Hotel Sales Blog

Hotel Revenue Management — Rate Parity

It seems that this issue is coming up again!  For those that are not familiar with the term, rate parity means displaying the same rate across all channels.  The reasons for this is not to undercut your own rates on other channels — this means that the consumer can be assured that they are getting the best rate for  your hotel no matter where they go to ‘buy’ you. It becomes an integrity and trust issue.

With group rates now trending higher than mid week corproate rates it is critically important that nothing appears on the web site or OTAs that would lead group attendees to book out of the block at lower rates.

This does not mean that packages that disguise the rate can’t be posted on the web site or OTAs.   It also doesn’t mean that you can’t post weekend deals that have fences that will protect a group booked at a higher rate.  For example, if you have a group checking out on a Saturday, make sure that any weekend package you have that covers that Friday has a 2 night minimum stay, Friday and Saturday, so group attendees won’t be tempted to check out on Friday and then book another room at the reduced weekend rate for Friday.

Merchant Agreement relationships will also be damaged if one OTA finds that you have a different (meaning lower) rate on another OTA.  This does not apply to the Opaque channels.

Lack of rate parity not only confuses and gives a bad impression of the hotel to the consumer, it is the best way I can think of to ’shoot yourself in the foot’ by undercutting yourself!

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