Hotelbeds Selects RateGain to Lead the Sector in Rate Integrity

NEW DELHI and PALMA DE MALLORCA, Spain, Dec. 12, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Hotelbeds, one of the world´s leading bedbank, has today reported the launch of a partnership with RateGain, the market leader in hospitality and travel technology solutions.

RateGain will provide Hotelbeds with 'Parity+' - an advanced end-to-end rate integrity management solution that use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to track integrity issues in real time - to help identify its hotel partners cases of opaque rates intended for offline channels being sold in other channels.

Hotelbeds has chosen to work with RateGain following a competitive RFP to find the world's leading third party provider of rate integrity technology and monitoring tools.

Entering into this agreement is inline with Hotelbeds' commitment to take on responsibility for leading the fight against rate integrity abuse on behalf of the owners of the 180,000 properties that it partners with. As part of this, Hotelbeds has created a team dedicated to monitoring rates and invested in automated technology unavailable elsewhere in the market that uses Data Analytics to track travel sellers' flows. More recently, Hotelbeds has introduced comprehensive measures and technology solutions, including a strict 'three strikes' policy for channels that violate distribution rules; tools that allow full traceability of rates; and the data-driven segmentation of customer channels to more closely align them with the distribution strategies of hotel partners.

As a direct result, Hotelbeds has blocked 800 sales channels of offending sellers and given up €300 million of otherwise profitable sales over the last year, resulting in a 90% reduction of reported incidences over the last six months to just 0.01% of room night production.

Carlos Muñoz, Managing Director at Hotelbeds commented, "This year we have made significant progress in fighting rate integrity abuse on behalf of our hotel partners and I´m pleased to confirm that incidences are now down to just 0.01%. But, we fully recognize that this is the number one priority for many hoteliers and we are determined to not only reduce incidences further, but to also become the market leader of solutions that offer hotels; distribution capabilities that ensure they can sell the right rate, in the right channel, to the right guest, at the right time."

He added, "We want to provide transparency on the state of distribution with both Hotelbeds and other players to our hotel partners. Therefore, recently we put out an RFP to find the best third-party provider of rate integrity technology and monitoring solutions, and it gives me great pleasure to confirm that after carefully assessing all available providers, we´ll be working with RateGain to track down rogue sellers that violate agreements by selling opaque rates originally intended for offline channels."

Apurva Chamaria, Chief Revenue Officer, RateGain technologies said: "We feel this partnership is a watershed moment for our sector as Hotelbeds sets a fantastic example to the whole hospitality sector as to how bedbanks can confront rogue sellers violating rate integrity. Naturally then the opportunity to work together to fight this cause was unmissable as no other bedbank takes this issue as seriously. Hotelbeds has a winning formula, not seen elsewhere in the market, that takes accurate client segmentation through its access to the largest data pool available of client data-points and behavior, and combines it with a commitment to investment into cutting-edge distribution technology and automated processes."

Highlighting about the Parity+ solution, Apurva further added, "Parity+ will provide Hotelbeds with an overall parity score, giving information on availability and rate violations by both property and meta-channels - as well as helping understand violation causes, all in an easy to navigate single view dashboard. Additionally, the 'On Demand Data Refresh' feature will assist Hotelbeds to be on top of issues across 500+ distribution channels and the 'Test Reservation Module' called 'Closed Loop Service' will uncover the rogue operator behind the leaked rates."

Parity+ will allow Hotelbeds to configure smart rate shopping leveraging the data of DHISCO - the company acquired by RateGain - and comes with an AI 'Auto Reasoning' feature. By tackling integrity issues in real-time, and providing a robust rate integrity workflow management solution, Parity+ not only uncovers the rate integrity issues, but also automates the categorization and resolution of these issues, providing a complete solution for rate integrity management. Additionally, Parity+ provides industry best benchmark capabilities, meta-channels monitoring, multiple POS, mobile apps and member rates.

In recent years, Hotelbeds has focused hard on providing hotel partners with incremental, high-value bookings via B2B channels such as tour operators, retail travel agents, airlines, and points redemption schemes. These B2B channels provide hoteliers with guests that stay longer, book further in advance, cancel less, spend more in destination and come back more often.

About Hotelbeds:

Hotelbeds is the world's leading bedbank. In a fragmented and complex travel landscape, Hotelbeds provides over 180,000 hotels properties across the globe with access to high-value, complementary distribution channels that significantly increase occupancy rates and optimise RevPAR - whilst not competing with the hotelier's direct distribution strategy. Hotelbeds does this by offering hoteliers access to a network of over 60,000 hard-to-access B2B travel buyers such as tour operators, retail travel agents, airline websites, and loyalty schemes in over 140 source markets worldwide. These channels provide hotel partners with returning guests that book further in advance, cancel less, spend more in-destination and stay longer. In addition to accommodation, Hotelbeds is also the world's largest B2B seller of travel ancillaries, offering 24,000 transfer routes and 18,000 activities, as well as attractions, tickets and car hire. Operating under the 'Beyond the Bed' product line, it provides both hoteliers and travel distribution partners with an efficient platform and powerful tools to easily integrate and commercialise its leading portfolio of high-margin products. The company is headquartered in Palma De Mallorca, Spain and employs around 5,000 employees across over 60 offices globally. For more information, visit www.hotelbeds.com

About RateGain:

RateGain is one of the top provider of SaaS products, which help travel, and hospitality companies make more revenue every day. RateGain offers products, which help with rate intelligence, cognitive revenue management, smart e-distribution, and brand engagement. RateGain is proud to support 125,000+ hotel properties globally, influencing $13 Bn revenue by providing 240 billion rate and availability updates & powering over 30 million bookings. RateGain is trusted by 25 out of the top 30 OTAs, tour operators and wholesalers, 23 out of the top 30 hotel chains, 7 out of the top 10 car rental companies, top 5 cruise lines, and many leading airlines worldwide. In 2018, RateGain acquired DHISCO, which made it the only company in the world to offer end-to-end frictionless distribution. In June 2019, RateGain acquired award-winning BCV to offer guest experience cloud to maximize guest lifetime value for hospitality chains. For more information, visit www.rategain.com

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