Group Bookings

Block rooms for a wedding, tour series or conference, track pick-up against the block, mark the group definite, release held rooms and handle the cut-off.

A group is one piece of business holding a number of rooms before anyone is named. Open Groups in the sidebar: the list at /groups shows every group with its block, its pick-up and what is still held, and clicking a row opens the group at /groups/{id}.

Blocking rooms is not a note to self. A block is an allotment: it takes the rooms out of sale the moment you save, moving the same availability a reservation moves. The calendar, the booking engine and every connected channel see those rooms as sold, which is the whole point of holding them — see Channel manager. Nothing is sold twice because the organiser was slow with the names.

Reading groups needs reservation read access; creating one, taking names, releasing and cancelling need reservation write.

Key terms

Room block — a number of rooms of one room type, on one rate plan, held for the group. A group has one block per room type and at least one block in total.

Blocked — the rooms the agreement is for.

Picked up — rooms on the block that now have a name: reservations on the group that are not cancelled. Cancelling a member booking hands its room back to the block.

Released — rooms given back to general sale, by hand or by the cut-off sweep.

Held — blocked − released − picked up: rooms still out of sale and still waiting for a name.

Reference — every group gets a number of the form SUN-G-000012: the property's booking prefix, a G, and six digits. It comes from the same counter as reservation references, so no two pieces of business ever share a number.

Create a group

New group

Click New group on the Groups page. The sheet warns you what you are about to do: the rooms come off sale everywhere from the moment you save, and names are added afterwards.

Name the business and the contact

Group name is required — "Ahmed & Sara wedding", "Pearl Tours Feb series". Company / agent, Contact name, Contact email and Contact phone describe who you are dealing with and show under the group's name on the list and the detail page.

Set the stay and the cut-off

Stay is one date range for the whole block; every room booked off the block runs those dates. Cut-off date is optional — leave it empty for Never release automatically and the rooms stay held until you release them by hand. It cannot be after arrival.

Block the rooms

Click Add room type once per room type. Each line takes a Room type, a Rate plan belonging to that type, and a number of Rooms. A room type can appear only once, and the plan select stays disabled until the type is chosen ("Room type first").

Agree the rate and who pays

Group rate per room / night is optional; leave it empty to sell at each block's plan price. Who pays is either Each guest pays their own or Organiser pays room & tax; guests pay extras — see Master folio & group billing.

Create group

Create group briefly reads Blocking rooms… while the inventory is taken, then "Group {reference} created" confirms it and the new group opens. If the nights are not all there the whole group is refused — nothing is half-blocked.

The Company / agent box is a label, not a link

On the New group sheet, Company / agent is free text recorded against the group. It does not attach the group to a partner record, and it does not bring that partner's negotiated rates or billing terms with it. To bill a company for a stay, name the partner on the booking itself — see Negotiated rates & company billing.

The Groups list

Four pills filter the list:

Pill	Shows
Open	Everything that is not cancelled — the working view
Tentative	Held but not yet confirmed by the organiser
Definite	Confirmed business
Cancelled	Groups whose block has been given up

The table columns are Group (name, reference and company), Stay, Blocked, Picked up, Held, Cut-off and Status. The Cut-off column reads Released once the held rooms have gone back, the cut-off date while one is pending, and — when the group has no cut-off at all. Groups are listed by arrival, latest first.

The group page

The header carries the group's name, its status badge, a Rooms released badge once the block has gone back, and the reference with the company and contact beside it. Five tiles summarise the group:

Tile	Shows
Stay	Arrival → departure for the whole block
Blocked	Rooms the agreement is for
Picked up	Rooms with a name on them
Still held	Rooms waiting for a name, with `Cut-off {date}`, `No cut-off` or `Released` beneath
Master folio	The master balance, with the group's billing mode beneath

Room blocks lists one row per room type — room type, rate plan (with the group rate per night when one is set), Blocked, Picked up, Released and Held, with a non-zero held count picked out in amber so you can see at a glance what is still unsold.

