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# OpenStays Private Limited: Direct Booking Engine

## Sitemaps
[XML Sitemap](https://openstays.org/sitemap_index.xml): Includes all crawlable and indexable pages.

## Posts
- [Why Do Hotels Fail in India? The Honest Reasons Nobody Talks About](https://openstays.org/blog/why-do-hotels-fail-in-india/): Why do hotels fail in India? Lease maths, compliance and staff costs that don’t shrink with size, borrowed demand, and the off-season, the honest list.
- [Do Google Reviews Really Matter for Hotels?](https://openstays.org/blog/do-google-reviews-matter-for-hotels/): Do Google reviews matter for hotels? Yes, in India more than anywhere. What the stars actually decide, how unfair reviews work, and why replies matter.
- [Should Hotels Take Advance Payment from Guests?](https://openstays.org/blog/should-hotels-take-advance-payment/): Should hotels take advance payment from guests? An honest, owner-side answer for Indian properties, no-show maths, UPI, refunds, and how much to ask.
- [The Disadvantages of OTA for Hotels That Only Show Up After a Year](https://openstays.org/blog/disadvantages-of-ota-for-hotels/): The disadvantages of OTA for hotels rarely show up in month one. Commission creep, rented guests, rate parity, an honest look at what listings truly cost.
- [Why Guests Remember Homestays](https://openstays.org/blog/why-guests-remember-homestays/): A homestay is remembered for its people, not its rooms. Why the personal touch is your strongest business advantage, and how to protect it.
- [Upcoming Changes to WhatsApp Business API Pricing from October 2026](https://openstays.org/blog/upcoming-changes-whatsapp-business-api-pricing-october-2026/): It is 11pm and a guest is asking your WhatsApp assistant whether hot water will be ready before a 6am checkout. The reply goes out in seconds, the booking stays confirmed, and nobody at the property had to wake up to type it. That quiet, instant reply is WhatsApp Business API pricing at work in the background, and sometime this year, most hosts using it will notice a small new line on the bill they had not seen before.
- [We will be discovering Chikkamagaluru](https://openstays.org/blog/discover-chikkamagaluru/): We’re thrilled to share that the OpenStays team is heading to the beautiful hills of Chikkamagaluru this June for the “Discover Chikkamagaluru” event, organized by the Karnataka Tourism Society in association with the Chikkamagaluru Resort Owners Association and Hotel Owners Association.

## Pages
- [OpenStays vs. Every Other Way to Take Bookings](https://openstays.org/compare/): SEE THE FULL PICTURE
- [Direct Booking vs OTAs: What Commission Actually Costs You](https://openstays.org/compare/direct-booking-vs-otas/): DIRECT BOOKING VS OTAS
- [iCal Sync vs a Channel Manager: Which Does Your Property Need?](https://openstays.org/compare/ical-vs-channel-manager/): ICAL SYNC VS A CHANNEL MANAGER
- [GST Composition Scheme for Small Hotels and Homestays](https://openstays.org/resources/gst-composition-scheme/): If you run a small hotel or homestay, you have almost certainly heard of the GST composition scheme from a chartered accountant, a fellow host, or a WhatsApp forward promising "flat 1% tax, no headache." The pitch is simple: pay a small fixed percentage of turnover, skip the monthly filing grind, and stop worrying about input tax credit calculations. For a trader selling goods out of a small shop, that pitch is often true. For a hotel or homestay taking room bookings, the real answer to "can I use the GST composition scheme" is more layered than most of that WhatsApp advice lets on, and getting it wrong can mean a notice from the department months after you have already filed a year of returns under the wrong scheme. This guide walks through what the GST composition scheme actually allows for hospitality businesses in India, where it genuinely applies, where it does not, and what a realistic decision looks like for a property your size.
