Overbookings occur when the total number of rooms booked is greater than the number of rooms you have available. If you have received a booking when your property is full, learn how to manage overbookings, and how to prevent them in future.
What causes overbookings?
Overbookings typically happen because of:
Mapping issues - Room rates not mapped or mapped incorrectly to the incorrect rate
Disabled status - Channel rates or entire channels are disabled
Important: When a channel or channel rate is disabled, no inventory updates will be sent to that channel, creating high risk for overbookings
Availability errors - Incorrect availability showing on channels
Synchronisation delays - Two bookings made within 5 minutes on different channels (updates take up to 5 minutes). To prevent this, you can set up an automatic closure yield rule to automatically apply a stop sell when your room availability reaches 1
Missing manual entries - Walk-in reservations not entered, causing incorrect availability
Connection problems - Issues with channel connectivity
What happens when a channel or channel rates becomes disabled?
When a channel or channel rate becomes disabled:
No inventory updates are sent to the channel
The channel continues to sell rooms based on old availability data
This creates significant risk for overbookings
If a channel rate or channel has become disabled due to an error, resolve the error, then re-enable the channel or channel rate, or delete the rate directly on the channel if no longer needed
What to do if you get an overbooking
If you discover an overbooking, take these steps:
Contact the channel directly. We are unable to contact the channel on your behalf.
Check your availability across all connected channels
Resolve any error messages if a channel or channel rate is disabled
Look for specific error messages on your Dashboard
Fix the underlying issue before re-enabling
Re-enable any disabled channels or channel rates:
To enable a channel: Go to Distribution > Channels > My channels, and update your channel settings
To enable a channel rate: Go to Distribution > Channels > My channels, edit your channel settings, ensuring Start updating channel is set to Yes
If your property is connected to a PMS that manages your inventory
If your PMS manages your inventory and availability, follow these additional troubleshooting steps:
Contact your PMS. provider to verify correct availability was sent from the PMS for the affected room type and stay date.
Check rates are mapped to. your PMS: Go to Distribution > Connectivities > Rooms and Rates Mapping and review all PMS mapping codes. Confirm that all room codes, rate codes, and inventory codes match between SiteMinder and your PMS.
Go to Reservations and filter by Booked Date. Check if any failed or pending reservations are preventing correct availability updates from reaching your PMS
How to prevent overbookings
To help reduce the risk of overbookings:
Regularly check that your availability is correct.
Ensure all required room rates are mapped to your channels correctly.
If your property is connected to a PMS that manages inventory, verify that your PMS mapping codes match between SiteMinder and your PMS, and check for any failed or pending reservations that may affect availability updates.
If you only have one room left and you know it is likely you’ll get a booking for this room, you could place a stop sell on low-performing channels, and only offer the last room to your high-performing channels.
Check the property, channel, and connectivities statuses on your Dashboard page regularly to monitor and fix any channel rates or channels that may have become disabled.