of Night Audit, is supported in Traditonal MyCard.

In summary, this email bounce back/non delivery error occurs when properties are trying to send links to third party websites in their messages to Booking.com guests.  

There are a few options moving forward to ensure you can effectively communicate property details via email.

1. You can create (we can assist as well) a new Confirmation Email that is specific for just Booking.com

In this email you will just remove any internal website links, but can reference where on your website guests can access this information.

 and/or

2. You can create an automatic template within Booking.com that can be sent to guests at the time of booking. This can be a shorter version of your confirmation email, but can include the links on your website.

Essentially their position is that the Booking.com listing is ‘their’ website for Booking.com guests, therefore no other links are allowed.

If you need assistance with either of these options, please contact our Support Department and can help review and walk you through these steps.

Booking.com summarizes the ‘auto replenish’ feature on their website at: https://support.connect.booking.com/hc/en-us/articles/360020430911-What-is-auto-replenishment-and-how-does-it-work- and also at: https://partner.booking.com/en-us/help/rates-availability/extranet-calendar/configuring-auto-replenishment-closed-rooms-and-units.

Basically what is means is that on a Booking.com cancellation, Booking.com will immediately open the room. We recommend asking Booking.com to confirm that you have Auto Replenish set to No (or Off).

On the day of an ownership transition, where training is often required, we start by helping you transfer existing folios or stay overs so the system is ready for in-house guests the first night.  Please refer to this KB article: https://support.bookingcenter.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/249 for details on that process.

We prefer to handle folio transfers (from old system to new for in-house and arriving guests) prior to intial training, if possible.  Plan on at least 20 minutes to complete depending on the number of stay overs.

To get staff comfortable with MyPMS prior to the ownership change or training date, have them access the 'Instant Demo' on PC/Macs or Tablets prior to a formal training on your - or their - devices.  Use the built in web browser on the Mac/PC/tablet - your trainer can show you how to make the Bookmark an Icon on the device.  There is no special software to download on mobile devices, so this can be done at the convenience of your staff

Below is an outline you can refer to for formal training by a BookingCenter trainer.  It doesn’t have to be in this exact order, as questions arise or emphasis might shift.  For instance, Setup area training will be reserved for Managers.

1. Prepare the MyPMS Training Manual

Click this link : https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/MyPMS+Training+Guide to experience the MyPMS Training Guide.  Use this for quickly getting up to speed on the MyPMS system - it's designed to train staff on basic operations.

2. Login to the ‘instant demo' system of MyPMS here. 

Just click the ’Start Instant Demo’ button to begin.

3. Learn by Experience

It is important to actually make bookings and cancel them to get the 'experience' of using the system prior to going live with your own data.   The login info above is demo data and there is NO harm in making bookings and then canceling them, it is OK to learn this way.  In fact, using it hard is what teaches you they best lesson - you can not hurt the system :-)

4. Training Outline

Below you will find the outline that will be followed during our scheduled training. 

I. Introduction

A. Personal & Company Introduction

B. Industry Overview

C. Customer Information

D. Reference Manuals

II. Overview of Process

A. 120-Minute Training

B. One Internal Champion

C. Software -> Book Now buttons -> Network

D. Optional GDS distribution

III. Setup Area

A. Users, PMS Setup

B. Access and Planning

C. Rates and Manage Rates

IV. Making a New Booking

A. Enquiry, Availability and 

B. Booking Sub-Menus

C. Internet Bookings

V. Folio Management 

A. Deposit Policy

B. Charges, Payments, Credit Cards, Refunds

VI. Letters

A. Using Email, Print, Screen

B. Editing and Creating Letters 

VII. Daily Operations

A. Housecleaning

B. Reports

c. Night Audit

VIII. Central Reservations and Channel Manager

A. Setup Area Settings

B. Web Bookings

c. Mobile, Facebook, Google Tracking, and OTAs

If you have any problems or questions, do not hesitate to contact me. Getting started now with the demo login above will greatly enhance the training.

1. Prepare the MyPMS Training Manual

Click this link : https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/MyPMS+Training+Guide to explore the MyPMS Training Guide.  Use this for quickly getting up to speed on the MyPMS system - it's designed to train staff on basic operations using our public demo.

2. Login to the ‘instant demo' system of MyPMS here.

Just click the ’Start Instant Demo’ button to begin.

