Introduction Manual First Steps Reservation overview Invoice overview Accounting Journal Settings Users Room Categories Rooms Guest categories Prices Tourist tax / accommodation levy Subsidiaries Reservation Origin Reservation Status Templates Online Booking Automations

Online Booking

The online booking feature allows guests to request or book accommodation directly through the website – around the clock, with no manual effort required.

Setup

Online booking can be set up in the administration area under Settings → Online Booking . There the feature can be activated and one defines which accommodations and rooms should be bookable – either all or a specific selection.

Design options are also available: colours and optional custom CSS can be adjusted to match the look of the website. Payment terms, cancellation policy, and a custom confirmation message can be stored here as well.

The confirmation email to the guest is sent as an automation . Its template, attachments, further conditions or switching delivery off entirely are configured under Settings → Automations .

Design of the booking page

Two designs are available for the public booking page, switchable under Settings → Online Booking . Each one has a preview link there.

Modern: Spacious layout with large room photos and clear step guidance. The default for new installations.
Classic: Compact, plain layout – shows a lot in little space.

Colours can be adjusted in both designs, as can custom CSS. The “Modern” design additionally exposes named CSS variables (for font, corner radius, spacing and more), listed in the help text of the CSS field.

Note: Properties already using online booking stay on the “Classic” design automatically, where existing custom CSS keeps working unchanged. You can switch to “Modern” at any time – review your custom CSS afterwards, as the page structure differs.

Entry point: search or calendar

There are two ways for guests to find their stay. The entry point is set under Settings → Online Booking and always applies to the whole booking page – the two cannot be offered side by side. From the price display onwards, both paths continue identically.

Search: The guest enters a period, party size and room count and picks from the matching room categories. The right choice as soon as more than one room is bookable.
Calendar: The guest sees the occupancy of an accommodation and picks the period directly in the calendar. Recommended for single properties.

Availability calendar on the booking page

In the calendar, guests page through months with the arrows or jump straight to a period using the month picker. How far ahead bookings are possible is controlled by the booking horizon in the settings.

Limits of the calendar: The calendar always books exactly one accommodation . If several rooms are released, guests can switch between them – but switching discards the current selection, and several rooms cannot be booked in one go. That is what the search is for. Rooms configured for multiple occupancy do not appear in the calendar because their nights are shared between several bookings; they remain bookable through the search. The calendar shows the occupancy . Whether a stay satisfies the booking rules is checked after the period has been selected.

Booking Process

The booking process guides guests through four simple steps. The first step follows the configured entry point – in the calendar the guest picks accommodation and period there instead of search criteria:

Search: The guest enters the desired period, number of guests, and number of rooms.
Selection: For each available room category, all bookable occupancy options are displayed with their respective prices. The guest selects the desired number of guests per room and the number of rooms.
Details: The guest enters their contact details (name, address, email) and receives a cost summary along with information on payment and cancellation terms.
Confirmation: After submitting, a confirmation page appears with the configured message text.

Availability is checked in real time so guests always receive up-to-date information.

Booking Mode

There are two booking mode options to choose from, depending on the preferred workflow:

Inquiry: The guest submits a non-binding request. A notification is sent and the booking is confirmed manually. Ideal when one wants to review each stay personally.
Direct booking: The guest books immediately and bindingly. The reservation is created automatically in the system. Recommended for fully automated processing.

In both cases, the guest automatically receives a confirmation email. Additionally, an email notification can be sent to the administrator if this is enabled in the app settings.

Embedding the Booking Page

The booking page can easily be embedded into an existing website, for example as an iFrame. The ready-to-use embed code is available directly in the online booking settings.

Allow embedding

You keep full control over which websites are allowed to display your booking form. For the form to actually be embedded into an external website, that website must be entered in the online booking settings under Allowed embedding sources . This ensures that the booking form only appears on the sites you have explicitly approved – an important safeguard against unwanted embedding or misuse of your booking funnel.

One website per line, for example:

https://www.my-hotel.com
https://my-hotel.com

The domain including https:// is sufficient – a path such as /booking is not required. If the website is reachable both with and without www , both variants should be entered.

