Understand the external booking channel configuration
Configure booking channels that connect to the CRS and operate via extranet platforms.
The CRS connects with many distribution partners that operate via extranets.
📌Note: Depending on your service agreement, these tasks may be handled by the SHR support team or managed directly by you.
Consult the playbooks for each channel you use or plan to use to understand how to set up the functionality and how data transfers within your technology stack.
External booking channel setup
Below will outline how to access the external booking channel setup:
Click Chain Manager on the left navigation.
Click External Booking Channel.
Click the Overview tab
.Based on your user rights, this displays all hotels within your chain along with the channels they are connected to via the external booking channel (EBC) module.
Click Search to filter the view.
Click Export to export the details.
Click the Setup tab
.The options on these screens are dynamic and will change based on the channel enabled.
Each channel has documentation available to help you understand the various configuration options and successfully implement the connection.
Click the Select Room / Rate tab
.On this screen, you can select the specific rooms and rates intended to be sold on the specific channel.
Left-hand side display:
Filter and search your hotel's rooms and rates.
The display of room and rate codes and/or names is controlled by your profile setting consistent with the rest of the system pages.
In fields where the text is long, hovering over with your mouse will display the full content.
Right-hand side display:
Once added, the rooms and rates will display on the right-hand side of the screen.
⚠️Important: Only the rooms and rates that will be sold on the channel should be enabled. Remove them if they are discontinued in the future. This will avoid any mismatch of data and error messages. The rates must be configured with values loaded and valid dates and updates will be sent accordingly.
Multiple offer mapping
You can map the same room or rate to multiple offers. This feature is useful in cases where a single rate or room could be used with minor variations on the EBC side. For example, if a room can be sold with or without breakfast included, and also as a bed and breakfast rate. Rate codes and room types will appear on the mapping menu as many times as they have been added.
Below will outline the steps to multiple offer mapping:
Click Chain Manager on the left navigation.
Click External Booking Channel.
Click the Select Room / Rate tab
.On this screen, you can select the specific rooms and rates intended to be sold on the specific channel.
Left-hand side display:
Filter and search your hotel's rooms and rates.
The display of room and rate codes and/or names is controlled by your profile setting consistent with the rest of the system pages.
In fields where the text is long, hovering over with your mouse will display the full content.
Right-hand side display:
Once added, the rooms and rates will display on the right-hand side of the screen.
Click the Mapping tab
.On this screen, you'll see the rooms and rates selected on the select room/rate tab ready to be mapped to the channel:
Where codes are displayed, you can hover over to see the full display of the room or rate.
This is where the room and rate codes the channel recognizes as the CRS sends out relevant messages.
If there is no mapping code relevant to a specific room and rate combination, use the ARI suppression tab to indicate these cases and avoid error messages.
This screen may have different options displayed based on the channel's requirements. Please see the documentation for the specific channel to complete the setup
Go to the Inventory Safeguards tab.
This is optional.
You can reduce the total room inventory by a certain amount before sending out to the channel. This feature is flexible to allow different inventory reductions based on room type and can be used for external booking channels.
An example of this is: If your inventory safeguard is applied to Booking.com and your king room, and is a total of three, and your hotel has five king rooms available, Booking.com will be told there are only two king rooms available instead of the full five.
The calculation of this is: five available rooms – three inventory safeguard = two total available rooms sent to channel.
📌Note: If you did not apply this same safeguard limit to Expedia, for example, then Expedia would receive the full 5 rooms available from the CRS which could cause parity issues.
Important considerations for safeguards:
If you do not apply the same safeguard to each channel for the same room types, it could impact your parity.
You cannot input negative safeguard.
You cannot input a different safeguard value by date or date range.
If you do not want a safeguard, simply leave the field blank.
If you input a safeguard count which matches the number of rooms you have on property, that means you will never have bookable inventory for that room type out to the channel.
If the safeguard count matches the current available count of the room type, it means you are effectively sharing with the channel that no inventory is now available.