3. Learn by Experience

It is important to actually make bookings and cancel them to get the 'experience' of using the system prior to going live with your own data.   The login info above is demo data and there is NO harm in making bookings and then canceling them (or making folio charges, payments, etc), it is OK to learn this way.  In fact, using it hard is what teaches best lessons - you can not hurt the system :-)

4. On Site Overview

Who will set the times and agenda of the Training, the BookingCenter trainer or the GM/Owner?  Whoever will be the lead should schedule and articulate who needs to be where and when.

The PMS "cutover” time should be an explicit decisions between the BookingCenter trainer and the GM/Owner.

If there were a Booking Import(s) and otehr data files from a prior system, it was clearly agreed when these would be run and the 'gaps' that occur between the running of the import files and the trainng date.

If Booking were imported, have teh leader (whoever generated the 'bookings file') find the 'delta' between the 'old system' and MyPMS.  Usually it is as simplea as running an 'Arrivals Report' from both systems to make sure all bookinsg were imported. If there is a 'gap' identify why and for what cause and eitehr try and perfomr another import, or accept those 'gaps' will be done by staff manually.

The focus of the Training after the switchover has occured is usually in this order:

1. In-house bookings ((ie 'Stay Overs') need to have their Charges and Payments sumamrized on their folios before progressing.  This can be done by one staff member who has clear understanding of how "Balance Forward' works.
2. Arrivals are usually the second focus of a trainng, alowing teh staff to manually enter these arrivals or to 'check them in' and earn about deposits, paymenst, and check-in processes (both manually and via Self Check-in)
3. If the property uses Companies and Groups, it's best to focus on future arriving Groups, who may have not been imported, whose Bookings needed to be 'added to a Group", will need Hard and Soft allocations added, and to 'Setup teh Group Folios' in order to make sure billing is done properly for all Groups who have been setup in teh odl system.
4. Once the Companies are clear, it's important to focus on clearly understanding Folios.  This is where teh use of manual credot csrds, DB:, EMV, or TRaditonal MyCard needs to be explained and demoed.
5. Now focus on Night Audit and clarify who will assist the first night (or 2) of teh NIght Audit process.
6. Rates, Reports, and Management & Setup areas are usually done last.

The process above can be done in one day for a small property if all stay are present for a complete 8-10 hor day. Else 2 days for larger properties and situations where staff need to be trained in 'shifts'.

• It will allow some bookings to 'fall through the cracks', such as those booked the same day as arrival. For customers who are setup for Self Check-in, the system knows if a booking is received (from Booking.com or Expedia, for example) for 'today' and immediately begins the automation setup as per the Self Check-in guidelines.  This contrasts to Auto Letters, which are only sent once per day, so these 'same day arrivals as booked' bookings would have to be manually delivered via a Letter you issue manually.
• Also, their is no way to initiate payment automatically with the Guest agreeing to 'pay now', which is a core part of self check-in that guarantees payment has been received prior to delivery of a Lock Code. Rather, you will have to manually apply payment to the folios to get payment.
• Because the Guest will not be required to check an "I Agree' button to initiate payment, this provides less support in the event of a dispute.  The only guarantee one would have to support a dispute would be the eSign letter. That is less desireable than a proper Self Check-in where an explicit message is displayed to accept payment terms.
• The eSign letter will also have to be manually confirmed to be signed and on file before the Lock Code goes out, as no Self Check-in process would verify that it is on file and received prikor to delivery of a Lock Code.

Such scenarios are less than ideal, in order to save on costs, but can be done if one wishes to use Auto Letters to automate the delivery of Lock codes.

Our recommended approach to solve the batch isssue is to reach out to TSYS/Global Payments at 1-800-847-2772. You will need to know your V# or Merchant ID to get the needed support.  You can also email their support group at: 855-882-0507; ISVCARE@TSYS.com but this will take awhile, so we recommend phoning during business hours and resolving the issue quickly.

Once on the phone with TSYS/Global, have them help identify any offending transaction(s) and walk you through completing the batch manually on the device to clear any issue(s). 

The first and most comprehensive is the use the Search Bookings function under the BOOKINGS TAB in the Front Desk. See Search Bookings in the online manual.  This will teach you how to make custom queries to get the 'subset' of bookings desired for your needs.

To export a list of all of your Guests, go to SETUP | RELATIONSHIPS | GUESTS. See,  Export All Guests to a File. and Guests in our online manual.  This provides a complete list of all Guest data stored in BookingCenter.

