FAQ E-plano Web-based Property Management System Internet Hotel PMS online for small hotels, motels, inns, bed & breakfasts, apartments, studios, resorts, chalets, lodges, camping, camp sites. The web application E-plano is the electronic planning of your hotel, apartment complex or holiday resort. Your lodging has a room chart, hotel diagram, shuffle board or calendar? Your accommodation needs a reservation system or booking system? E-plano combines many functions related to renting the available spaces in your property. Keep track of reservations, booking patters and occupancy levels and install a property management system on-line and keep all customer data at your fingertips. Because E-plano runs via the Internet, there is no software to install, no need to upgrade software (ever), no need to acquire or maintain expensive hardware, no need to worry about back-ups, data storage or security.

Below are some frequently asked questions regarding the various functions of front office, back office and housekeeping. We hope you and your reservations/sales staff will find them helpful.

You and your staff receive new bookings all year round, either in person or by e-mail, fax, telephone, mobile or SMS. Anyone, from wherever they are can enter the required information into the system (if you wish you enter only the customer name). E-plano automatically recognises if the booking is for a repeat customer or company, so no need to re-enter these data.

Various staff can use the daily E-plano, at any tme from wherever they are. Your front-office and housekeeping staff for example wish to know which rooms will be expecting new guests and can ensure that everything is ready prior to guest check-in. Front desk clerks retrieve the guest’s reservation from E-plano by searching for the client’s name or by viewing all of the check-ins for that day. Using the print function of the browser they can print the particular reservation and verify all the facts in the presence of the guest. A list of arrivals can be prepared the day or the night before by back office staff or night auditors. Upon check-out, your reservation staff can check the reservation data and accept payment for the outstanding balance. A list of departures can be prepared the day or the night before.

When a reservation is cancelled it can be removed from E-plano quickly by deleting the booking. The customer’s contact details remain in the system and are not deleted, unless you wish to do so. It is not possible to delete customers who have reservations on their name. Deleted reservations can be found in the trash bin from where they can be restored anytime.

Names, addresses and other personal data of customers are stored on the E-plano servers, in your private hotel database. Customers can be added and modified any time, irrespective of reservations. However, at least the customer’s name must be entered before a reservation can be created. In case you forget, E-plano will create this new customer for you. All customers’ contact details remain in the system and can be updated anytime. For each customer all reservations (past and future) are listed. It is not possible to remove a customer from the database if he/she has reservations against his/her name. Finally, exporting data is possible by creating a CSV file of your customer database. All you need to do next is open the newly created file on your PC and convert it into a spreadsheet. You can then sort and query the data, print address labels, send emails etc. from your PC.

When an existing reservation needs to be amended in E-plano you or your staff staff can open the reservation and change the status, change the arrival and/or departure date, move the booking to a different room, change to meal plan and finally check the new Total Cost and/or insert a new Agreed Price. The Save Price - the original total amount – remains visible until you click the save button.

Any hotel owner or employee can easily learn how to work with E-plano, and once the hotel rooms are entered into the system, you can enter your first reservations within minutes and view them in E-plano in real-time.

When a particular room is not available E-plano does not accept the reservation. However, E-plano gives you the option to proceed with the new booking and click on Save as Rejected. This way any “rejected” reservations can be wait-listed, until their status changes. Additionally, any incomplete bookings can be “parked” here temporarily, whatever the reason may be. All rejected reservations appear in a separate panel on E-plano (below the chart of accepted bookings) as well as in the list of reservations.

Only the administrator has access to the online reservation system and he/she can grant access to other users. There is no need to worry about losing control over your room inventory. All bookings are neatly kept in one place, so no more mistakes or confusion over bookings or room allocations.

9. How do I know the difference between confirmed and optional reservations?

Each reservation has the status of confirmed, with deposit, option or from contract and four colours are used to recognize the status of each booking. In the E-plano this is visualised clearly and by “touching” (mouse over) or “clicking” the booking all additional data can be retrieved.

E-plano operates over the Internet, eliminating the need for expensive hardware and software and other costs associated with a traditional PMS, like maintenance, upgrades and training. E-plano works with all types of internet connections (ADSL, broadband, cable, wireless) and with all major browsers, such as Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. It is advisable to work on a computer with a fast CPU and extended memory but it is not a prerequisite.

The four possible meal plans are identified as Room Only, Bed & Breakfast, Half Board and Full Board. For each room and for each period you can enter four prices into the table of Fixed Pricing: RR, BB, HB and FB.

You have access to the system from anywhere; all you need is a PC or laptop with internet connection. This means E-plano is accessible to satellite offices, remotely located personnel, business partners or managers who are out of the office temporarily. E-plano is also a live-saver when the hotel is closed, and when owners and/or employees are away from the hotel. Obviously they still need to handle early bookings for the next season.

Fixed Pricing is how we call the tariff of room rates for the whole year. It is possible to enter, for each room separately, all the room rates for the rest of the year with more than 150 possible rate changes during the year. Once the fixed prices are entered into the E-plano system all reservations automatically use these room rates as default. The total cost of a booking is always calculated taking into account any rate changes, unless the room rates have been left blank.

While traditional property management systems can cost thousands of Euros to set up and maintain, E-plano is available for a minimum annual membership fee and with low upfront costs. The administrator decides who has access and which user(s) has(have) the authority to view, add, modify or delete data. In addition to the administrator many users can be added, at no extra charge.

Overriding the existing price list (Fixed Prices) is common practice in the hotel business, as managers take into account length of stay, early booking or last minute discounts. For maximum flexibility, each room reservation therefore features an Agreed Price, which is at the discretion of the manager. When an Agreed Price is entered, E-plano automatically calculates the new Total Amount, which is lower (or higher) than the original cost. The calculated cost of the booking here simply is the number of nights multiplied by the Agreed Price.