We tell you what we've been up to and what's coming up next. GuestPro Style.
We have recently put into production a new version of our hotel management platform, GuestPro V2. This release is the culmination of two intense years of learning, development and strategy in the hotel technology space.
Our company had no previous experience in hotel management systems, so the learning we have accumulated since we launched V1 has been very important. During this time, we have detected needs, we have worked with the main APIs in the sector (Booking.com, OTA, GHA...), but, above all, we have talked to many hotels and holiday rental companies, lots of them.
Little by little, during this process, we have been modelling a new product concept, the platform, for which we saw that a change of architecture was necessary, and it was then that we started working on V2. The work has not yet been completed (it would never be completed) and, nevertheless, we believe that it is now one of the most advanced tools in the sector and, above all, that we have laid a very powerful foundation on which to continue moving forward.
The Whin platform
Whin is a vertical, modular and open system for the accommodation sector. In other words, a single system for direct sales, distribution control, booking and customer management.
This model aims to solve the biggest technological problem facing the accommodation sector: the multiplicity of suppliers, and the problems associated with it, such as connection difficulties, duplicity or lack of data integrity, lack of definition of which player should be in charge of which tasks, manual work by hotel staff, "tennis matches" between different suppliers, slow and expensive operations, etc.
Whin V2 aims to be the most advanced hotel management system on the market, a new evolution. This is why, unlike classic cloud PMSs, it has been designed from a modular point of view: Whin can be a PMS, a Booking Engine, a Channel Manager, a CRM, a Call Centre or a CRS, depending on the needs of the client or the "role" assigned to the user who connects to the application.
In the platform model, bookings do not travel from one application to another, information is not diluted in the process and any changes made are reflected throughout the platform. In short, a "single source of truth", where all the technological tools that a hosting company needs are connected.
Whin V2 architecture
API-first model. User roles and activity logging
With V2 we have taken the API-first architecture to the ultimate extreme. Everything is APIs, even internally, there are no database queries, only APIs. All user and application activity is logged. There is much more control over the level of access to each resource, and all information can be read and written by third party applications.
For practical purposes, this allows us to:
- Establish different user permissions within the application (roles).
- Further facilitate integration with third party applications.
- Increased security thanks to activity logging
- At a commercial level, it allows us to market the different modules independently, according to the client's needs.
Policies: deposits, penalties and charges
Every tariff is associated with a policy and this policy allows us to calculate the amounts, deposit deadlines and penalties. Thanks to this, we can launch automations, both for payments and e-mails.
This allows us to:
- Automatically validate the cards once we receive the bookings.
- Charge the deposit if applicable
- Charge penalties at the precise date and time.
Obviously, for this it is necessary to work under PCI-DSS regulations and to have a POS configured for webservice operation with card not present. Of course, we advise our clients to be able to work under these conditions with their current bank and the same virtual POS (so it is not necessary to pay more commission).
Supplements
The big dilemma with V2 was what to do with them. Channels and Channel Manager don't support them, so we were determined to eliminate them, but hoteliers love them (nobody likes having to work with 100+ rates).
Our solution has been an in-between design that takes the best of each model where the supplements are rates, but:
- The price of the supplement is unbundled and independent of the room rate, as the rate is a combination of parent rate + supplement.
- The price and restrictions are completely dependent on the parent, so these are "virtual rates" that do not even need to be controlled in the inventory.
This allows us to:
- Break down the price of bookings coming in from all channels.
- Break down the amounts on invoices for accounting or ERP purposes
- Control room rate and supplements independently (supplement calendar, e.g. weekends, seasonal changes)
Calendar of quotas and guarantees
One of the most "curious" problems we have encountered is the way hotels, especially those working with guarantees, keep track of their actual availability. We have not found any PMS that helps hoteliers particularly well. We have found a few tweaks, such as Excel macros, but, as in the case of card automation, it is all very rudimentary.
With Whin V2, we have introduced a new calendar of quotas and guarantees, which allows hoteliers to have a precise visual control of the actual availability of the hotel. Guaranteed rooms are subtracted from the online availability and can be easily limited with a quota to certain channels.
New integrations
We will soon announce the availability of a new integration with SiteMinder, SiteMinder Exchange. This will be the third integration we have developed with them and will allow us to offer our automation platform to all customers of the popular Channel Manager, regardless of the booking engine or PMS they use. We also expect to announce Google Hotel Ads and Trivago shortly.
A new booking API specification
The new specification has a better design which makes it much more powerful and yet very easy to use. It has been the most technically challenging change because it meant completely rebuilding our booking database. With the new specification, we have completely redesigned the type of operations that can be performed, resulting in a very comfortable API to work with at the development level.
In practical terms, this allows us to
- Better usability and user experience
- Ease of integration with third party applications
New search API (engine)
And last but not least, our new search API. This is the API that powers our booking engines and, in the new version, offers unprecedented versatility. For the first time, we will have a multi-channel search API, which means we can create different engines for each hotel. For example, the web booking engine, the agency booking engine, the metasearch engine or the call centre booking engine.
As in the case of the booking API, the new specification is better designed, more powerful and more comfortable to work with.
Among the new features we highlight the rate-mix and room-mix (reservations with room change) and, above all, the personalisation of the offer for registered users.
The new engine makes it possible to create exclusive rates, discounts and extras based on customer ratings using tags.
We have only taken the first step on a long road.
With all the new features, we have the feeling that we are only at the beginning of the road we want to travel. Two years later and we are just beginning.
Our goal is to keep learning, keep improving and keep moving forward. The road is not easy, but from the feedback we receive, it is very gratifying. We don't sell smoke or hype, we sell real solutions to our clients' critical problems. And now we do it from a 360º perspective, so the benefits we bring to our clients are even greater.
"Money Talks, Bullshit Walks.
Whin Style.
