Orioly features part 5. – Booking management

Did you start organizing tours and activities because you like working with people, you love tourism, and nothing excites you as much as introducing guests to your destination? Do you feel that managing bookings is boring and complicated? Then this blog is for you.

Whether you already use Orioly or not, find out how you can easily manage your online and offline bookings, track departures and receive payments, automate emails, and manage data that gives you a better insight into your business.

Booking management with Orioly

In Orioly, everything we listed above is in one place under the category Bookings.

For each experience, you can see its departures, and the date the reservation was created.

In addition, you can see who is the payer and how much has already been paid.
Within Orioly all the booking documents such as quotes, invoices, or vouchers are automatically created and can be viewed and/or printed for each booking as well as the guest manifest for each departure that you can print or download from the Dashboard.

Generating payment link and additional options

In the Booking section you can also find additional features related to payments. Using them will help you a lot with your daily tasks.

If a guest has just created a booking and will pay later or just has paid a deposit, you can easily add payment anytime along with the payment method, whether it is cash, wire transfer, or credit card, as well as the date and time of payment and all the important notes about it.

At the same time, you can add a refund to each booking to note this in the system that will also be visible in the Analytics so you can easily analyze your business results and see how many of the cancellations with refunds have been made.

One useful feature when it comes to managing bookings is the generated payment link for a booking without any or partial payment. With that option, you can enable subsequent card payment of the deposit or total amount.

Click on the three dots next to the booking with Reservation, Inquiry, Deposit, or Incomplete status, select Payments, and Generate a payment link. Then add the payment amount, copy the link and email it to your guest.

Every single booking, regardless of whether it was created, online or offline, can be edited. Simply update the number of passengers for each price category (adults, children, students), and there is also an option to add information about passengers such as their first and last name, email address, phone number, and other.

How many times have you arranged everything with the guest, they paid for the tour, and then remembered that they would like to include some extras after a few days? Orioly makes updating very simple and quick.

Subsequently, you edit add-ons, i.e. add to your booking additional products or services such as souvenirs, museum tickets, meals, etc., if the guest has requested them. Once you have done this, just generate a payment link and add the rest of the amount that needs to be paid.

Rebook option – change the date and time of departure

It is often the case that you are forced to change the departure date for an already created reservation because the guest has changed his mind or will not make it to the departure that was initially booked.

In that case, you can use the Rebook option in Orioly without having to cancel it. You can easily and quickly change the departure date and time.

Once you have done that the guest will automatically receive a confirmation email for the new departure date, while the status of the initial reservation will be changed to Canceled.

Another way you can change the departure date is to set the status to Canceled. Then, by clicking on Add new booking button, create a new one with the latest information received from the guest.

The above-mentioned button can also create an Offline booking in case your guest contacts you by phone or on the spot, directly in your office, or by email.

Offline bookings

To create an offline booking, after clicking Add new booking, select the date and time of departure for the desired product and then click on the next step.

Here you will select the number of guests per price category, and if you disable the option “Details not needed”, you can add the information for each guest individually.

Then add any fees and add-ons, contact details, and answers to questions with feedback from the guest, such as the existence of special needs or mobility issues.

The last step in creating an offline booking is adding the payment details, which you will only be able to access if you finished the previous steps.

In this last step, it is essential to note if the guest has already paid the entire amount or only a deposit so that you have accurate information about collected payments at all times.

You can choose whether it is cash, card, or transactional payment, and you can also add a note in which you will write the details such as payment of the first installment or similar messages that are important to you.

Conclusion

Managing bookings efficiently takes a lot of time and effort if you are in the business of tours and activities. Working and keeping track of everything manually can be very complicated, outdated, and time-consuming.

Regardless of the booking system you use, it’s a good idea to check all the options available to manage your bookings. That way, you will not only save a lot of time, but also it’ll be easier for you to follow and update the information that is important for your business.

For more information on how to get the most out of Orioly, read also:

• Orioly features part 1 – the percentage of occupancy, closing departures, cut-offs
• Orioly features part 2 – automate email confirmations, cancellation policy, GDPR
• Orioly Features Part 3 – partnerships

ORIOLY
on February 7, 2023

by Lidija Šomodi