Activity Schemes
Housekeeping activity schemes determine which activities, when and for which Room Type to be performed for. You may specify what to be done on arrival, each N days or on departure.
To set up schemes, navigate to menu Settings->All Settings-> Housekeeping Assistant->Housekeeping Activity Scheme->'+' icon on top right.
Under the 'Generic' tab:
- Name (1) - Enter a Name of the scheme
- Room Types (2) - Select for which room types it is applicable
- OOS Type(3) - select if the activities will be connected with an OOS status. Check for more details below.
Important: If several schemes are linked to a room type, they will all apply to this room type. This way you can separate all common activities for the different room types into one scheme and link it to all room types, while creating separate schemes of specific activities for each room type.
Under the 'Scheme' tab:
- click the '+Add activities' button to add a new line
- select when should these activities be performed - choose between 'On arrival'; 'Every N days'; 'On Departure'.
- select which activities should be performed for the selected room types on the respective day
- specify a certain number of credits (i.e. how much time will be needed to complete the specific tasks), if left empty, the system will use the sum of credits predefined for each individual activity.
Let's use the two screenshots above to form a better understanding of how the Schemes work.
- We created a Scheme named: Cleaning schedule - ALL
- We selected all room types since the activities will be applicable to all room types
- We indicated that an 'Inspection' will be done on arrival date and will take 5 credits. (1)
- We indicated that every day there will be a clean taking 25 credits. (2)
- We indicated that every 3 days of the stay there will be a Towel and Linen change taking 15 credits. (3)
Important: On the 3rd day of the stay, both (2) and (3) will be generated for the room.
- We indicated that on Departure all activities will be performed taking 45 credits. (4)
However, our Villa has a Kitchenette that will require attention. If we were to add the kitchenette activities to this scheme, they would be generated for all other room types as well. Thus, we need to create a separate Scheme applicable just to the Villa:
Important: Reminder that these kitchenette-specific activities will be an addition to the ones generated from the general cleaning scheme.
Note: Having separate schemes for specific room types is a common occurrence. Most notably, separate schemes will be needed when the same activity takes drastically different time to complete - e.g. daily clean of a DBL room might take 15 credits, while for an Apartment it might take 35.
In this case, we would have 1 activity scheme for DBL in which the total credits will be 15 and another activity scheme for the Apartment where 35 credits will be counted. This is important so that the system can present to you an accurate forecast of how many credits total per day you will have, consequently, how many housekeepers you will need.
Connecting schemes to OOS statuses
By selecting an OOS status for the Activity Scheme, the included activities will only be performed when a room is marked with the respective OOS status.
For detailed planning of each OOS type, define all OOS statuses, schemes, and related tasks that you need. The housekeeping schemes and the related tasks operate the same way as with the bookings. The only difference to which you need to pay more attention is the departure date.
On Departure - in contrast to bookings, for OOS statuses, it is the date following the last date of the OOS status. If the period of the OOS status 01 January - 03 January, then the task marked "On Departure" will be generated on 04 January. In this case, the room will become free/dirty on 4 January. In the rest of cases, the feature behaviour is similar to the one of bookings.
On Arrival - the task will be generated for the start date of the OOS status.
Repeat every N days - the task will be generated depending on the OOS status period for the specific room and the set number of days.
These housekeeping schemes are also taken into account in forecasting (Housekeeping Forecast report) to better plan the number of housekeepers you will need.
Activating the Activity Schemes
To activate the scheme, you will need to link it to the room types it will refer to. By doing this, when tasks are generated for the day, the activities from the scheme will be added in the Housekeeping report.
Activity Schemes and Charge Templates
Activity schemes have one more crucial function - they can be selected in Charge Templates.
Important: These activity schemes must not be linked to a room type.
This way, there is a link among the additional services, rates (through the charge templates for the package elements) and the specific housekeeping activities. The housekeeping schemes without a room type are designed this way, because otherwise they will automatically be applied instead of being only activated when there is a charge (for a room, additional service or package element) linked to the housekeeping scheme for the given date.
You can use this feature to solve the issues with e.g. baby cots, as well as the stocking of special consumables related to various packages or extra services (e.g. Champagne and flowers in the room on arrival). Here is how:
If for a specific date, there is a posted charge containing a housekeeping scheme, this scheme will be activated on this date. This doesn't mean there should necessarily be an activity for this date under this scheme.
Important: If it is an arrival scheme, and there are charges for each day of a stay, this will lead to the creation of an arrival activity only. And the opposite is also true. If the scheme is for all days of a stay, but there is a charge only on arrival, only an arrival activity will be created. In other words, to have an activity created for a date, you need to have a combination of a charge and a scheme defining an activity for this date.
To link an Activity Scheme to a Charge Template, navigate to menu Settings->All Settings->Charges & Taxes->Charge Templates->edit the respective Charge Template->select the activity scheme in the 'Housekeeping template' field.
To summarize the example from the screenshot:
- we created Housekeeping activities - 'Place bottle of champagne' and 'Place flowers'.
- we combined those under 'Add champagne+flowers' activity scheme which is set on arrival and not linked to any room types.
- we attached the Activity Scheme to the Charge Template.
When this Charge template is posted for the arrival day of a booking, the respective Housekeeping tasks will be generated in the housekeeping report. This way, your housekeeping team can prepare the room as requested by the guest.
Important: This automated procedure will work regardless of how the charge template is posted - manually by a user, booked as an extra service (supplement) through the BookDirect; MyBooking Portal or OTA's, or through a Rate Package.