Bed & Breakfast News Sept-Oct 2016 (#42) | Page 17

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Don’t use these parasites!
We refuse to use OTAs as we regard them
as parasites serving no useful purpose. As
a point of principle, we never accept any
booking without communicating with the
people wishing to stay with us.
If every B&B took the same attitude as us,
there would not be an OTA problem for the
B&B Industry.
Robert & Tricia W
But of course, very many members get
a significant (and growing) amount of
business from the OTAs – and some
have made a point of saying they do
not have a problem dealing with them
– for example:

I’ve found Booking.com
and Expedia helpful
I have to say that we have dumped
Laterooms (commission too high and
business model out of date) and Agoda
(no contact with guests, no arrival times
and too many cancellations).

I do not use TripConnect but advertise the
best rate is available on my own website at
TripAdvisor.
Our online links now are to Booking.com
and Expedia (Hotel Collect only). Both
of them allow me to instigate my own
cancellation policy. I also take a one night
deposit on all bookings through them and
have applied a 14 day cancellation policy
which I am flexible with if it suits me. My
Channel manager allows me to add a £10.00
supplement per room to all OTA rates and
though this doesn’t cover all of their 15% it
does help and hardly anyone notices.
We have few cancellations or no shows
from them and though we will lose some
business by taking the deposit I am happy
to take it. At the moment over 55 - 60% of
my business comes via repeat, telephone
or my own website. I have found Booking.
com and Expedia (to a lesser extent) very
helpful and have had none of the problems
I keep reading about on forums, perhaps
because I haven’t allowed the business to
be institutionalised by blindly following
their suggested booking model.
IH