- [Hotel Cancellation and No-Show Policy: What Indian Law Allows](https://openstays.org/resources/hotel-cancellation-policy/): A hotel cancellation policy that says "100% non-refundable, no exceptions" feels simple to enforce, until a guest disputes it in a consumer forum, on a public review, or over WhatsApp, and you discover the clause may not actually hold up. Indian law does not ban cancellation charges or no-show fees. It does something more specific: it requires that whatever you retain actually reflects your genuine loss, that you apply the same standard to yourself when you cancel on a guest, and that the terms were disclosed honestly before the guest paid. Most independent properties get this roughly right in practice and wrong on paper, which is exactly the gap that turns an ordinary cancellation into an avoidable dispute.
- [AI-Bookable Hotels: A Readiness Guide](https://openstays.org/resources/ai-bookable-hotels/): AI-bookable hotels became a live reality on 27 August 2026, when Google began rolling out hotel booking directly inside AI Mode in Search. A traveller can now research, compare and book a room without ever clicking through to a hotel website or an OTA listing, the whole transaction happens inside the chat, backed by Google Pay. Ten major chains and online travel platforms were the first to be connected. It is currently limited to the United States, and it is currently limited to large chains and the biggest global booking platforms, but the direction is unmistakable. ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini can already research and, in a growing number of cases, complete a hotel booking on a traveller's behalf. Independent hotels, homestays and resorts in India are not part of this first wave, and that is exactly why this is the right moment to prepare rather than the moment to worry.
- [AI Agent Hotel Bookings](https://openstays.org/product/ai-agent-hotel-bookings/): AI agent hotel bookings let a guest’s own AI assistant check your real availability and complete a booking directly with you, no OTA in between, while the same connection opens your property to the OpenStays partner program so other AI apps can find and book you too.
- [WhatsApp Coexistence](https://openstays.org/product/whatsapp-coexistence/): WhatsApp coexistence lets your property run the ordinary WhatsApp Business app and OpenStays’ automation on the exact same number at the same time, so nothing about the number guests already message, save, and trust has to change.
- [Enquiry Management Software](https://openstays.org/product/enquiry-management-software/): Enquiry management software pulls every enquiry from WhatsApp, your website, phone calls and walk-ins into one list, gives each one a status and an owner, and reminds someone to follow up before it goes cold.
- [Why Is My Hotel Not Getting Bookings?](https://openstays.org/resources/why-is-my-hotel-not-getting-bookings/): There is rarely one single reason a homestay, hotel or resort suddenly stops getting the bookings it used to get. Most owners check one thing, usually the room rate, and stop there. But a property with a fair rate can still sit empty because guests never see the listing, or see it and do not trust it, or message on WhatsApp and wait four hours for a reply, or find the dates wrongly blocked on the calendar.
- [Rate Parity Strategy for Hotels](https://openstays.org/resources/rate-parity-strategy-for-hotels/): A rate parity strategy is easy to set up and then forget about. Tracking a small set of numbers every quarter is what turns it into an ongoing source of margin rather than a one-time exercise.
- [TDS on Hotel Room Rent](https://openstays.org/resources/tds-on-hotel-room-rent/): TDS on hotel room rent is narrower than most property owners assume. It only applies when a business or professional payer of a certain kind takes your rooms on a regular basis, meaning specific rooms are reserved under an agreement, and its payments to your property cross ₹50,000 in a month. When that happens, 10% TDS applies under Section 393(1), Table Serial Number 2, of the Income Tax Act, 2025, the provision that replaced the old Section 194-I from 1 April 2026.
- [WhatsApp Response & Conversion Reports](https://openstays.org/product/whatsapp-response-and-conversion-reports/): Response and conversion reports show how fast enquiries actually get answered, how many turn into bookings, and where in the conversation guests are dropping off, instead of a general sense that WhatsApp is going fine.
- [WhatsApp AI Upsells](https://openstays.org/product/whatsapp-ai-upsells/): WhatsApp AI upsells let a guest browse and book add-ons like breakfast, late checkout, a spa slot or an airport pickup right inside the same chat, priced and billed automatically, without anyone at the property having to ask.
- [WhatsApp Remote Check-In](https://openstays.org/product/whatsapp-remote-check-in/): Remote check-in lets a guest send their ID and confirm your house rules over WhatsApp before they arrive, so the front desk becomes a key handover instead of a paperwork queue.
- [Resort Booking Software](https://openstays.org/product/resort-booking-software/): A resort rarely sells a single room to a single guest. It sells a package, a cottage or a villa, a meal plan, an activity add-on, priced per person, to a group of six or sixteen who all want an answer before the long weekend fills up elsewhere. Resort booking software is what runs that whole flow, enquiry, package quote, group negotiation, advance, guest ID for every name in the group, from one connected stack rather than a patchwork of tools built for a single hotel room.
- [Hotel Upselling: How to Increase Revenue Without Raising Room Rates](https://openstays.org/resources/hotel-upselling-guide/): Most independent hotels and homestays in India try to grow revenue the same way: by changing the room rate. Raise it in peak season, lower it in the off season, match the competitor down the road. It works, but it is only one lever, and it is the lever every OTA listing and every rate-comparison site is watching. Push it too hard and you either price yourself out of bookings or train your regular guests to wait for a discount.
- [Travel Agent Discounts](https://openstays.org/product/travel-agent-discounts/): Travel agent discounts, tracked properly, mean every agent gets the rate you actually agreed on, every booking they send is tagged back to them automatically, and you can finally see which relationships are worth keeping.
- [Revenue and Occupancy Reports](https://openstays.org/product/revenue-and-occupancy-reports/): The dashboard shows today’s numbers. Revenue and occupancy reports show last month’s, broken down by room type, compared against the month before, and checked against what actually reached your bank account.
- [Seasonal Pricing for Hotels: How Much to Raise (and Lower) Your Rates](https://openstays.org/resources/seasonal-pricing-for-hotels/): In February 2026, as the India AI Impact Summit brought thousands of delegates to Delhi, a suite at the Taj Palace that normally listed for around ₹90,000 a night was quoted at roughly ₹25 lakh. Base rooms at The Oberoi reportedly jumped from about ₹1 lakh to ₹5.6 lakh. Within days, a LocalCircles survey of over 34,000 people found that 71% wanted a cap on hotel room rates during peak demand, and 74% wanted the government to step in.
- [Staff Logins with Roles](https://openstays.org/product/staff-logins-with-roles/): Properties that reach for staff logins with roles usually do so after the first time this actually causes a problem, not before. That is understandable, setting up separate logins feels like extra admin when the team is small and everyone is trusted. The cost of skipping it simply stays invisible until the exact week it stops being invisible, usually the busiest week of the year, when three people are covering shifts and something goes wrong that nobody can trace.
- [Per Room vs Per Person Pricing: Which Should Your Property Use?](https://openstays.org/resources/per-room-vs-per-person-pricing/): If you are setting up rates for a new property, or rethinking pricing on an existing one, this is one of the first structural decisions you will make: do you charge one price for the room, or a price per guest staying in it? Our recommendation, and the practice used by the overwhelming majority of hotels, homestays and resorts worldwide, is to charge per room, with a modest additional charge for guests beyond a set base occupancy, rather than multiplying your rate by the number of people in the room.
- [Multi-Property Management for Groups & Chains](https://openstays.org/product/multi-property-management/): Running three properties should not mean three separate logins, three WhatsApp numbers to check, and three sets of rates to update by hand. Multi-property management is what lets an owner or a small operations team see every property, every reservation and every guest conversation from a single account, without pretending a group is just one big property.
- [Guest CRM](https://openstays.org/product/guest-crm/): A guest who has stayed with you three times deserves to be recognised on the fourth, not asked the same questions again from scratch. A guest CRM is what quietly builds that memory, turning every booking, every WhatsApp conversation and every preference mentioned in passing into a profile the next conversation can draw on automatically.
- [Online Hotel Reservation System](https://openstays.org/product/online-hotel-reservation-system/): A booking is not finished the moment a guest pays. It is pending, then confirmed, then checked in, then checked out, and sometimes modified, cancelled or a no-show along the way. An online hotel reservation system is what tracks that whole lifecycle, for every booking, regardless of whether it arrived through an OTA, WhatsApp, your own booking link, or a phone call.
- [Hotel Booking Software](https://openstays.org/product/hotel-booking-software/): Hotel booking software should not mean five separate logins that quietly disagree with each other. OpenStays runs the booking engine, the WhatsApp AI concierge, room and rate setup, the occupancy calendar, rate negotiation and guest ID compliance on one account, so a rate change made once is correct everywhere a guest might see it.
- [Unmarried Couples in Hotels: What Indian Law Actually Says](https://openstays.org/resources/unmarried-couples-in-hotels-india-law/): No Indian law, state or national, prohibits two consenting adults from checking into a hotel room together, married or not. That is the direct answer. What makes this a recurring source of confusion for both guests and properties is that the law is settled while everyday practice is not: some hotels have informal policies that go further than anything the law requires, some front-desk staff apply personal judgement inconsistently, and a small number of well-publicised incidents involving local police or self-appointed "moral policing" groups have made the topic feel legally murkier than it actually is.
- [Get More Bookings for Your Property](https://openstays.org/get-bookings/): FOR HOMESTAYS, HOTELS & RESORTS
- [Hotel Star Rating Criteria in India](https://openstays.org/resources/hotel-star-rating-criteria-in-india/): A hotel's ‘star rating’ in India usually means one of two very different things: the official government classification issued by a Ministry of Tourism committee, or an informal number a guest sees on Google, an OTA listing, or a review site. This page is about the first one, the official classification system, what the different star categories actually require, who administers it, and how to apply.
- [GST Invoice Format for Hotels](https://openstays.org/resources/gst-invoice-format-for-hotels/): A GST invoice is not just a receipt for a guest's stay. It is a legal tax document, and if it is missing a mandatory field or shows the wrong tax rate, it can cost you an ₹25,000 penalty per invoice and cost your corporate guest their input tax credit claim. This guide covers the invoice format itself: the fields a compliant GST invoice needs, the tax rates and HSN/SAC codes that apply to a hotel bill, and a free downloadable template you can start using today.
- [Guest Feedback Form for Homestays, Hotels and Resorts](https://openstays.org/resources/guest-feedback-form-for-homestays-hotels-and-resorts/): A guest checks out, hands back the key, and you never hear from them again, until three weeks later when a two-star review shows up on Google with complaints you could have fixed on the spot. A simple guest feedback form closes that gap. It gives guests a private, low-friction way to tell you what went wrong (or right) before they decide whether to write a public review at all.
- [Occupancy Calendar for Hotels](https://openstays.org/product/occupancy-calendar-for-hotels/): Which rooms are booked tonight. Which are blocked for maintenance. Which are sitting open with nobody looking at them. An occupancy calendar for hotels puts every room against every date on one screen, so the answer is a glance rather than a search across three different places.
- [Room and Rate Plan Setup for Hotels](https://openstays.org/product/room-and-rate-plan-setup-for-hotels/): Every booking your property takes, on the website, over WhatsApp, through an OTA or by phone, depends on one thing being right first: a clear, accurate list of what rooms you have, what each one costs, and which rate plans apply to it. Room and rate plan setup for hotels is where that foundation gets built, once, correctly.
- [Seasonal Pricing for Hotels](https://openstays.org/product/seasonal-pricing-for-hotels/): Weekend rates, festival week markups, monsoon discounts and early bird pricing do not have to be changed by hand on every room, every date, every season. Seasonal pricing for hotels applies your own rules automatically, across every date they touch, the moment you set them.
- [Hotel Reservations Dashboard](https://openstays.org/product/hotel-reservations-dashboard/): Direct bookings, WhatsApp enquiries, agent bookings and manually entered OTA stays end up in a dozen different places. A hotel reservations dashboard puts every reservation, every pending request and every rupee of revenue on one screen, updated the moment something changes.
- [Automated Guest Messaging](https://openstays.org/product/automated-guest-messaging/): The reminder that never gets sent, the ID request nobody follows up on, the review ask that only happens if someone remembers. Automated guest messaging for hotels sends every one of them on time, for every booking, without a task list.
- [AI WhatsApp Concierge](https://openstays.org/product/ai-whatsapp-concierge/): Guests message from the room, not just before they book. An AI WhatsApp concierge for hotels answers wifi, checkout and local questions in seconds, any hour, without anyone standing at a desk.
- [Metasearch](https://openstays.org/glossary/metasearch/): Metasearch compares room rates across OTAs, wholesalers, and direct booking on one screen. Here is what it means, how to get started, and how it connects to rate parity.
- [Late Check-Out](https://openstays.org/glossary/late-check-out/): Late check-out means keeping a room past standard check-out time. Here is what it means, how to manage requests without disrupting same-day turnover, and how to avoid the common mistakes.
- [Early Check-In](https://openstays.org/glossary/early-check-in/): Early check-in means handing over a room before standard check-in time. Here is what it means, how to manage requests without disrupting housekeeping, and how to avoid the common mistakes.
- [Gross Rate](https://openstays.org/glossary/gross-rate/): Gross rate is the full price a guest pays for a booking, before commission or markup is removed. Here is what it means, how it differs from net rate, and how to read it correctly.
- [Net Rate](https://openstays.org/glossary/net-rate/): Net rate is the amount a property actually receives after commission or markup is deducted. Here is what it means, how it differs from gross rate, and how to manage it with agents and wholesalers.
- [Non-Refundable Rate](https://openstays.org/glossary/non-refundable-rate/): A non-refundable rate is a discounted room rate a guest books in exchange for giving up cancellation rights. Here is how it works, why properties offer it, and how to structure one well.
- [Best Available Rate (BAR)](https://openstays.org/glossary/best-available-rate/): Best Available Rate (BAR) is the lowest publicly bookable rate for a room and date. Here is what it means, how it anchors every other rate, and how to manage it well.
- [Seasonal Pricing](https://openstays.org/glossary/seasonal-pricing/): Seasonal pricing means adjusting room rates for peak and off-peak periods. Here is how it works, how it differs from dynamic pricing, and common seasonal patterns for Indian properties.
- [Booking Window](https://openstays.org/glossary/booking-window/): Booking window is the gap between when a guest books and when they arrive. Here is how it works, why it matters for pricing, and how it varies by guest type in India.
- [Rate Parity](https://openstays.org/glossary/rate-parity/): Rate parity means offering the same room rate across every channel you sell on. Here is what it means, why OTAs enforce it, and how to maintain it without losing bookings.
- [Minimum Stay](https://openstays.org/glossary/minimum-stay/): Minimum stay is the shortest booking length a property will accept for given dates. Here is how it works, how it differs from length of stay, and how to set it without losing bookings.
- [Length of Stay](https://openstays.org/glossary/length-of-stay/): Length of stay measures how many nights guests actually book, and it quietly shapes pricing, staffing, and revenue strategy. Here is how it differs from a minimum stay policy, what drives it, and how to use it to price more profitably.
- [Corporate Booking](https://openstays.org/glossary/corporate-booking/): A corporate booking runs on a company account with a negotiated rate and agreed billing terms, whether it is one traveller or several. Here is how it differs from a group booking, how to handle GST invoicing correctly, and how to avoid the billing disputes that quietly kill corporate accounts.