If you wish to save a financial record of all folio transactions in BookingCenter, we recommend the Transactions Report for exporting Folio transaction activity.

Because you will wish to have a record of any Advanced Deposit (AD) or Advanced Charges (AC) applied to future bookings, use these links to learn about the data and reports to access Advanced Charges/Deposits.

Finally, because you may wish to know what, if any specific Folio charges have been applied to future bookings, use the Item Analysis report to get a list of Charges, and their booking IDs, to post any Folio Charges (“Items”) for your future bookings.

We also support a complete list of XML messages (based on Open Travel Alliance, so they are 'industry-standard') that get detailed data from BookingCenter, which you can review here.  Keep in mind, we only provide credentialed access to XML web services to customers who have signed an NDA and are part of our Web Services agreement.

There are times when customers need these to go to multiple email addresses, and we suggest creating a free email account (such as with www.Hotmail.com, www.Yahoo.com, or www.Gmail.com) for an email you will use and then that service will forward them to whomever you choose.

Generally, that card is valid for 2 days prior to check-in to 2 days after check-out for the full Room + Tax amount of what was booked via that OTA 'merchant' (specific OTAs have their own policies).  This card is only valid for the Projected Income that MyPMS shows (the rates sold via the OTA + taxes) so never attempt to authorize more than that amount on the Virtual Credit Card.  If one manually authorizes this card, and then attempts another auth, it will be denied - only one auth for the Virtual Credit Card can be obtained, and only within teh time frame that OTA allows (generally 1-2 days prior to checkin till 1-2 after checkout). We recommend not manually authorizing virtual credit cards.  Just issue the 'Apply Payment' to the folio for the proper amount, which obrtains the auth automatically (if using MyCard).

Booking.com has a good article on these Virtual cards here: https://partner.booking.com/en-us/help/policies-payments/payment-products/everything-you-need-know-about-virtual-credit-cards 

Errors Obtaining Authorizations on Virtual Credit Cards

There are times when a Virtual Credit Card will not be able to receive an auth (BookingCenter will show: "Unable to accept payment' as an error message if using MyCard).  We will have no idea why, though usually it's because there was already an auth taken from the Virtual Credit Card. In these situations, you will have to login to your merchent center for the specific OTA, find the booking, and request a new Virtual Credit Card from the OTA for that booking. This new card should then get manually entered into the PMS and this may require a manual Payment or Auth (depending on scenario) for the amount the OTA states is appropriate for the booking: the Rate + Tax that were booked.

BookingCenter has developed a way to require a guest's credit card as part of our Self Check-in system so that the Virtual Card is used only for the approved Room + Tax amount, and 'incidentals' are then paid to the card the guest has chosen.  We do this as detailed here for ADDPAYMENT.

Get Started

Contact BookingCenter Sales to get a contract established with the SiteNew.  BookingCenter staff will setup the property to reflect the same, or make new changes based on the goal of ownership.

Schedule Migration Date

Schedule a date and time for a ‘cutover’ from the SiteOld property to the SiteNew.

Export Data from SiteOld property

Before their migration date, determine what you want to ‘migrate’ from the SiteOld property to the SiteNew and get your team ready.  The most basic is the ‘Future Arrivals’ so that all in-house and arriving bookings are inside the SiteNew at the transition date.  To do this, use the Search Bookings function under the BOOKINGS TAB in the Front Desk. See Search Bookings in the online manual.  

You want to use the ‘Arrival Date From’ begins and enter the date of the transition, ie September 1, 2023.  You then want to use the Arrival Date To” and enter a date somewhere far in the future so that any booking take for 10 years in the future are contained the in the file.  Choose ‘Save as .CSV’ to get that list into a .CSV file where it can be managed in a spreadsheet program. 

Import Data for SiteNew property

Download the template file we provide here called “sample_import_bookings_file.csv” (under the section ‘Easiest Way to Import” which is also attached here.

This data you have exported from the step above needs to be reviewed before importing to BookingCenter.  Do not import any cancelled bookings (it will cause errors with your availability), and make sure that the data looks appropriate.  Once this file is ready for the SiteNew, send it to BookingCenter by attaching it to a support ticket at: https://support.bookingcenter.com.

Practice the Data Migration

We recommend doing a small sample of the import file a few days before the actual ‘migration date’ so that your staff can quickly download, place the data into our ‘sample_import_bookings_file.csv’ format (which can be saved as CSV, Excel, Google Sheet, or Apple Number), and cleanse it to be ready for the import on the day of migration.

