Clock PMS+ Update (30 Jul 2018) : Support Centre

New Guest Profiles

We have entirely redesigned the Guest Profile system. Our goal is to:

Provide more flexible, powerful and secure Guest Profile system
Meet the GDPR requirements
Merge the data of Guest Profiles and Registration Cards into one

New Structure

The Guest Profile and Registration Cards have been merged into one and the information, entered at the booking stage (names, contacts, etc.) can be enriched with more detailed information from the Registration card at a later stage.
The new profile has the entire information in one place. In case of a guest's repeat visit, the whole information is associated with the bookings and there is no need for repeated information entry.

Main guest

Each booking has one main guest who cannot be deleted from the booking.

The same, however, can be changed for a new guest (new profile) or already existing profile.

The entry of new guest data at the booking creation actually creates a new profile. If an existing one is chosen, the booking is associated with the same. Unlike before, with the editing of the booking data, the profile data is now also edited, i.e. the data associated with this profile in all checked-in and expected bookings. The behaviour of checked-out bookings is a little bit different. For more information on that, see Data History below.

Additional guests

You can add data of other guests to each booking. Each of these guests is also a Profile and remains in the Profile database, similar to any other guest.

Data history

When a booking is checked out, the contained guest data is kept intact. During the last guest edit (e.g. change of the address or passport), the data of this profile is NOT CHANGED, but kept the same as before.

Migration of old data

Due to the merge of Profiles and Registration Cards, after the addition of the registration Cards to the Profile database, some information doubling occurred. For the time being, we have added a first version of the profile merge feature. We are working on its improvement and various changes to reduce the number of doubled profiles.

Custom fields

Our new Guest Profile system enables you to define any kind of fields to be contained in Guest Profiles, Registration Cards and the Register.

By default, the field settings have some system fields which cannot be deleted, but can be hidden when unnecessary (see below).

The field types supported by the Guest Profile system are:

Text field. The field allows the entry of text or numerical information. In addition, a value list can be defined to select from instead of typing the data every time.
Numerical field. This field is for entering numerical values only. Here you can also define a list of allowed values to select from instead of typing them every time.
Date. The field is for dates checking their format.
Phone. The field is for phone numbers checking their format.
Email. The field is for email addresses checking their format.
Country. A field with a list of countries of your choosing.
Language. A field with a list of the subscription languages.

To set up these fields, go to 'Settings' - 'Guest Profile Fields'. For the existing accounts, the fields are transferred the way they have been in the Registration card. See below how you can hide the unnecessary fields.

Personal Data Encryption

Each of the Guest Profile fields can also be encrypted. In other words:

Encrypted. If your local legislation (e.g. GDPR) requires special access to a field, you can choose to make this field encrypted. In this case, the access to it will depend on a special right: Personal Data: Access. A disadvantage of encrypted fields is that they cannot be used in marketing segmentation reports. Examples of encrypted fields: guest names, phone, email, address, passport number, date of birth and other personal data.
Non-encrypted fields. The access to non-encrypted fields is easier and can be used in the marketing segmentation reports. Examples of such fields: country, guest loyalty programme level, guest type, marketing source and other additional information.

Please note that the field type (encrypted or not) cannot be changed upon its creation. Carefully think through what information will be stored in it and what kind of field it should be.

Field arrangement, visibility and requirements on the different screens

Now you can order the fields in a way suitable for your needs and in accordance with the applicable norms. For example, the arrangement of the address fields is different for the various parts of the world. The field arrangement is different for each account. To order the fields, go to 'Settings' - 'Guest Profile Fields' and at point 2, select the account.

Choose the Sort Order for each field. The smaller numbers are on top.

In the same screen, you can set whether and on which screens a field is to be visible

Short/Long Guest Form. For your convenience, the guest data is initially shown compactly in the booking (Short Guest Form). Through the 'Show All Fields' button you can choose to also see the rest of the fields. This way, apart from being compact, the form can also allow the entry of additional data, if you wish. Should you decide for a field to be completely invisible, don't choose any of the options for it.
Hotel Registry. Select if the field is to be included in the Register ('Booking' – 'Hotel Registry')
Print Form. Choose whether it should be included on the Registration Card Preview/Print screen. This setting is useful, when using a standard registration card. In case of a custom registration card, the contained fields depend on the template itself.
Self Service/Kiosk. Set if a field is to be used for data entry on the registration screen in the Kiosk or the Self Service Portal.
If you make the field 'Required', the guest will be required to complete it, and if the field is 'Shown', it will be visible, but not required and may be left empty.
WRS. Select if a field is to be shown at the last booking process stage. Once again, it can be 'Hidden', 'Sown', and 'Required'.

Important fields and Default values

If your local legislation (e.g. Police Registers) requires you to collect certain data of your guests (e.g. passport number, date of birth, etc.), you can make the respective fields Important. This will give you an additional option to track if all these Important fields are filled in by guests. Thus, a booking can initially be created with the contact details only, and the rest of the information to be gathered at a later stage: during the self check-in or at the reception check-in. The Important option also lets easily check and review if all the necessary data is entered.

