hostelsclub manual v2-4 en

ESTABLISHMENT

MANUAL

Version 2.4

March 2011

HostelsClub.com Manual, Version 2.4 2

Table of Contents

Table of Contents ......................................................................................................................................... 2

Welcome to HostelsClub.com! ................................................................................................................. 3

Logging in to the Back Office ................................................................................................................... 4

The Home Page ............................................................................................................................................ 5

Inserting Rooms: ............................................................................................................................................ 6

a)Creating Private Rooms ..................................................................................................................... 6

b)Creating Shared Rooms (Dorms) ..................................................................................................... 7

The Availability Calendar ........................................................................................................................... 8

How to read the availability calendar? ................................................................................................. 9

a) Private Rooms: .................................................................................................................................... 9

b) Shared Rooms: ..................................................................................................................................... 9

-To insert availability ............................................................................................................................... 10

-To Change a Price ................................................................................................................................ 10

-To Change Availability ........................................................................................................................ 10

-To Remove Availability ........................................................................................................................ 10

Managing Availability ............................................................................................................................... 11

Editing Prices ................................................................................................................................................ 12

Alternative use of rooms ........................................................................................................................... 13

Managing Reservations ............................................................................................................................ 14

Confirmation Email..................................................................................................................................... 15

How to Recover Credit Card Details for No-Shows .......................................................................... 16

How Can I Modify My Page on Hostelsclub.com? ........................................................................... 17

How Can I Insert Restrictions On My Lisitng? ....................................................................................... 18

How Can I Insert Minimum Stays for Certain Periods? ..................................................................... 19

Here you can see if a group has replied to one of your bids. ........... Error! Bookmark not defined.

How do I reply to a Group booking request? ................................................................................... 21

Checking Your Statistics ........................................................................................................................... 22

Your Ratings ................................................................................................................................................. 22

The Booking Interface ............................................................................................................................... 23


Welcome to HostelsClub.com!

Dear Partner,

Congratulations! Your property is now a member of the Hostelsclub.com network. We believe that

our new Back Office system is very simple and extremely easy to use. This manual will guide you in

using that system and in a few minutes you’ll be able to manage the various services offered by

HostelsClub.com.

Please read and follow the steps for inserting and setting up your rooms so you can start receiving

bookings from HostelsClub.com as soon as possible.

Looking forward to a profitable partnership,

The HostelsClub.com team

* Remember: You are responsible for offers and prices advertised on our website! If you make a

mistake and cannot change it, contact us immediately.

In the Back Office, the sections marked by a double asterisk (**) are mandatory.

For any question, opinion or problem, please contact the staff of HostelsClub.com at:

[email protected].

mailto:[email protected]


Logging in to the Back Office

1. To log in, go to www.hostelsclub.com, scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on

Hotel Back Office --------------------------------------↓

or go to https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/index.php and save that page in your

bookmarks for easy access next time!

2. Insert the login and password you received in the welcome email you got when your user

account was created.

3. Click >Enter

In case you lose your login and password, contact us at [email protected] and we will send

you new ones.

http://www.hostelsclub.com/

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/index.php



The Home Page

The new Back Office home page will display right away the most useful information about your

property:

1. If you have a single user managing multiple properties, you will have a drop-down menu

here to switch between your properties.

2. Here you see how many reservations you have received through HostelsClub.com during

the current month.

3. Here you can manage your rooms and access directly your advanced availability

calendars.

4. Here you have the last 4 unread reservations – please note that only the last 4 will be

displayed here, you may have more unread reservations than the ones you can see in this

box; just click on “view all reservations” to see all the reservations for your property.

5. Here you see your availability for the next month. The orange bar on the left side shows the

total number of beds you have inserted. The green bars show how many beds are available

each day: if the number is 0, you have no beds left for that day!

6. This is a resume of all the guests that will arrive in the next 7 days. Click on > view to see the

details of these reservations.

7. Here you can see the new group booking requests you have received. Click here for Group

Booking.

8. Here you will see if a group a replied to your offer with a message.


Inserting Rooms:

a)Creating Private Rooms

1- Click on “Rooms” from the top bar.

2- We suggest that you create a price before creating a room. To create a price for the room click

on: View/edit prices for PRIVATE rooms in the right column.

3- Click on Insert new Private prices.

4-

Insert here the name for your price (example:

double room high season): the guests will NOT

see this information.

Insert here the price per room for weekdays

(from Sunday night to Thursday night) in the

currency you selected when joining.

Insert here the price per room for weekend days

(Friday and Saturday nights) in the currency

you selected when joining.

