Playbook, hotel
Three separate diaries and none of them is the room system
A guest asks to book a treatment, a table or a meeting room as though they were one act, and inside the building they are three departments with three diaries, three notice periods and three quite different cancellation positions. The spa may be run by a concession. The restaurant sells to people who are not staying. The meeting room comes with a layout and a set up. What the assistant can usefully do is say which door each one is behind.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for appointment booking holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- None of these diaries is the room inventory, so holding a confirmed room gives a guest no claim on a treatment, a table or the boardroom, and residents are regularly surprised to be told the restaurant is full on the night they are staying.
- The spa usually carries a late cancellation charge the room booking does not, because a therapist's hour cannot be resold at short notice, and that charge applies to a resident exactly as it does to anybody walking in off the street.
- The restaurant takes bookings from people who are not staying, which is why a Saturday table goes while rooms are still selling, and why a guest who assumed a table came with the room ends up eating somewhere else.
- A meeting room is sold with a layout, equipment, a set up time and often a catering minimum, so what a guest thinks is an hourly slot is a small event with a lead time attached to it.
How it arrives
- can we book a table for two on saturday
- do we need to book the spa in advance
- is the restaurant open to non residents
- can we hire a meeting room for the morning
- what happens if we cancel a treatment on the day
- do we get priority in the restaurant if we are staying
What has to be indexed for this to work
| Each diary named, with who runs it and how it is booked | The restaurant, the treatment rooms, meeting and function space, and anything run by a concession rather than by the hotel. Say for each whether it is booked on its own page, by phone or through reception, because that routing is the answer to most of these messages. |
|---|---|
| Notice and cancellation for treatments and tables | How far ahead a treatment should be booked, the notice needed to cancel without a charge, what that charge is, and how long the restaurant holds a table past the booked time. These differ from the room terms and every guest assumes otherwise. |
| The meeting room in numbers | Capacity by layout, the blocks of hours it is sold in, what is included by way of screens, boards and connectivity, whether there is a minimum spend, and how much notice a set up needs. Planners compare on these figures and skip anywhere that makes them ask for them. |
| What residents specifically get | Whether guests use the pool and gym without booking, whether treatments carry a resident rate, whether tables are held back for residents and until what time. Write it as a rule, because at the moment it is a habit that whoever is on duty applies differently. |
The reply
Those are three separate diaries and none of them is the room booking, so staying here does not itself hold a table or a treatment. The restaurant takes its own bookings on the restaurant page and takes them from people who are not staying too, which is why Saturdays go early [1]. Treatments are booked with the spa directly and carry their own cancellation notice, which is shorter and stricter than the room terms because a therapist's hour cannot be resold at a day's notice [2]. Meeting rooms are quoted rather than booked online, since they come with a layout and a set up. I cannot see any of those diaries or make a booking in them, so leave your name, an email, the date and what you want and it will go to the right department.
It separates the three at the start, because the guest has bundled them and everything after depends on unbundling them. The reason the spa notice is stricter is given in half a sentence, which is what keeps it from reading as mean. The refusal names the diaries rather than the service, so it is clear that nobody in this window can see a slot in any of them.
Where it stops
The trigger. The guest names a date and time for a table, a treatment or a meeting room, asks whether a slot is free, or wants to change or cancel one that already exists.
I cannot see the restaurant book, the spa diary or the meeting room schedule, and I cannot make or change a booking in any of them. Leave your name, an email, the date and time you want and how many people, and it will go to the right department to confirm.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never say a table, a treatment or a meeting room is free at a given time, since none of those diaries is visible from here.
- Never say a resident is guaranteed a table, when the restaurant is selling the same evening to people who are not staying.
- Never waive or reduce a late cancellation charge on a treatment, which is a therapist's paid hour and the spa's decision to make.
- Never confirm a named therapist, a treatment length or an item of equipment for a date, when none of it has been checked against a diary.
Questions
- Can it take a restaurant booking?
- No. It has no diary, cannot write into one and cannot see whether a time is free. It routes the request to the department that can, with the date, the time and the party size already captured so the callback is a confirmation rather than a question.
- Our spa is run by a concession. How should that be written?
- Say so plainly and give their booking route. A guest sent to reception for a spa the hotel does not run loses a day and the concession loses a treatment, and neither of them finds out why.
- Should residents be told the restaurant may be full?
- Yes, and before arrival rather than at seven in the evening. It is the most preventable disappointment in a hotel with a good kitchen, and the version discovered at the door is the one that ends up in a review.
Keep reading
- Everything for a hotelRate inclusions, check in times, parking and room accessibility answer well. Live availability and a named reservation do not.
- Handling appointment booking in generalIt cannot write into a calendar. The job is removing every reason not to book, then handing over with the details already gathered.
- Whose problem is the car, and whose problem is the cancelled tripWhether a cancelled trip is claimable sits between a guest and their insurer, and a car park notice is not the hotel accepting liability.
- Where is the tray, and will the shirt be back by sixA guest waiting on a tray or a shirt back by six needs the kitchen or housekeeping, not a chat window that can see neither.
- Can I get a van in there, and other arrival questionsHeight barriers, charges, reservable spaces and how far the station really is. All published, and all asked late at night.
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