On Arrivals list, there is an icon denoting the bookings with missing Important data. In the Register, there is a filter to show all all the guests with missing Important data.

For each of the fields, a default value can be filled in. This is most useful when it comes to Country and Language, as well as in the cases of eventual additional fields, e.g. Level, Marketing Segment, etc.

Masking (Anonymisation) of values

Through the system of masking/anonymisation of data, you can choose the way in which data to be shown on most screens.
The masking is aimed at maximally limiting the access to personal data for staff who don't need to have such access and for the places where such data is not necessary.

By default, data masking is applied to first name, email and phone, but not the surname. This way almost everywhere in the system, the guest data is shown the following way: "J Smith, j.sm****@***.com, ******456". If you wish, you can choose and change which data to be masked. If you change this setting, it will be valid for the newly created profiles, and the old ones will stay the way they were, if not edited and saved again.

Masking is available for the following fields through following format:

First Name – The first letter of the name
Surname - The first letter of the surname
Email – The first 4 characters of the email address. The masked email looks this way: 'j.sm****@***.com'
Phone – The last 3 digits of the phone number. This is a masked phone number: '*******456'

Access Rights

We have changed and enriched the access rights to personal data, so that you have greater flexibility when determining which employee to what information to have access to.

For this reason, we have added two new rights: Personal Data: Access and Personal Data: Bulk Access. Here is their behaviour:

If a user does not have the Personal Data: Access right, but still has access rights to the system, bookings and other screens, the same can see the masked fields (First Name and Surname, Email and Phone) the way you have chosen for these fields to be visualised (masked or not). The rest of the guest data contained in the encrypted fields will not available for this employee. For the same to perform their duties, the screens are accessible, but the encrypted information is shown this way: ****.
If the user has the Personal Data: Access right, the same can see the full content of the encrypted fields. Still, on most screens the guest info is minimised and only the masked fields are shown. The full information can be seen on the screen of the booking itself and in the respective Guest Profile.
Advanced Personal Data: Bulk Access. This right has been created for screens and features allowing access to multiple personal data records. Such screens are: the Register, various data exports to the police, as well as the API. Through this right, you can meet the GDPR requirements to grant access only to personnel who need direct access to this information.

Profile Merge

Use the Profile Merge feature to remove doubled profiles in your database.

From the profile search, choose two or more profiles and then decide which of them to become the main one. If there is missing or doubled information, choose which of the data for each field to be kept and then merge the profiles.

Acceptance of marketing emails

To the Profiles, we have added a new Accept Marketing Emails field. In the WRS settings, you define if this field is to be shown in the WRS.

In addition, there is a new filter in the Guest Mailer. So if you decide that an email is a marketing one, you can set the filter in such a way that this email will not be sent to the booking. Alternatively, you can have different emails sent to guests having chosen to accept marketing emails and such who haven't.

Marketing Email Unsubscription

In the Guest Mailer template, now you have a new parameter to let you add a link for marketing emails unsubscription. If chosen by guests, they will be sent to a confirmation page. Upon the confirmation, the system will find all profiles containing this email address and update the Accept Marketing Emails field.

Capacity counters – daily capacity

We have enriched the capacity counters functionality, adding an option for certain dates to be able to set a different availability. For the dates for which there is no surplus availability set, the availability defined in the counter itself is considered.

Example: You have a PARKING counter with a capacity of 20 spaces. For 10 and 11 January, you would like to reserve 3 spaces for your staff. With the new feature, you can set a capacity counter of 17 spaces.

To set daily capacities:

'Settings' - 'Charge Template' - choose 'Capacity counters by dates' from the 'Capacity counter' section
Select the number of days as of today or a period
In the table, mark days of your choosing. You can choose random cells by holding Ctrl/Cmd.
Click 'Set Capacity' and enter a value.

Other improvements

Notes in bookings and Credit Card details. We would like to remind you that in accordance with the requirements of PCI DSS and banks, the Credit Card details should be filled in solely in the fields specially designated for this purpose and providing the necessary levels of data protection. For this reason, we have added a content check to the Notes fields in bookings to prevent the entry of such information.
Room Change and Housekeeping. A new feature added to let you mark the room change completion. After moving guests to a new room and marking this operation as completed, the housekeeping status of the old room of the guests will be changed to 'Checked-Out'.
To mark the guest moving as completed, open the Booking Edit screen and click the Done button next to the respective moving.
Company on the Rate and Availability screen and in the CRS. If you select a company on these screens, only the rates associated with the company will be shown.
In addition, in case of a new booking, the selected company will be transferred to the booking.
Housekeeping Report. The OOS status has been added to the report, as well as a room status filter.
A new 'Booking: Set manual price' right. It has automatically been granted to all having the 'Booking: Create and edit' right.
Kiosk – passport pictures. We have added a new setting for the Kiosk to require passport pictures or not. Now there is a third option: 'Requested, but not required'. If selected, the Kiosk will prompt passport pictures, but there will be a button for the guest to decline. Should the guest decide to do so, the same will go to the next step of the check-in process.
Guest mailer – a new Confirmed filter added. The 'Confirmed' status of a booking shows if the booking has received confirmation from the system. Through the new filter, you can set the automatic confirmation of all bookings not having received confirmation in any other way. The new filter will also prevent the receipt of doubled confirmations by guests.
Guest Mailer. Now you can also use parameters in the email subject.
In the multiple booking update features (from booking search screens), we have added an option to update the Confirmed status of a booking.
Now you can translate the Badge field in the rate. You can find the translations in 'Rate Description/Translation'.
The new parameters for Room and Guest Mailer. In the Guest mailer, you can now access the following fields from the guest room: "Room door code(s)" and "Common door codes" ( booking.arrival_room.room_door_codes, booking.arrival_room.common_door_codes )
To the reports allowing the merge of data from many accounts, we have added buttons for the quick selection of all accounts.