Click >>SUBMIT. You have just created a new

price!

You can continue to create prices for all the

other types of rooms you will be inserting, or

come back in the future to add/edit prices.

5- You are now ready to create private rooms.

6- Go back to the “Rooms” page.

7- Click on Insert PRIVATE rooms

Insert the number of rooms of the same type

you wish to create.

Insert here the name of the rooms – the clients

will NOT see this information on our site, it’s for

your benefit only!

Tick this box if the room has a private WC.

Choose the default price among the ones that

you created.

Insert the number of people of the room’s

occupancy.

If it is a room for 2 you can specify if it is a

double bed or a twin (leave blank).

Select a classification for the room. This is what

the client will see as the ROOM TYPE on our site,

this is how you can make two double different

and give them different prices! Example Single

Room with view could be classified as a single

deluxe and therefore have a higher price than

a single standard.

Click >>Insert: you have just created a new

Private Room!

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/price_sh.php

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/price_sh.php?mod=create

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/room.php?mod=createshared


b)Creating Shared Rooms (Dorms)

Please note that you need to ask HostelsClub.com staff to be enabled to use shared rooms, since

they are not available by default.

1- Click on “Rooms” from the top bar.

2- We suggest that you create a price before creating a room. To create a price for the room click

on:View/edit prices for SHARED rooms in the right column.

3- Click on Insert new Shared prices.

4-

Insert here the name for your price (example:

girl dorm high season): the guests will NOT see

this information.

Insert here the price per bed for weekdays

(from Sunday night to Thursday night) in the

currency you selected when joining.

Insert here the price per bed for weekend days

(Friday and Saturday nights) in the currency

you selected when joining.

Click >>SUBMIT. You have just created a new

price!

You can continue to create prices for all the

other types of rooms you will be inserting, or

come back in the future to add/edit prices.

5- You are now ready to create shared rooms

6- Go back to the “Rooms” page.

7- Click on Insert SHARED rooms

Insert here the number of rooms that you want

to create of this same type.

Insert here the name of the rooms – – the clients

will NOT see this information on our site, it’s for

your benefit only!

Tick this box if the room has a private WC.

Choose the default price among the ones that

you have created.

Insert here the number of people of the room’s

occupancy

Choose the type of room from the drop down

menu.

Select a classification for the room. This is what

the client will see as the ROOM TYPE on our site,

this is how you can make two dorms with the

same occupancy different and give them

different prices. Example: 6 bed dorm female

standard / 6 bed dorm female deluxe

Click >>Insert: you have just created a new

Shared room!

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/price_sh.php

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/price_sh.php?mod=create

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/room.php?mod=createshared


The Availability Calendar

If you click on manage private rooms or manage shared rooms from the homepage you will open

the room’s Availability Calendar:

Here you can quickly check:

1- How many rooms of each kind you have inserted (point 6)

2- How many beds you have for each kind of room (point 6)

Example:

This means you have inserted 20 rooms of the kind “4 beds mixed shared” with private WC

which gives a total of 80 dorm beds.

3- In the last column you will see in which currency your prices are inserted, in this case

Norwegian Krones (NOK). This is the default currency you selected when you joined, to

change this contact us.

Example:

IMPORTANT: The price is always PER BED in the SHARED ROOM calendar, but PER ROOM in the

PRIVATE ROOM Calendar!


How to read the availability calendar?

a) Private Rooms: The green number represents how many ROOMS are available.

The second line is the price PER ROOM in the currency you selected.

The last line is the number of reservations for that kind of room on that day.

Some examples:

Means you have 0 beds available for that day, and zero reservations.

Means you have 32 ROOMS available, for a price of 239 (this price is in the currency you

selected when joining – you can change the default currency by sending an email to

[email protected]).

Means you have 31 ROOMS available, for a price of 239 and you have 1 reservation: click

on the number of reservations (in this case <1>) to see the reservation details.

Means you have 0 ROOMS available and 3 reservations: click on the number of reservations

(in this case <3> to see the reservation details.

b) Shared Rooms: The green number represents how many BEDS are available.

The second line is the price PER BED in the currency you selected.

The last line is the number of reservations for that kind of bed on that day.

Some examples:

Means you have 0 beds available for that day, and zero reservations.

Means you have 32 BEDS available, for a price of 239 (this price is in the currency you

selected when joining – you can change the default currency by sending an email to

[email protected]).

Means you have 31 BEDS available, for a price of 239 and you have 1 reservation: click on

the number of reservations (in this case <1>) to see the reservation details.

