In recent years the Internet has emerged as the biggest worldwide marketplace ever, accessible 24/7, from anywhere! Massive numbers of online tour operators and wholesalers have opened up the way toward online reservations. Online booking revenues have reached USD 54 billion in 2004, and are projected to rise to USD 70 billion in 2006, according to Jupiter Research. Surely no hotelier will want to be left behind!
The fact is that many travel websites are not yet powered by booking engines. Online reservations are more likely to be called "reservation requests" as they lack critical real-time information: rates and availability for the Internet user to view immediately. Several letters or phone calls must follow up the request – and the reservation may still not be made.
Let's not wait around passively, simply satisfied that our hotel's name is listed on numerous websites; we may be thinking that we are at least slowly building brand awareness, but we can still get left behind.
Pelican System, developer of hotel booking software, has been supporting hotels in order to be able to capture online reservations through a hotel's own website, and now proposes to assist hotels in embracing internet user reservations through other websites.
A hotel can now distribute as many links as possible to travel websites with no booking engines, so that a hotel is not only listed, but in addition an Internet user can now book rooms through that particular travel website. Pelican System will read which travel website the Internet User is generating a booking from.
This system is very convenient for all parties involved. Travel websites do not have to develop their own booking engines to be able to capture online reservations; guests are more likely to be satisfied when they are able to link directly to hotels. Hotels in turn do not have to hassle with paper contracts, and are able to capture online reservations instead of just listing information.
About Pelican System
Pelican is an Internet-based reservation system designed to manage all types of bookings, whether made directly by guests or through travel agents and corporate clients.
For Internet users (direct guests) Pelican will provide instant confirmation of reservations made through the hotel web site, and will notify the hotel' reservation department though automatically generated e-mail messages.
For travel agents and corporate clients Pelican offers a feature called "Online Contracting," which eliminates the need for paper-based, fixed-term contracts, allowing the hotel to set and adjust rates and allotments instantly according to seasonal period, special events, or unexpected demand.
For more information please visit
www.pelicansystem.com. Author:
Linda Husin
R&D Manager of Pelican System
linda@pelicansystem.com