Customized Cancellation Policies

With Octorate, you can create custom cancellation policies to link to your rates.

From the section Settings > Takings and terms of sale, you can access the Cancellation Policies area and click on the + to start setting them up:

After choosing a name for your cancellation policy, you’ll need to configure the details by entering the following info:

The number of days before the guest's check-in after which, if they cancel the booking, the cancellation policy will apply 💳

The cut-off time

Then, you’ll be able to decide the penalty to be applied — whether to charge for one or more nights, a fixed amount, or a percentage:

The percentage will be calculated based on the total amount of the stay.

The Title and Details fields allow you to add a title for your cancellation policy visible to your guests, along with a short description that will appear in the booking engine and on the confirmation voucher:

All info you set will also be shown in the Booking Engine during the reservation process.

Your guests will always be informed about the applicable cancellation policies for the rate they’re booking.

By enabling the non-refundable option in your cancellation policy, the rates linked to it will appear with a red banknote icon:

This info will also appear in the booking engine:

And on the booking confirmation voucher as well:

Once you’ve created your cancellation policies, you’ll need to link them to your rate plans.
If you haven’t set up your rate plans yet, check out our dedicated article.

In the rate plan settings page, you’ll find the field where you can link a payment policy and a cancellation policy.

IMPORTANT: If you have a multi-account setup, you can create payment policies, cancellation policies, and rate plans from your master account. You’ll see them appear in your child accounts with this icon:

Everything we’ve covered here applies to setting up cancellation policies in the booking engine.

How to set cancellation policies for OTAs?
For most portals, you can manage the cancellation policy directly from their extranets.
For some, you can still update the policy by pushing it from Octorate:

  • Airbnb

  • VRBO

  • Hometogo

  • Marriott

For these, go to the content push section of your listings and edit them under the Reservations area.

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See you soon!
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