Means you have 0 BEDS available and 3 reservations: click on the number of reservations (in

this case <3> to see the reservation details.




Editing Prices and Availability for One Day:

The advanced availability calendar allows you to quickly change prices and availability for each

particular room in each particular day:

WARNING: With this method you can edit price and availability, also for more than one day at a

time, but you must save your changes before you change month. You will get a warning message

if you try to change month without saving your modifications.

Click on to save the modifications you have made.

This is the standard cell. Green: number of ROOMS/BEDS (Private/Shared) and underneath,

the price in your default currency.

-To insert availability To insert availability for one day, you have to put a number of beds or rooms AND enter a

price on the line underneath before pressing Enter on your keyboard.

In this example, you enter <3>, then enter <545>, then press Enter on your keyboard (do NOT

click “Go” on the screen).

-To Change a Price

Highlight with your mouse the value you wish to change and write the new number.

Press Enter on your keyboard (do NOT click “Go” on the screen).

-To Change Availability

Highlight the number of beds or rooms available with your mouse.

Change it to the number you wish, in this case 93 (this number cannot exceed total number

of beds + reservations) and press Enter on your keyboard (do NOT click “Go” on the screen).

-To Remove Availability

Highlight the number of beds or rooms available with your mouse.

Change the number to 0 and press Enter on your keyboard (do NOT “Go” on the screen).


Managing Availability

To manage the availability, click on manage private rooms or manage shared rooms in the Rooms

page or you can click on the icon in the Quick links section of the home page.

1- Choose if you want to INSERT OR REMOVE availability.

2- Choose which kind of room you want to manage:

i. You can choose 1 type of room OR all types of rooms.

ii. You can choose to apply the change to all rooms of that type or select how many of

that type.

3- Choose if you want to use an existing price. You can select any prices that you have used

before or inserted for any of the rooms, or tick the use default prices box if you want to use

them (this is the price that was setup when you created the room) which is handy when

you’ve selected more than one type of room.

4- If you want to use a new price, write the amounts, in the currency you chose when you

joined HostelsClub.com, for weekdays and weekends.

5- Choose the date range that you wish to apply the changes to.

6- Click “GO”.

The Availability Calendar is the best way to create and manage prices and availability. If you

create a price directly in the Calendar, you will not be able to assign a name to it: in the price list,

you will see it listed without a name, but only with the amounts for weekdays and weekends (if your

price is 15 € in weekdays and 19 € in weekends, it will be listed as 15 – 19). To create a price and

give it a name, you should use the “prices” page.

See How to create prices for private rooms.

See How to create prices for shared rooms.


Editing Prices

To edit or insert prices, go to “Prices” from the top bar.

From here you can view, create or edit prices for your rooms.

Prices for SHARED ROOMS are PER PERSON.

Prices for PRIVATE ROOMS are PER ROOM.

You can insert a single price, different prices for high and low season or a single price that changes

on weekend nights.

If you edit a price, all the rooms with the old price will automatically be updated to the new one:

you do not need to create a new price every time your pricing policy changes, just update the old

one and your listing will change accordingly.

See How to create prices for private rooms.

See How to create prices for shared rooms.


Alternative use of rooms

It is possible to create a room for a certain amount of guests, but to sell it for a different number of

guests as well: e.g. you will be able to create a double room which will also be listed as a single

(double with single use), or a triple that can be also listed as a quad.

This will only be possible for private rooms.

To create an alternative use for a room, go the “Rooms” page and click on “View/edit

alternative uses for PRIVATE rooms” in the right column.

To create an alternative use for a room,

click on the “+” sign beside the room’s

name: you will be able to create more

than 1 alternative use for each room (e.g.

a double room can be listed as double,

single AND triple).

Please note that you can only use a room for MORE guests than the original number: ONLY doubles

can be also listed as singles.

You will be able to insert discounts only in percentage (and only for double – single use), while price

increments can be inserted both in percentage and in your currency.


Managing Reservations

To see and manage all your reservations, click on in the top bar.

You will now see the reservations page:

The First column has your reservation number.

Second column: the site that sent the reservation: it could be HostelsClub.com, one of our affiliates

(as Hostels.st in line 2) or even your OWN SITE, if you are using our booking engine.

Click on the eye symbol (Point 1) to see all the details of the reservation.

Click on any of the green arrows on top of the columns to sort the reservations by number (default),

username, still to pay, first night or last night in your property.

In the right column (Point 2) you can perform advanced searches and apply filters through all your

reservations.


