Guides / Choosing a hotel PMS
How to choose a hotel PMS in India: a checklist
Updated By the EkamOS team
The short answer
A hotel property management system (PMS) is the software that runs a hotel’s rooms: bookings, check-in and check-out, the guest folio, housekeeping status, room rates and the daily close. Choosing one in India means checking those basics and the local paperwork too: a guest register, foreign guest (Form C) records and GST invoices.
What a PMS has to do in an Indian hotel
Most of what a PMS does is the same everywhere. The Wikipedia article on property management systems describes software that automates guest bookings, guest details, online reservations and the posting of charges, and that may connect to point of sale, revenue and door-lock systems. For a small hotel that comes down to a few screens used all day: the booking list, the front desk board, the folio and the housekeeping list.
An Indian hotel adds its own paperwork. The FRRO’s online Form C system states that all accommodators and hotels are legally obliged to fill Form C for every foreigner, including OCI cardholders, so the software should capture passport details at check-in. Bills have to be GST invoices, and a hotel with a restaurant wants food charged to the room instead of billed separately. A PMS that handles the desk but not these leaves the paperwork in a register book.
The checklist, in the order the desk uses it
Take this list to every demo and ask to see each item done live, on your own room types if possible.
- Bookings and the front desk. Can you see today’s arrivals, in-house guests and departures on one screen, and check a walk-in in without leaving it? Ask to see a check-in done live, with a second adult added to the room.
- The guest folio and check-out. Charges and payments should go on the guest’s folio as they happen, and check-out should turn the folio into one invoice. If you run a restaurant, ask whether its bills can be charged to the room. The guest folio guide explains what goes on one.
- The registers you keep. Check that the guest register records every adult in the room, not just the booker, that it exports for a date range, and that foreign guests’ passport details are captured at check-in for Form C.
- GST invoices. Invoices should carry your GSTIN and the tax split, run in sequence, and be corrected with credit notes instead of being edited. Ask your accountant what they need from the software, for example a Tally export.
- Rates, and who can change them. A rate calendar by room type and date, with weekday or seasonal rules, stops rates being changed over the phone. Check who can change a price; in a small hotel it is usually only the owner.
- Housekeeping. The desk should see which rooms are clean and ready without walking the corridor, and housekeeping should see which rooms need turning.
- Night audit. The software should close each business day: post the night’s room charges, mark no-shows and save a report with occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room. See what night audit is.
- Online travel agencies and direct bookings. If most bookings come from Booking.com, MakeMyTrip or Goibibo, ask whether the PMS is connected to them today, through a channel manager, and ask to see it working. Check too whether it gives you a booking page for your own website.
- Where it runs. Software that runs in a web browser works on the desk laptop and on a phone with nothing to install, but it needs a connection, so ask what happens when the internet drops. Software installed on one desk computer is tied to that machine.
- Getting your data in and out. Ask how your rooms, room types and rates get in on day one, and how you would export your data if you ever left.
Questions to ask on a demo
A demo shows what the seller chooses to show. These requests show what your desk will actually do.
| Ask | Why it matters | A good answer shows you |
|---|---|---|
| Check in two adults, one of them a foreign guest | Every occupant belongs on the register, and Form C needs passport details | Both adults recorded and the passport fields filled in the same check-in |
| Charge a restaurant bill to a room, then check the guest out | Slips that never reach the final bill are lost money | The charge on the folio, and one invoice at check-out |
| Correct an invoice after it has been issued | An issued invoice should not be edited | A credit note against the original invoice |
| Change tomorrow’s rate from a staff login | Rate changes should be controlled | The change refused for staff, or recorded with who made it |
| Run tonight’s night audit | Every business day should close the same way | Room charges posted and a report saved |
| Which online travel agencies are connected today? | A roadmap item is not a feature | A live connection, or a plain “not yet” |
Write down the answers for every product you see, and ask for anything promised “soon” to be shown working before you pay for it.
Mistakes owners make when choosing
- Choosing on the length of the feature list. What matters is whether the few screens the desk uses all day are quick and clear.
- Leaving out the night shift. The person who runs night audit and handles late check-ins should try the software before you decide.
- Leaving out the accountant. Ask them what they need from the invoices and the export before you buy, not after the first month.
- Treating “coming soon” as available. Plan around what works today. If a feature you need is on the roadmap, ask when, and do not rely on it until it is live.
EkamOS
How EkamOS answers this checklist
EkamOS is hotel management software for independent hotels in India. Against the checklist, this is what it does today.
- A front desk board with arriving, in-house and departing guests, check-in, walk-ins and check-out, and bookings with ready-made views for today and the next seven days.
- Check-in records every adult in the room, and the guest register exports by date range as CSV or PDF. Each foreign guest gets a Form C record with a 24-hour deadline from check-in, shown as due or overdue until you mark it filed; filing it on the government portal is still done by you.
- Charges and payments go on the guest’s folio, a café on the same property can charge orders to the room, and check-out settles the folio into one GST invoice. Corrections to an issued invoice are made with credit notes.
- A rate calendar by room type and date with weekday or seasonal pricing rules. Only the owner can change prices.
- Housekeeping tasks by room, with status, so the desk knows which rooms are ready.
- Night audit posts the night’s room charges, marks no-shows and saves a report with occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room, which you can download as a PDF.
- A direct booking page for your own website, and a Tally export of issued and paid invoices for your accountant.
- It runs in a web browser on a laptop or a phone. Rooms, room types and rate plans are imported from a template, and you see every row before anything is saved.
Not in EkamOS yet: live channel manager sync with Booking.com, MakeMyTrip and Goibibo, online prepayment on the direct booking page, meal plans on the rate calendar, and group bookings and company billing.
Choosing a hotel PMS: questions
Is a hotel PMS the same as hotel management software?
Usually, yes. In India the two names are used for the same thing: software that runs bookings, the front desk, folios, housekeeping and billing. Some sellers use “hotel management software” for a wider bundle that also includes a restaurant point of sale (POS) or accounts, so ask what is included.
Do I need a channel manager as well as a PMS?
Only if you sell rooms on several online travel agencies and want availability to change on all of them at once. A channel manager is the link between the PMS and those sites; some PMS products include one and others connect to a separate one. If you sell mostly direct or through one site, you can start without one.
Is a PMS worth it for a small hotel with 10 rooms?
The jobs are the same at 10 rooms as at 50: the register, the folio, the rates and the daily close. What changes is how long they take by hand. The best test is to run a week of your own real bookings through the software during a trial or demo.
Cloud or installed hotel software?
Cloud software runs in a browser, so the owner can see the desk from a phone and there is nothing to back up at the desk, but it needs an internet connection. Installed software runs on one computer without the internet but is tied to that machine and its backups.
Will a PMS file Form C for me?
Check with each product. Form C is submitted on the FRRO’s online Form C system. A PMS can capture the passport details at check-in and show when a Form C is due; EkamOS does that, and you mark the record filed once you have submitted it.
Sources
The pages this guide relies on, opened when it was written or last updated.
- Property management system, Wikipedia
- Online Form C (Form III) for accommodators, Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO), Bureau of Immigration
Related guides
- Hotel night audit: What night audit is, the steps to run one, and the figures on the report: occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room.
- Guest folio: The running bill for a hotel stay: what goes on it, the types of folio, and how it is settled at check-out.
See EkamOS on your own kind of business
Tell us what you run. We will walk you through the parts of EkamOS that fit it, and be straight about the parts that are not ready yet.