3 Common Pitfalls of Booking Group Lodging (and How to Avoid Them)
When you’re planning business travel for yourself, you might find it easy to book the right hotel for the right price.
But when you’re organizing a business trip for a large group, it’s a whole other ball game. There’s lots to think about and lots to organize. This can translate into lots of stress.
So, what can you do to streamline and simplify the process of group bookings?
In this article, we’ll outline the common pitfalls of group bookings – and how to avoid them.
Common problems with business travel group bookings
Problem #1 – Finding a hotel that’s big enough to accommodate your entire team
When you’re booking a stay for a large group, you can struggle to find a hotel with enough rooms for everyone. You might also struggle to find enough rooms of the right type.
This particular group booking headache gets worse when there are limited hotels available – either because your team is traveling to a rural destination or because they’re traveling at a particularly busy time of year.
Problem #2 – Getting rooms for a fair price
Costs can quickly mount when you’re arranging business travel group bookings. You need to find hotel rooms at rates that don’t break your budget.
When booking for a large group, off the shelf rates are almost always too expensive. This means you have to go through the time-consuming process of negotiating with individual hotels to agree on a set price. You’ll often have to negotiate any perks as well – including free wifi, parking, breakfast, etc.
Problem #3 – Planning and keeping track of payments
The next hassle – arranging payment for big group bookings. This is complicated further if different personnel come and go from hotel rooms throughout the duration of a project.
Some hotels fail to provide business travel managers with easy payment options, meaning you spend an unnecessary amount of time just paying your company’s hotel bills.
That’s precious time that could be much better spent elsewhere.
The key takeaway: Planning business travel group bookings can be time-consuming, expensive and stressful. But, there is another way…
Managing group bookings with Hotel Engine
Hotel Engine is a hotel booking platform made for businesses. We help you find hotels at great prices, and provide a suite of powerful travel, reporting, and analysis tools too.
We also offer a wide range of services for members planning group or project hotel stays.
So, what can you expect from the Hotel Engine experience?
How does Hotel Engine work?
Hotel Engine members can search, book and manage business hotel reservations with ease. They can also keep a close eye on their travel trends and spend over time.
If your company has multiple employees all needing to arrange travel, you can simply assign them their own login. Based upon the travel policies you’ve inputted, they can then book hotel rooms for themselves within set budget parameters.
You’ll get a single bill for all your bookings each month, which you can pay in one monthly lump sum.
Sometimes, however, you need a little extra support. This is where the Hotel Engine Project Services team comes into their own.
Key benefits of booking group travel with Hotel Engine
You’ll get the best rates
If you’re planning a project or trip where you’ll need more than nine rooms, let our Project Services team do the hard work for you. They take your group booking requirements and negotiate with hotels to get the best possible group rates.
However big your team and however small your budget, we will find the ideal hotel booking solution for your group stay. And the best part? This service comes at no charge for Hotel Engine members.
You’ll find it easy to pay
We won’t send you invoice after invoice. Instead, the Hotel Engine team spends time reconciling all your group hotel bills and additional expenses.
We’ll then send this to you in one clean and easy to understand invoice at the end of the month. Simple!
You’ll get great support
Need to make an amendment to your booking? Or just want to clarify your reservation details? Our team is on hand 24/7 to answer your questions and make booking changes.
If you frequently make group bookings through us, we’ll also assign you a dedicated Account Manager. This hotel booking pro will learn the needs of your company inside out and provide truly tailored support.
You’ll work with group booking experts
You’ve probably already gathered that our Project Services team are pretty excellent at what they do.
They’re experts in the hotel industry and always know how to make your group bookings go without a hitch.
We’ve provided group lodging for:
- Construction crews
- Project-based stays
- Conferences and trade shows
- Group business meetings
- Company events
- Professional trainings
- Temporary and long-term staffing solutions
We’ve also arranged hotel accommodation for emergency response management and disaster relief companies. Our easy reporting and exporting feature even makes it easy for you to be quickly repaid by FEMA.
Whatever your group booking needs, we’re confident that we can provide accommodation that meets your requirements as well as an all-round exemplary booking experience.
You’ll save time
Let Hotel Engine take care of your group booking headaches and you’ll save a ton of time.
You won’t have to search for hotels. You won’t have to negotiate rates. You won’t have to pay multiple invoices each month.
That’s a heap of time you can put into other business initiatives, much more deserving of your time and attention.
Ready to let Hotel Engine manage your business travel group bookings?
The Hotel Engine platform is completely free to use. We don’t make you sign a contract and we don’t charge any fees. You can use us as much or as little as you like.
This goes for group bookings too! Whether you want to book one room or 100, the Hotel Engine Project Services team is ready and waiting to lend a hand.
Just fill in our group booking request form. Tell us your destination, required number of rooms and your budget, and we’ll get back to you with hotel options.
Audrey Fairbrother is the Content and SEO Manager at Hotel Engine. She spends her days writing about all things business travel, researching topics that are important to Hotel Engine’s audience and cultivating the company’s brand voice. When she’s not working, Audrey enjoys spending time with her family, and hiking in the nearby Rockies with her dog, Albie.
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