Confirmation Email

This is the confirmation email you will receive when a customer makes a reservation for your

establishment:

General details

Customer details

Reservation details: price, rooms, dates

Payment details: total price, how much the

customer has paid to HostelsClub.com, how

much is the balance to be paid in your default

currency.

The balance of stay will be paid to you directly by the client. There is no exchange of money

between HostelsClub.com and your institution.

NOTE: All bookings are confirmed by email. However, it is still very important to check your Back

Office regularly to see if you've received new bookings and to verify that your price and availability

is in order.


How to Recover Credit Card Details for No-Shows

You can recover the details of the credit card the client used to make the reservation in case they

no-show. Please note: ALWAYS write your cancellation policy in your description. You are not

allowed to charge any money to no-shows unless you have a clear cancellation policy in the

description.

Go to from the top bar.

Click on the eye symbol to see the reservation details.

Click on > GET CREDIT CARD DETAILS

You will now be asked to re-type your password, for security reasons.

PLEASE NOTE: you can only see the credit card details for 14 days after the expected arrival date.

It will not be possible to recover the details after this limit.


How Can I Modify My Page on Hostelsclub.com?

Updating your description, coordinates and facilities is a key factor for getting more bookings

through HostelsClub.com: our Advanced Research System allows the guest to look only for hotel

with certain facilities and/or near a certain place.

GPS Coordinates are the MOST important: if your coordinates are not confirmed and updated, your

establishment will not appear on HostelsClub.com.

Go to the Description Page from the Home page top bar.

In the right hand column you will see these options.

Click Modify to insert your property’s description and directions;

how to reach your establishment form train stations, airports,

main roads… in English.

Click Pictures to insert a maximum of 10 pictures of your

establishment.

Click Videos to insert a video of your property*.

Click Facilities to tick off the facilities you offer from a list.

Facilities are essential to your listing! (see above)

Note: if you want HostelsClub.com to send you group booking

requests, you have to tick the “Group bookings accepted” box.

Click Translate description to insert your description and

directions in other languages. This is not essential however the

more languages your property’s info is translated in the more

success you will have with our site.

Click Coordinates (geocoding) to confirm and update your GPS

Coordinates. GPS Coordinates are essential: if your coordinates are not confirmed and updated,

your establishment will not appear on HostelsClub.com.

*Please note: videos inserted here must be videos regarding your hostel, its features and/or how to

reach your hostel. Please do not insert videos of your city or any video not regarding your hostel.


How Can I Insert Restrictions On My Lisitng?

You can insert general restrictions: send an email to [email protected] to ask us to do it for you.

Minimum nights – restriction on reservations can be from 2 to 7 nights.

Maximum beds/night - limits the number of people for each reservation (can be between 4 and 20

people).

Weekend restriction – The weekend restriction allows you to choose what constitutes a weekend.

Please note that this restriction is for your entire listing and cannot be changed for different dates.

There are 2 parts to this restriction. Choose one of the following:

No (No restriction applies) - This is the system default.

Yes -> Friday and Saturday nights must be booked together (Sunday checkout)

Yes -> Saturday and Sunday nights must be booked together (Monday checkout)

Yes -> Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights must be booked together (Monday

checkout)

Weekend option (rigid or flexible) - This option activates exceptions to the weekend restriction so

that you do not deter clients wishing to make a long reservation if their dates do not comply with

the weekend restriction chosen. Choose one of the following:

Strict (no exceptions allowed)

2 nights flexible (allow exceptions for reservations of 2 or more nights)





7 nights flexible (allow exceptions for reservations of 7 nights)

Contiguity restriction – whether you accept or not reservation periods with gaps.



How Can I Insert Minimum Stays for Certain Periods?

To activate a period restriction, please send an email to [email protected] with the following

information:

Restriction name - for example: Carnival, Easter, Summer.

Date from: dd/mm/yy

Date to: dd/mm/yy

You can choose your minimum stay from the following options:

Strict

2 nights minimum stay






The strict option means that every day in the date range must be booked. This can only be used in

conjunction with date periods of 7 nights or less. You will find this option useful if you have a

package available for a certain period or require bookings to have a minimal stay for holiday

season.


How Does Hostelsclub.com Group Booking Work?

From the Groups section in your back office, you can set the parameters for group

requests that will be forwarded to your establishment. If you do NOT want to receive Group Booking

requests from HostelsClub.com , click in the right column.

Setting filters is extremely important to avoid receiving requests that you can’t take.

Here you can set the minimum and maximum

number of members that a group can have. You

will not receive any requests for groups larger than

the top limit you set or smaller than the bottom

limit you set.

