How do you verify late OTA reservations before the 11 p.m. audit to keep walk situations at zero and check-ins smooth? I run a 10:45 p.m. cross-check between Opera and two OTAs and call any unmatched bookings, but I’d love a simple checklist or script that keeps notes clean for the morning team and ensures every confirmed guest has a room.
Try a 10:30 late-arrival sweep in Opera: filter for res created after 8 p.m., tag them “Late OTA,” paste the OTA conf # in Remarks, pre-assign a room, and for any “unmatched bookings” drop a one-liner note like “11p verify — OTA#, rate, ETA, initials” so the AM team trusts inventory; as a backstop, hold 1–2 phantom overflow rooms you release at audit — think training wheels you take off at 11. If you want a quick call script, use “Hi, it’s Lily from [Hotel]; confirming your ETA and card ending ____ so we keep your room.”.
Building on @lilyH90, I add a tiny buffer by dropping the channel manager sell limit by 1 at 10:40, clear the “unmapped/pending” queue, then in Opera stamp a note like “Verified OTA – TB 22:45” and pre-assign — like putting a traffic cone on the last parking spot while sync catches up. If it’s unused by 11:10 I reopen that room. Which CM are you on (SiteMinder/SynXis)?
, that ‘80+ by 9:30’ flood — what saved me is setting two public update windows and telling clients in my signature and morning voicemail (11:45 and 4:15), then logging a Clio custom field called Next Touch during triage. Attorneys see it on a saved view, and I can punt non‑urgent pings while I hit service deadlines; only caveat is true fire drills, which I flag to break the window. If you’re living in ‘Outlook rules and Clio tasks’ already, custom fields are quick to add: https://help.clio.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001931193-Custom-Fields — worth a try?