Drip Feed Overview: Allows you set a maximum number of rooms pushed to an OTA, regardless of the actual availability in your channel manager. The restriction can be applied to a specific date or date range, for a chosen room type
Example of how Drip Feed works
Studio Room has 10 rooms available
For a selected channel, you only want to show 2 rooms as available on a certain date
Set the drip feed to 2, the channel will always receive 2 rooms available, regardless of actual inventory, as long as actual availability stays at 2 or above
When a booking is made from that channel, actual availability drops to 9 but the channel will still show 2 available, not 1
The availability will only drop below 2 once actual inventory itself falls below 2 (e.g. if actual availability drops to 1, the channel will then show 1)
Drip Feed Settings when selecting Drip Feed, you are present with 4 ettings
Off Drip Feed setting not applied
Closed Sends 0 inventory to the selected channel for chosen dates (without reducing overall availability).
Allotment Sets a booking counter (e.g., restricts to 3 bookings). Each booking reduces the allotment number
Number Caps the number of rooms visible based on availability. (e.g., availability is 5, cap at 3). When inventory drops below this cap, availability reflects reality.
How to apply Drip Feed
Navigate to Availability & Rates
Login to extranet > Availability & Rates
Select the channel you wish to apply Drip Feed to
Set Drip Feed
Then select Drip Feed from the 'Rules' drop down menu, a row will appear below each room type
Simply select the Drip Feed selection drop down, for the applicable date and room type
SAVE - to apply and send changes to OTA
Additional Information
Drip Feed acts as a counter that limits the total number of bookings allowed for a room type via a channel, reducing by one with each booking received (e.g. a restriction of 3 drops to 2 after one booking), and does not apply to restrictions set at the base rate level
Sets a maximum number of rooms available on a channel for a given room type, capping bookable availability at that limit (e.g. a restriction of 3 caps bookable rooms at 3, even if 5 are available) while pushing actual availability once inventory drops below that cap
Drip Feed can also be managed through Bulk Update
Drip Feed setting applies to Parent room only