Choosing hotel management software in Nigeria: eight tests to run

Most hotel software lists the same features: reservations, billing, reports, a booking engine. The lists won’t tell you which system suits your hotel. What will is how each one handles the situations your hotel meets every week.

So give every system you shortlist the same eight, on its demo or its free trial, with your own rooms and prices. Hotels in Nigeria often compare systems such as eZee Absolute, Cloudbeds, HotelOnline, Little Hotelier, InnGO or Venus. This guide is written by Janus, and the tests work on any of them, ours included.

Before you start

• Who will use it. The receptionist on a shared desk computer records almost everything. If they can’t use it on day one, the figures you see will be wrong. Ask a receptionist, not the owner, to try each test.
• Where you’ll look at it. If you check the hotel from your phone, run every test on your phone too.
• What it costs, in naira. Ask for the monthly price for your number of rooms, what setup costs, and whether the price is in naira or dollars.
• What happens when the internet drops. Ask each vendor directly, and ask to see it.

The eight tests

1. A guest books on your website and pays online

Look for: the booking exists only once it is paid, the money reaches your account, and the booking arrives with its bill, so nobody types it in again.

Ask: where does the money go, and when does it reach my bank?

2. Reception records a transfer that hasn’t reached the bank

Look for: what staff recorded is kept apart from what has actually arrived, management can see what is still waiting, and the desk can still get on with the guest. Here is why that matters at the front desk.

Ask: who confirms a transfer, and where do I see the ones still waiting?

3. A guest stays two nights, orders food and pays part of the bill

Look for: room charges post themselves, food lands on the same bill, and what is still owed stays visible after the guest leaves.

Ask: show me a guest who has left owing money. Where would I find them next week?

4. A company sends several staff and needs one invoice

Look for: one invoice across all the stays, with VAT, the TINs and the company’s purchase order, built from the guests’ bills rather than typed again.

Ask: can I see what each company owes, and for how long?

5. The bar count comes up short

Look for: sales draw stock down as they happen, and each difference can be traced to a cause before anyone is blamed. Our bar stock taking routine shows what that tracing looks like.

Ask: what happens when a drink is sold that the system thinks is out of stock? A good answer is that the sale still goes through and the count explains the gap.

6. Someone buys supplies and photographs the receipt

Look for: the photo becomes the expense, with the amount and the VAT read for you, and the receipt stays with it for the accountant.

Ask: what happens when the receipt is faded or handwritten?

7. You’re away and want today’s picture

Look for: on your phone, today’s sales, the money received and how much of it is confirmed, who owes what, and what was spent, each figure opening to the records behind it. Our post on managing a hotel from a distance covers what to check.

Ask: can I see this for one hotel, and for all of them together?

8. Month-end: the accountant wants the numbers and the proof

Look for: the management accounts and the receipts behind them, prepared from the same records the desk keeps, not rebuilt in Excel.

Ask: can I give my accountant a file without retyping anything?

Two questions for every vendor

• How are mistakes corrected? A correction should be a new entry that keeps the history, and every entry should say who made it. Figures you can’t trace are figures you can’t trust.
• Who helps us switch? Ask who sets the system up, how guests already in the hotel are moved across, and who answers when the desk is stuck.

How Janus does on these

• Booking site: guests pay in full through Paystack, settled straight to your hotel’s bank account, and each booking arrives with the guest’s bill already open.
• Transfers: for a hotel with its Paystack receiving account connected, Janus confirms matching transfers against Paystack’s records. Other payments wait until a manager confirms them, and Janus never stops the desk checking a guest out.
• Guest bills: room charges post themselves, bar and restaurant sales land on the same bill, and the balance stays in view until it is paid.
• Companies: on the Hotel plan, Janus puts a company’s many staff stays on one invoice, with VAT, the hotel’s and the company’s TIN, and the company’s purchase order and goods received note.
• Stock: on the Hotel plan, Janus can draw stock down from the recipes attached to recorded bar and restaurant sales.
• Expenses: upload a receipt or invoice, and Janus prepares the expense for review and keeps the document and VAT details together.
• From your phone: you can open your hotel’s recorded sales, guest bills and payment checks wherever you are.
• Month-end: Janus brings sales, expenses, payroll and asset costs together to prepare your financial reports.

Run the tests on your own hotel. Start with Janus, or see the price for your rooms.