Preparing for the Migration : Data and In-House Guests

A BookingCenter transition rep will be assigned to help import your readied file and manage the guests that are in-house on the date of the migration. These bookings will need Balance Forward adjustments for prior payments and charges that need to be accounted from the SiteOld property to the SiteNew.  See the article here to learn more about making these Balance Forward adjustments.

Merchant Account

Plan to have your new merchant account setup for SiteNew by a few days prior to the transition date. Contact BookingCenter Sales to get this started ASAP as creating a new merchant account and getting devices to your property can take up to a week or longer. 

OTAs and GDS Representation

If the property is not changing ownership, BookingCenter can simply switch the OTA connection for you, assuming the Rams are the same between the SiteOld property and the SiteNew.  If rooms are changing, then we will have to re-map and make sure we ‘cleanse’ any older rooms that are ‘retiring’ so pay attention tot his and make sure to communicate any room changes to BookingCenter when doing the switch.

When a property changes ownership, the major OTAs (Expedia, Booking, Airbnb, etc) usually accept an ‘assignment’ of the old contract and keep the same profile. But not always and BookingCenter has no contract over this decision. It’s best to contact your OTA market manager days prior to the migration to plan for this. If a new ‘Profile’ needs to be built ion an OTA, that can take from hours to days to get a new contract signed and the extent ready for BookingCenter to connect to. Plan ahead!

GDS switches take a minimum of 11 business day to complete, so plan ahead of you are going to perform a GDS switch.

Website

If the website stays the same, y9our webmaster will need to know the SIteID of the SiteNew property so they can make changes to the website to point to SiteNew. If there is going to be a change of websites entirely, then have y9our webmaster read the guide to how the Booking Engine is customized, and can be used, at:

https://docs.bookingcenter.com/display/MYPMS/Booking+Engine

After reading that, have your webmaster view the HTML integration for the 'Booking Engine widget' detailed here as it will provide details on the ‘widget’ code he/she needs.

Email addresses 

Make sure that the email addresses (for support, billing, booking notifications, auto reports, etc) for SiteNew are setup and can be retrieved by the staff of SiteNew, as you don’t want to loose these important communications. You can always update emails them under the Setup area of the SiteNew property

Users

There may be users associated with SiteOld that need to become Users in SiteNew. Let BookingCenter  Support know which Users need to be transferred or connected to both, and we shall do so.

These are the main topics you want to focus on when a property must migrate from one MyPMS profile to a new one. Making sure these steps are followed is recipe for success!

• What are the differences between BookingCenter Payments (BCPayments) and other merchant accounts you may have had, such as TSYS, Vital, VisaNet, or Heartland Payment Systems?

There are no functional differences.  All support the same authorizations, Purchases (Credits), Credits (Debits), and Batch settlement reporting within the PMS.

• When does funding occur?

Funding gets to the us 48hrs after a batch settlement and we transmit a wire to your checking account on the next Fed Wire.  If there is a weekend or holiday, FedWire does not operate, so this works like 'clock work' on normal business days, but is delayed by weekends and holidays.  

A typical example:on the business date 11th, if the property pays Purchases (Credits) and Credits (Debits) onto folios, batches before 1 am on the 12th (thus making the close of the batch the ‘business day’ of the 11th),  the morning of 13th BookingCenter would ‘see’ the money. We would then wire the monies the next morning, so it would be in your checking account on Wednesday the 14h.

An example occurring over a weekend,on the business date 15th, if the property pays Purchases (Credits) and Credits (Debits) onto folios, batches on the morning of 16th (which is a Saturday, in this example) at 6 am, BookingCenter would ‘see’ the money on Tuesday the 19th. We would then wire the monies the next morning, so it would be in your checking account on Wednesday the 20th.

• What events can delay a batch being transmitted to my checking account?

If there are a large amount of refunds in a batch, this can delay due to how the merchant networks analyze for fraud.  A “a large amount of refunds“ is based. On your historical norms, not a finite number.

• How do I know what has been deposited to my checking account?

If the User logs in from another device, then an email will be sent to that User's email on file notifying them of a new login via a new device.  This allows the User to analyze if their account was hacked, and alter the password or User settings to be more restrictive.