The CRS is not sending the safeguard value to the online travel agencies (OTA) channels, it is simply reducing the available inventory count BY the value that was entered.
Click the Tax tab
.This is so you can adjust tax calculations.
On this screen, you can adjust the tax values to the outbound and or inbound rate values:
This is useful to accommodate channels that sell rates including or excluding taxes when the CRS is configured the opposite way.
Hover over any codes to see the full name of the rate.
You can use or not use any combination of the options for each rate as required to obtain the desired result.
To keep rate values as configured in the CRS and to accept any rate value sent on a reservation, leave the entries as zero or one hundred. Any other value will cause the rate values to change accordingly.
Tax adjustment types:
Outbound tax percent and outbound flat amount: This is the amount the system will add to the rate value as configured when it is sent to the channel.
Inbound tax percent and inbound tax flat amount: This is the amount the CRS will deduct from the rate value on reservations when the booking is received from the channel.
Tax adjustment example:
The hotel is configured with rates excluding taxes in the CRS but the channel requires rates to be sold including taxes. Therefore, for the rate code a $100 rate will be treated as follows:
$100 rate will be sent with an additional 20% resulting in $120 out to the channel to be sold.
When a reservation is received, it will be reduced to 83.33% of the value.
So, with this setting, for a $140 rate on the booking, the CRS will adjust the value resulting in a $116.67 rate on the reservation.
Go to the ARI Suppression tab
.This is so you can suppress specific room and rate combinations.
On this screen, you can suppress or block a specific room and rate combination from sending updates out to the channel from the CRS:
This feature is useful if some rates are not sold for specific room types or if the channel's extranet does not require rates to be sent from the CRS.
ARI suppression does not affect inbound reservations so it is still important to map room and rate combinations for the reservation records to post with the correct information.
📌Note: There is a feature to auto-suppress ARI if a hotel chooses to enable this. See CRS-External Booking Channel - Auto Suppress ARI.
Go to the Re-Sync tab
.When changes are made to availability, rates, or inventory (ARI), these updates are automatically triggered to send to the channels. The re-sync screen enables you to force these updates through immediately, regardless of when the last or next update will process automatically.
This feature is useful when:
A channel is being set up for the first time.
Changes have been made to the mapping or other setup.
Re-syncs can be done at a granular level by:
Date or date range.
Channel(s).
ARI type.
Specific rooms or rates.
⚠️Important: As re-syncs can take time to process depending on the channel and other messages being sent at the same time, it is recommended that only the necessary elements are triggered in a re-sync
Go to the Activity tab
.This is so you can monitor channel activity.
This screen can be filtered to view channel activity by message type - inbound and outbound - as well as the status of the update:
This is useful to ensure updates out to the channel and incoming reservations are received successfully.
If there are errors, validate that the setup and mapping, and suppression are set accurately and then re-sync the messages.
If the errors persist, visit the documentation for the specific channel for more information and troubleshooting advice.
Some of the results include:
EventID - If available, click on the hyperlink to see the exact XML message.
Event - Type of message sent, in the example below, it was an availability message.
Time - Server time (US Mountain) - Time message was triggered to send to the channel.
Local Hotel Time - Same as above in relative time zone.
Status - OK means a successful message, other statuses may be error or pending.
ID1 - Room type related to this message.
ID2 - Rate code related to this message.
Date Range - Dates for which the message was sent.
Message - Any message returned from the channel - this is useful for troubleshooting errors.
Last Update - Last time there was activity, usually a response from the channel related to this message.
Parent Event ID - If this message was sent in a bundle with others, the related ID will display.
Go to Chain Error Log tab
.Similar to the activity tab, the chain error log tab displays activity for the entire chain.
This feature is useful for central distribution offices or multi-property teams to ensure hotels are successfully processing ARI and reservations.
🤓Tip: Always consult the specific channel documentation for complete setup requirements and troubleshooting guidance, as each channel will have unique configuration needs.