Forecasting Room Availability
Front office managers do this as short-term
planning to know the number of rooms
available for future reservation
It helps to manage the room inventory
effectively as the number of rooms are fixed
The forecasted availability and occupancy
numbers are important to the daily operations
It is the foundation for making room pricing
decisions, set room aside for OOO for
maintenance or deep cleaning as well as for HR
planning for the entire room & food division
Forecasting Room Availability
Skill of forecasting is complex and can be
acquired through experience, effective
recordkeeping and accurate counting methods
Following types of information can be helpful
in room availability forecasting:
•A thorough knowledge of the hotel and its
surrounding area
•Market profiles of the constituencies the hotel
serves
•Occupancy data for the past several months and for
the same period of the previous year
Forecasting Room Availability
•Reservation trends and a history of reservation lead
times (how far in advance)
•A listing of special events scheduled in the
surrounding geographic area
•Business and historical profiles of specific groups
booked for the forecast dates
•The number of non-guaranteed and guaranteed
reservation and an estimate of the number of
expected no shows
•The percentage of rooms are already reserved and
the cut-off date for group room blocks held for the
forecast dates
Forecasting Room Availability
•The room availability of the most important
competing hotels for the forecast dates (as
discovered by blind calls)
•The impact of citywide or multi-hotel groups and
their potential influence on the forecast dates
•Plans for remodeling or renovating the hotel that
would change the number of available rooms
•Construction or renovating plans for competitive
hotels in the area
Forecasting Data
•The process of forecasting room availability generally
relies on historical occupancy data.
•To facilitate forecasting, the following daily
occupancy data should be collected:
•No. of expected room arrivals
•No. of expected room walk-ins
•No. of expected room stayovers (rooms occupied on previous
nights that’ll continue to be occupied for the night in question)
•No. of expected room no-shows
•No. of expected room understays
•No. of expected room check-outs
•No. of expected room overstays
Forecasting Data
•Percentage of No-Shows =
Number of The process of No-Shows
Number of Room Reservations
•Percentage of Walk-Ins =
Number of Room Walk-Ins
Total Number of Room Arrivals
Forecasting Data
•Percentage of Over-Stays =
Number of Over-stay Rooms
Number of Expected Check-Outs
•Percentage of Under-stays =
Number of Under-stay Rooms
Number of Expected Check-Outs
Forecast Formula
Number of Rooms Available for Sale
Total No. of Guestrooms
- No. of OOO Rooms
- No. of Room Stayovers
- No. of Room Reservations
+ No. of Room Reservations × % of No-Shows
+ No of Room Understays
- Number of Room Overstays
_______________________________________
Number of Rooms Available for Sale
Establishing Overstays & Understays
Understay rooms represent permanently lost
room revenue
Overstays may boost room revenues. It is a boon
when the hotel is not operating at full capacity
In order to regulate both, front office staff should:
•Confirm or reconfirm guest’s DOD at registration
•Present an alternate guestroom reservation form to
registered guest to overstay guests
•Review guest history
•Contact potential overstay guests, especially those who
have not left by check-out time
Forecast Formula
Yak & Yeti, a 120 room property, where on April 1
there are 03 Out of Order (OOO) and 55 stayovers.
On that day there are 40 guests with reservation
scheduled to arrive. Since the % of no show has
been recently calculated at 20%
The FOM therefore calculates that as many as 08
guests with reservations may not arrive
Based on historical data, 6 understays and 15
overstays are also expected.
The No. of rooms projected to be available for
sale on Dec. 01 can be determined as follows:
Forecast Formula
Number of Rooms Available for Sale
Total No. of Guestrooms
120
- No. of OOO Rooms
3
- No. of Room Stayovers
55
- No. of Room Reservations
40
+ No. of Room Reservations × % of No-Shows + 8
+ No of Room Understays
+6
- No of Room Overstays
-15
_________________________________________
Number of Rooms Available for Sale
21
Forecast Formula
Understay rooms represent permanently lost
room revenue
Overstays may boost room revenues. It is a boon
when the hotel is not operating at full capacity
In order to regulate both, front office staff should:
•Confirm or reconfirm guest’s DOD at registration
•Present an alternate guestroom reservation form to
registered guest
•Review guest history
•Contact potential overstay guests, especially those who
have not left by check-out time