Bookings (N) lists the member reservations: reference, guest, room type and room number, guests, total and status. Click a row to open that reservation. Until the first name arrives the panel reads "No names yet. Add the rooming list to turn held rooms into bookings." When the group has a master folio, Master folio in Accounting links straight to the Groups tab of Accounting › Folios.

Any Notes typed when the group was created appear in their own card at the foot of the page.

Statuses

Status	Meaning
`Tentative`	Rooms are held, the business is not confirmed. New groups start here.
`Definite`	The organiser has confirmed. The rooms are held exactly as before — the status records the commitment, not the inventory.
`Cancelled`	The block has been given up. The group can no longer be changed or take names.

Tentative and Definite move freely in both directions with Mark definite and Mark tentative; "Group updated" confirms the change. Cancelling is its own action and is not reversible.

Actions

Mark definite

Mark definite on a tentative group confirms the business. A definite group shows Mark tentative in its place if the organiser backs off again.

Release N held

Release {n} held appears while the group still holds rooms and has not been released. It asks you to confirm: the rooms go back on sale everywhere immediately, bookings already made are not affected, and the block cannot be enlarged again afterwards. "Unpicked rooms returned to sale" confirms it, the Rooms released badge appears and the Cut-off column reads Released.

Rooming list

Rooming list opens the dialog that turns the organiser's names into bookings — see Rooming lists. The button is disabled when no block has a room left to name ("No rooms left to name").

Cancel group

Cancel group gives up the block. Held rooms return to sale, the status becomes Cancelled, and "Group cancelled; held rooms returned to sale" confirms it.

The cut-off and automatic release

A cut-off date is the deadline you gave the organiser for names. Once that day is over on the property's own clock, every room still held is handed back to general sale, the block records them as released, and the availability goes out to the channels. The sweep runs every hour — a cut-off is a day, not a minute — so expect the rooms back within the hour after midnight rather than on the stroke of it.

The sweep only ever touches held rooms. Bookings already picked up off the block are untouched, and the group itself stays open: a late name can still be taken, it is simply sold from general inventory like any other booking rather than from a block that no longer exists.

A group with no cut-off date is never released automatically. That is a deliberate choice for business you are confident about, and it is also the one that quietly costs you rooms — use Release {n} held as soon as you know the group will not fill.

Cancelling a group

Cancelling cancels the block, not the guests. Rooms still held go back on sale, and the member bookings stay exactly as they are.

This is on purpose. Each of those bookings is a named guest with a rate, a deposit and a cancellation policy of their own, and giving the lot up in one click would waive fees the property is owed and cancel guests who may still be coming on their own account. Open each member booking and cancel it under the policy — see Cancellations & no-shows.

Refusals

Message	Why
`A group needs at least one room block`	Blocking nothing is not a group.
`Each room type may appear once in the blocks`	One block per room type; raise the room count instead.
`A block's rate plan must belong to its room type`	Plans belong to a single room type.
`The cut-off date cannot be after arrival`	A deadline after the guests arrive is no deadline.
`{Room type}: only {n} available on {dates}, {m} needed`	The nights are not all there. Nothing is blocked.
`{Room type} has no inventory set up for {dates}`	No inventory rows for part of the stay — see the inventory calendar.
`A cancelled group cannot be changed`	Cancellation is final.
`A cancelled group cannot take bookings`	Add names before cancelling, or book them outside the group.
`Rate plan currency does not match the hotel currency`	A block cannot be priced in another currency.

Blocks are set when the group is created

The Groups screens do not yet offer an edit form: the room blocks, the cut-off date, the group rate and the notes are what you typed on the New group sheet. What you can change from the group page is its status, and whether the held rooms are still held. If a block's size is wrong, release it and create the group again before names are attached.

Common mistakes

Treating a block as a pencil note. The rooms are gone from sale from the moment you save. A speculative block on a busy date costs real business, so give it a cut-off.
Blocking the wrong room type. A rooming-list row can only be booked into a type the group has blocked, so a block of Deluxe rooms cannot absorb a guest who needs a Superior.
Releasing early to free "just one" room. Release hands back every held room of every block at once, and the block can never be enlarged again afterwards.
Expecting Cancel group to cancel the guests. It never does. Cancel the member bookings individually, under the policy.

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