Interfaces

Saflok

One of the most popular access systems Saflok can now be used through integration with Clock PMS Suite. The version of the Saflok software should support the PMS protocols: Messenger PMS Web Service Interface Rev. 4. An API plugin and ClockIoT device are also required.

QuickBooks

We are glad to announce the last addition to our list of interfaces. The integration with Quickbooks Online. It links your Clock PMS Suite account and your QuickBooks Online company. The interface is designed to automate and simplify the accounting process by syncing invoices, credit notes, payments, and related data with QuickBooks Online.

API

We have added a new access right to personal data in bookings. If your integration needs access to personal data of guests in bookings, grant the API user the new 'Personal Data: Access' right. If your API user doesn't have this right, the same will be able to access bookings, but instead of the personal data of guests will get masked data. Please be careful when granting this access right to personal data, considering the GDPR requirements.
New API endpoint – guests (pms_api). It provides access to Guest Profiles and all related data. To access this endpoint, apart from the 'Personal Data: Access' right, the API user will need to also have 'Personal Data: Bulk Access' right. Please be careful when granting this access right to personal data, considering the GDPR requirements.
New API endpoint - charge_template_availabilities (base_api). It gives information of the available quantities of charge templates with capacity counters for a selected period.
New API endpoint - bookings/:booking_id/charges_by_source (pms_api). It gives information of the charges whose source is the booking (being posted in the booking). Please note that these are not charges owed by the booking. These charges are posted to the booking regardless of where they are transferred. Respectively, here you won't find charges transferred from other bookings to this one.
New API endpoint - event (pms_api). Index, creation and update of Events.
New API endpoints - /events/:event_id/folios and /events/:event_id/folios/default (pms_api). The first returns a list of of the folios of a Event, and the second - the default folio of the Event, as if there is no such one, it is created.
New API endpoint - meeting_room (pms_api). List of set-up Meeting Rooms.
New API endpoint - meeting_room_booking (pms_api). List, creation and update of Meeting Room bookings.
New API endpoint - meeting_room_booking/:id/charge (pms_api). Addition of a charge to the default folio of the Meeting Room Booking, as the Meeting Room becomes the source of the charge.
New API endpoint - meeting_room_availability (pms_api). It gives information of the available slots for booking in the Meeting Room Calendar.
To the 'companies' API endpoint (base_api), now there is POST method for the creation of a Company.
Companies endpoint, can search a company by VAT number using 'vat' parameter - examle: /companies.xml?vat=UK123456789
To the API endpoints rooms and room_types, a new is_virtual field has been added to show you if a room is a virtual one or not.
To the 'rooms' API endpoint, information of the OOS statuses of each room (room_status_allocations) has been added.
To the exchange_rates API endpoint, a new subunit_to_unit field has been added. This is the value by which a given value_cents is to be divided to get the value in the main currency. For more information, please see the documentation and the description of the money fields.
To the API endpoint for a new charge, the 'print_text' field has been added.

Fixes

Booking offers – sometimes in the WRS, a line in the offer appears as invalid, if for a room type there is only one available room left.
The Event-blocked virtual rooms didn't properly block the component rooms.
In some very rare cases, it was possible for a booking to take two rooms through the Self Service Portal or the Kiosk.
Daily charges by sources – the amounts are to be by currency, as no currency conversion is to be made, so that they can correspond to the other reports.
The editing of the manual price for multiple bookings didn't work in certain situations.
Folio Mail Template – a parameter for the public folio URL link was missing
The printing of multiple registration cards is now properly sorted by last name.
Rate Control Report – it also showed the departure date.
Kiosk – for guests moved to another room, the Kiosk issued a key to the old room
Out of season couldn't be for 1 day only, but only for multiple days
The corrected and doubled folios also copied the fiscalisation data which was not correct.
The font colour of the custom colouring of bookings in the calendar was not proper and made the text illegible.
The City Tax defined as percent was calculated on everything instead on the Room & Package Revenue Groups
Adyen – only the tokenization didn't work with the 3D secure cards
Event – payment posting to a folio. The payment subtype didn't update after the payment type selection.
Atomize – the button was also available in demo accounts

Clock PMS+ Update (30 Jul 2018)