The WSDL allows one to use both Time and Dates to query for bookings that match common requests. Below helps identify what the results provide:

ResStatus="Reserved" = confirmed 
ResStatus="Requested" = unconfirmed 
ResStatus="Cancelled" = Cancelled 
ResStatus="Active" = checked in 
ResStatus="Complete" = Complete 

The date type has an option "All" and "Cancelled", as well.

Date Type "All" "LastUpdateDate" "MadeOnDate" "ArriveDate" "DepartDate" "CancelledDate" are self-explanatory.


The easiest way to incorporate Housekeeping Services is to install the Housekeeping App and register the Housekeeping Service or individual(s) with an ID and password so they receive Housekeeping 'requests' automatically.  The notification usually occurs via a push notification to their mobile phones (iOS and Android both supported) but also emails can be used and the email used by the recipient for their needed automation.  The notifications are automated to occur when manually assigning housekeeping tasks, autonating them at checkout, or when a clean as been set for 'review', and/or 'complete'. This is built to work for many housekeeping services and is the cheapest way toward automation when working with offsite vendors.

But there are times when an outside service needs to have awareness of summary booking info to be able to analyze or schedule tasks ahead of time.  In such as situation, we have an API that we recommend.  The OTA_ResRetrieveRS - (Get Booking Summaries) call that queries bookings - and their status' - in order to plan ahead.

Date Type "All" "LastUpdateDate" "MadeOnDate" "ArriveDate" "DepartDate" "CancelledDate"

Status: "All" "Confirmed" "Unconfirmed" "Canceled" "Active" "Complete"

The result of the query is an array of bookings with sufficient details, such as the Booking ID (confirmation #), number of adults/children/Infants, Guest Name on the booking, and arrival and departure dates for each booking.  Note that this message also includes basic financial details of the rate and total projected income, so there is financial data shared with this message.

The API endpoint has the message specifics, but if using our client area in the Test system, ws-client-test, use the 'Modify Booking' message to enter in the Booking ID and click the Modify button (Site ID: EXAMPLE Site ID; Booking: 150509).

This will take you to a new 'Modify booking' section/URL to view a client interface to the message.

At the bottom of the page, you will see the Inventory Items derived for the Site Details messages, where the web services delivers a list of Items that are set to sell 'online' and that are flagged as 'add on at checkin' and/or addon at checkout' to differentiate Items that are to be sold during the guest stay process.  

The developer should identify one or more of the appropriate Item(s) and specifiy a quantity (such as 1 Breakfast and 2 Fosters Bitter beers) and submitting the message, the quantity (at the price set for the Item) to be added to the primary Folio of the Booking.

If one were log into MyPMS and load the booking, they should see the item(s) post to the folio of the specific booking.

In each booking message, there may be two 'negative' charges (ie, bring down teh total income for the booking) that get applied to the folio when the property is booked:  1) host_fee_base and 2) host_fee_vat

• Airbnb’s host_fee_vat field is the VAT charged on Airbnb’s host service fee itself, not a tax on your payout or on the guest stay.
• In other words, from a US accounting perspective: Total Airbnb fee expense = host_fee_base + host_fee_vat

For accounting, most hosts treat:

• host_fee_base as an expense (Airbnb platform/service fee)
• host_fee_vat either as VAT on purchased services (potentially recoverable input tax if you are VAT-registered and local rules allow) or as part of the expense if you cannot reclaim it.

Why VAT shows up on a USA listing

• Airbnb is a non‑US entity for many of its platform operations and is required in various countries to charge VAT on its service fees for electronically supplied services.
• That VAT obligation depends on Airbnb’s place of supply rules, not your property location, for example in Texas where there is no VAT government tax, so the VAT is Airbnb’s tax on the fee it charges you, not a US‑state tax.
• Airbnb issues VAT invoices when this applies and breaks out the VAT amount separately; your API’s host_fee_vat mirrors that breakdown.a

So even though the property is, for example, in Texas, host_fee_vat is best understood as a non‑US VAT on Airbnb’s own service fee, passed through and itemized to the folio.

If you’re using the XML calls and you want to determine what setting to use you to save a booking with the Site’s Deposit and Cancelaltion policy text, policy, and amount, you should follow the steps below: 

#1 -  Make a call OTA_HotelDescriptiveContentInfo - Site Information: Policies 

Type: Policies
OTA_HotelDescriptiveContentInfoPort  
Test end point: https://ws-server-test.bookingcenter.com/hotel_information.php?wsdl

This will return the key attributes you need to make the OTA_HotelResPort (New Booking call) 

Sample PHP/SOAP code: