This article explains how to configure and use the Area Allocation Suggestion feature in RMS, which recommends the most suitable area to assign when making or modifying a reservation.

Area Allocation Suggestion is a feature in RMS that helps staff make informed decisions when manually assigning an Area to a reservation. Rather than relying on staff knowledge alone, the system ranks available areas based on revenue or area-night performance criteria you define, presenting the best option at the top of the selection list.

This helps properties distribute occupancy and revenue fairly across all areas, particularly when managing Owner Contracts where fair income distribution between owners matters.

How It Works

When a staff member assigns an area to a reservation, Area Allocation Suggestion ranks the available areas based on the criteria configured in Setup. Areas with the lowest recent revenue or fewest area nights (depending on your configuration) are ranked highest, so the system steers occupancy towards under-performing or lower-revenue areas first.

The ranking can be calculated using a configurable look-back and look-ahead window - for example, the 30 days before and after the reservation arrival - so the suggestion reflects recent and near-future performance rather than all-time figures.

If the staff member assigns an area that is not the top suggestion, RMS will prompt them to select a Reason for not following the suggestion. This creates an audit trail for management reporting.

Prerequisites

• Book by Category must be enabled on the property so that areas can be assigned separately from the reservation.
• You must have a Security Profile with access to Setup to configure the Area Allocation Suggestion options.

Setting Up Area Allocation Suggestion

1. In the side menu, go to the Area Suggestion setup screen.
2. In the Include Statistics From field, select how the system calculates the suggestion ranking:
   • Tariff Posted - Revenue or area nights are calculated using only posted tariff charges. This is the default.
   • Base Tariff - Revenue or area nights are calculated using the base tariff rate, regardless of what has been posted.
3. In the Allocation Priority (or similar) dropdown, select the basis for ranking:
   • Revenue by Number of Days - Areas are ranked by revenue earned within a defined look-back and look-ahead window. Areas with lower revenue in that window are suggested first.
   • Area Nights by Number of Days - Areas are ranked by the number of nights occupied within the defined window. Areas with fewer occupancy nights are suggested first.
4. When Revenue by Number of Days or Area Nights by Number of Days is selected, enter the number of days in the Before and After fields. These define how many days before and after the reservation arrival date the system uses when calculating the area's performance.
   • For example, entering 30 in both fields means the system looks at each area's revenue or area nights from 30 days before to 30 days after the reservation arrival date.
5. Use the tick boxes to include or exclude specific reservation types from the calculation:
   • Include Owner Stays - When ticked, reservations for owner stays are included in the revenue or area-night count used to rank areas.
   • Include FOC Reservations - When ticked, free-of-charge (FOC) reservations are included in the calculation.
6. Save the settings.

Using Area Allocation Suggestion

Once configured, Area Allocation Suggestion works automatically whenever a staff member assigns an area to a reservation manually.

1. Open a reservation that needs an area assigned.
2. Select the area assignment field on the reservation.
3. The system displays available areas ranked in order of suggestion. The area ranked first is the one with the lowest revenue or fewest area nights within the configured look-back/look-ahead window - this is the recommended choice.
4. Select an area from the list.
   • If you select the top-ranked area, the reservation is saved without any additional prompts.
   • If you select an area that is not the top-ranked suggestion, RMS will prompt you to provide a reason before saving.
5. If prompted, select a reason from the Area Suggestion reason list and save.

Interconnecting Areas

When an area is part of an Interconnecting Area group, Area Allocation Suggestion takes the sibling areas into account when calculating rankings. This prevents the system from suggesting a room whose interconnecting partner is already occupied - a combination that would prevent the interconnecting configuration from being used.

Related Articles

• Auto Area Allocation
• Book by Category
• Category
• Area
• Owner Contract