Configuration of allowed embedding sources

If the field is left empty, the booking form can still be opened directly, but embedding on external websites is not possible.

Email Notifications

After a successful booking or inquiry, emails are sent automatically:

Confirmation email to the guest: Sent through an automation that is created during setup. Template, attachments and conditions can be adjusted under Settings → Automations , where delivery can also be switched off.
Notification to the administrator: Can be enabled in the general app settings so that one is immediately informed about new inquiries or bookings.

Occupancy & Pricing

In the second step of the booking process, each room category is displayed with all available occupancy options and the corresponding price for each. Every option appears as its own line showing the number of guests and the total price.

With the calendar entry point the accommodation is already settled, so only the single price matching the stated party is shown. If no price exists for that number of guests, this is stated explicitly.

All amenities and images stored for a room category are also shown in the selection, allowing guests to get a clear picture of what each category offers.

Note: Only occupancy options with a corresponding price category stored in the system are displayed. Room categories without a matching price are hidden entirely. All bookable rooms must therefore have the appropriate price categories set up.

Bookable Extras

Miscellaneous price categories that are marked as bookable online in the price settings are displayed as selectable extras in the second step of the online booking process.

The display differs depending on the price type:

Per person/night (e.g. breakfast): The price is automatically calculated based on the number of guests and nights. The extra can be toggled on or off.
Per room/night or flat rate (e.g. parking, final cleaning): The price applies per unit. The desired quantity can be selected via a dropdown.

All selected extras are itemised in the booking summary (step 3) and included in the total price.

Booking rules and restrictions

Under Settings → Online Booking it can be controlled which rooms are bookable online and on what conditions. Booking rules, special periods and the restrictions per room category are found on the Booking rules tab. The settings described here apply to online booking only; reservations entered by hand are not affected.

Booking rules

Booking rules define how long guests have to stay and on which days no arrival or departure is possible. The weekdays, the minimum nights and the room categories are chosen freely per rule. A rule can apply to individual room categories or to all of them and can be disabled at any time. On days no rule covers, any length of stay is bookable.

Every rule has exactly one type:

Minimum stay on arrival: if a guest arrives on one of the selected days, the booking has to reach the minimum. The departure day does not matter.
Minimum stay for a night: if a booking covers one of the selected nights, it has to reach the minimum as a whole . What counts is not how many of the selected nights are occupied but how long the booking is in total: with 4 nights set for the night from Monday to Tuesday, a booking covering that night has to last 4 nights in total. Mon → Tue stands for the night from Monday to Tuesday; the departure day does not count as a night.
No arrival possible: no stay can start on the selected days.
No departure possible: no stay can end on the selected days.

Special periods

Different rules can be stored for individual date ranges – public holidays or high season, for instance. They are created like the general rules, with a date range added. The first and the last selected day are both included.

Special periods take precedence over rules without a date range: within the selected period and on the weekdays selected there, the minimum stay of the special period applies – even if it is lower. Where several special periods overlap, the highest value applies.

An example: in general, at least 4 nights apply. A special period for November sets 2 nights. In November 2 nights are then bookable, in all other months 4.

Arrival and departure closures also apply within a special period.

If every special period lies in the past, a notice points this out.

Calendar

The calendar shows per room category what applies on each day. The row Arrival from … nights adds up all rules and shows from how many nights an arrival is bookable. Below it are the individual rules; colours distinguish general rules from special periods.

Where an arrival needs more nights than the rules of that day, for example because of a later night, the value is marked and the tooltip names the reason. Clicking a rule shows on which days it applies.

With rules on individual nights, a longer stay can be impossible while an even longer one is bookable again. The calendar marks such days.

Maximum number of rooms per category

It is possible to limit how many rooms of a category are visible and bookable online – independently of the actual availability. This allows individual rooms to be kept free for walk-ins or telephone reservations without offering them online.

Minimum occupancy

A minimum number of persons can be defined per room category. A double room with a minimum occupancy of 2 is then not offered for single occupancy online, for example. If no valid occupancy options remain for a category, the entire category is hidden.

Booking horizon

On the Settings tab it can be defined how many months in advance guests can book online. If the field is left empty, there is no time limit.