What Happens When Demand Surges and Your Hotel Rates Don't Keep Up?

Unexpected demand can be brilliant for business. But only if your pricing can react quickly enough to capture the opportunity.

Imagine it's 11pm on a Tuesday evening.

Unexpectedly, Oasis announce an additional concert date in your city. Within minutes, tickets are being snapped up and people are looking for somewhere to stay.

Your hotel starts receiving bookings…lots of them…..and then some.

Brilliant news!

Well, yes. Until you arrive at work the following morning, discover you've sold most of your available rooms at your usual Tuesday night rate, and realise what those rooms could have been worth.

You've filled the hotel, but a significant revenue opportunity has disappeared overnight.

And that's the problem with unexpected demand. By the time you've spotted what's happening, it can already be too late.

Surges don't always come with warnings

As revenue managers, we spend a great deal of time forecasting demand, monitoring booking pace and keeping an eye on local events.

But we can't predict everything.

Concert announcements, cancelled flights, sporting events or simply an unexpected flurry of reservations can change demand in minutes. And sometimes there's no obvious explanation at all.

The challenge isn't necessarily understanding why demand has changed. It's spotting that change quickly enough to do something about it.

And with busy commercial teams juggling multiple responsibilities, it's simply not realistic to expect someone to monitor bookings around the clock.

Surge Pricing: two ways to stay ahead of unexpected demand

That's exactly why we've introduced Surge Pricing to Right Revenue.

It monitors your booking activity, identifies unexpected increases in demand and helps you respond before valuable revenue opportunities disappear.

There are two ways your hotel can benefit:

1. Surge Pricing Alerts

Surge Pricing alerts are already switched on for Right Revenue hotels.

When the system detects an unexpected increase in bookings, it sends you an alert so you can review demand and decide whether to adjust your rates.

Where there's a relevant local event that might be driving demand, we'll flag that too.

2. Automated Surge Pricing

Want Right Revenue to do more than just alert you?

With automated Surge Pricing activated, the system can take action as soon as unusual demand is detected, without waiting for someone to review an alert.

Depending on the rules you've agreed in advance, that could mean:

• Increasing rates to a preset level.

• Adjusting prices to a multiple of your rack rate.

• Closing selected distribution channels to protect availability and reduce commission fees.

You remain in control. Your hotel agrees the pricing rules and thresholds in advance. Right Revenue simply monitors demand and takes the agreed action when those conditions are met.

And that can happen even at 11pm on a Tuesday, when nobody is watching the bookings come in!

What could one surge be worth?

Let's say your hotel sells another 20 rooms at £120, when demand might have supported £180.

That's a potential £1,200 in additional room revenue that could have been captured.

Of course, you might go weeks without an unexpected surge. You might experience two in a week! But that's the thing about unexpected demand. You never know when it's coming.

Surge Pricing is there when you need it, even when you don't know you need it.

What happens next?

Already using Right Revenue?

Your Surge Pricing alerts are already switched on, so there's nothing you need to do. Just keep an eye on your alerts to see when unexpected demand is building.

Want to take it a step further?

With automated Surge Pricing, Right Revenue can act on unexpected demand using the rules and thresholds you've agreed in advance.

Simply contact your Customer Success Manager to find out more about automated Surge Pricing for your hotel.