Here you can set the minimum price per person -

the customers will not see this info (you are free to

offer a higher price), but requests with a maximum

price that is lower than you minimum price will not

be forwarded to you.

This is how long your offer will be available for the

clients - in this case, if they do not reply within 48

hours, your offer is no longer valid.

In this section, you can choose which kind of

groups you are willing to accept – uncheck a box

if you do NOT want a particular kind of group:

request from kind of groups that you do not

accept will not be forwarded to you.

In this section, you can choose which age

restrictions apply to groups for your property.

Requests from kind of groups that you do not

accept will not be forwarded to you.

Here you can inform the customers about your

payment policy – deposits, deadlines…


How do I reply to a Group booking request?

From the back office home page, click “view” to see the request details: on the next page you will

see the number of guests, their age, the number and kind of

rooms they request (and if they prefer private bathroom), the

maximum price per person and any message the have sent

you.

Click “Send Offer” , in the top right corner of

the page, to reply to the request with your bid, or click

“Refuse request” if you are not interested.

In the next page you will be able to make your offer, specifying:

Total price for the whole stay (this MUST include HostelsClub.com’s 10% commission, as it will be

calculated automatically by the system, based on the number you entered here). Prices should be

inserted as follows: no separator for thousands, . as separator for decimals and no currency symbol

– the price will be inserted in your default currency. 5135.55 is a price entered the right way,

5,135.55 is wrong and 5135.55€ is wrong as well.

Bid validity – how long your offer will be valid after you submit it.

Number of rooms offered. If you are offering shared rooms, please specify in the “Notes” section

how many beds do the rooms have.

Notes – any message you want to send to the customer.

Payment conditions – your default payment conditions will appear here, but you can edit them for

any group.

Click on to send your offer to the customer. You will receive an email and a

back office notification whenever a customer replies to an offer you made: you will be able to reply

to these messages until the customer decides to book: they will pay our 10% by credit card, and

you will then receive all their contact details.

To modify your bid, please go to your back office home page, click on “View all group requests”,

click on the eye symbol next to the bid you want to edit. Then click “View bid” in the right column,

then “Withdraw bid” and finally “Back to request to send a new bid”.

From the same page, you can also renew your bid, in case it has expired.


Checking Your Statistics

From the stats page in your Back Office you will be able to see

Number of reservations per month: how many reservations you received through the

HostelsClub.com network each month.

Gross revenue per month: how much you earned from the bookings received through the

HostelsClub.com network.

Percentage of reservations by site: how many reservations were sent to you by

HostelsClub.com and by our affiliates.

Share of revenue by site: how the gross revenue of the reservations received through the

HostelsClub.com network is divided between HostelsClub.com and our affiliates network.

Availability graph: your availability for the upcoming month – this is the same graph you

can see on the Back Office home page.

Your Ratings

To check your ratings go to Ratings from the top bar.

Here you can see all the ratings left by your past clients on HostelsClub.com.

These ratings are visible to all the visitors on our website.

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/stat.php

https://www.hostelsclub.com/admin/stat.php?mod=rev


The Booking Interface

HostelsClub.com offers a booking engine service.

The booking engine is a booking form on your website, for your property only: visitors to your

website will no longer have to send you an email and wait for your reply, and more importantly

YOU will save the time you now use for replying to their emails.

The booking engine is a real-time secure way to receive reservations through your own website,

and it is extremely convenient for you for many reasons:

Reduced commission: HostelsClub.com only keeps a 2.5% commission for reservations made

on your website through the booking engine: the client pays 10% of the total amount, but

we will send you 7.5% and just keep 2.5%, to cover credit card transfer expenses.

You save time: no more replying to emails asking for a reservation.

It is active 24/7: even a customer from a different time zone can make a certified

reservation on your website in a few minutes.

No more reservations from your website without a verified credit card number.

The booking engine works with the same prices and availability you set on HostelsClub.com

– so absolutely no more work for you!

It is fully customizable to the look and feel of your website.

Is implementing the booking engine hard? Not at all: you only have to insert a link on your website!

You will see the link in your Back Office.

From the booking interface page you can

Configure booking interface – You can personalize the colors, pictures font and logos which

appear on your personal booking interface, and add extra HTML tags to further customize the

interface.

URL code for interface – Allows you to set up a special URL code for your link, to be used in the link

instead of the ID number. This URL code can even be your site's domain name.

View payment center – See how many reservations you received through your booking engine,

how much money HostelsClub.com owes you and how much we have already sent you.

hostelsclub manual v2-4 en

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