How does a hotel channel manager work?

Q&A • Hotel

How does a hotel channel manager work?

A channel manager is software that connects the hotel's room inventory to all online sales channels simultaneously. When a room sells on Booking.com, availability automatically updates on Expedia, Airbnb and the hotel's own website — in seconds, without manual intervention.

Technical flow of a channel manager

  1. The hotel sets availability and rates in the PMS — the channel manager picks them up automatically.
  2. The channel manager sends this data simultaneously to all connected OTAs via API.
  3. When a guest books on Booking.com, the OTA sends the confirmation to the channel manager.
  4. The channel manager creates the booking in the PMS and reduces availability across all other channels.
  5. Reception sees the booking immediately in the PMS — without manually checking each OTA.

How 4Hotel helps

4Hotel does not yet have a channel manager connected automatically to the OTAs: there is no API sync with Booking.com, Expedia or Airbnb. In 4Hotel you register your channels (Booking.com, Airbnb, Expedia, Agoda, direct) with their commission and the property ID from the extranet, log the updates you make manually in the extranet and enter OTA bookings in the single calendar. For those bookings the system refuses overbooking per room type, and the per-channel report shows the number of bookings, revenue and commission paid.