Hello @mauritsbots,

Here are a few more steps you can take to encourage bookers to add their credit card themselves for guarantee purposes in the MEWS PMS system:

1. Clearly communicate the importance of providing a credit card for guarantee purposes during the reservation process. Emphasize that it is a standard procedure and necessary to secure their booking.

2. Provide a user-friendly and secure online booking engine or guest portal that is easily accessible from your hotel's website or booking confirmation email. Make sure the platform is mobile-friendly for convenient access.

3. Include step-by-step instructions on how to add their credit card in the booking confirmation email or any pre-arrival communication. Highlight the benefits of adding their credit card, such as a faster check-in process or the ability to charge incidentals to their room.

4. Offer assistance to bookers who may have difficulty adding their credit card online. Provide a dedicated phone line or email address where they can reach out for support. Your staff can guide them through the process or manually input their credit card details with their consent.

5. Consider implementing a pre-authorization process where a temporary hold is placed on the booker's credit card to ensure its validity. Clearly communicate the pre-authorization process to bookers and explain that it will be released upon check-out.

6. Regularly update and maintain the security measures of your online booking engine or guest portal to instill confidence in bookers that their credit card information is safe.

By following these additional steps, you can encourage bookers to add their credit card themselves for guarantee purposes in the MEWS PMS system, streamlining the reservation process and enhancing guest satisfaction.

What we experience with customers who don't want to give their credit card is by sending them a cancellation if they don't enter their information in time or sending a payment link valid for say 48 hours to pay for the first night because they didn't enter a credit card. If they do not pay or enter their credit card that the reservation will be cancelled. Some pressure never hurts. Customers who do neither you may be almost certain if the weather is bad that they will not come off anyway.

Hope this is helpfull. 

Best regards, 

Robin 

Hi @barb00sa we are using MEWS BE, and have 0 say in what is marked or written there. 
What portal are you referring to? As a booker cannot login by themselves using a magic link, as the magic link is only created for the guest after a reservation is made?

Hello @mauritsbots 

surely at Mews there are mail templates that can be customized with your own text and explanation. Like the " before start" where you can put in some explanation to make clear to the people that they have to fill in their credit card information. At our hotel we also use Mews. Here the girls at the reception always have the instruction when making a direct reservation that they have to make it clear to the customer in advance what data we need from them to make a reservation. And that is name , phone number and an email address as well as a credit card number. If they say they don't have their credit card number at hand or their spouse is at work and has the credit card with them then an option reservation is sent out which is valid for 24 hours, then they can enter the card themselves or call back with the card information. If they say they don't have a credit card then we send a payment link from Mews or some other system that they must pay within 24 hours or the option will expire. So far I have had virtually no problems with that and it works satisfactorily. 99% always have their credit card through over the phone. Once the cc card is in the system you can have the pre-authorization done automatically, if the card is not valid then the customer is automatically notified to update their card details. Hopefully this will help you, although it is not really a solution to your problem of getting people to enter their card details, but it is a solution to get your card details faster.

Gr Robin

hi Robin, thanks but its not really the scenario here

• a booker, lets call him John, makes a reservation for Sally (by phone, or by e-mail. NOT in the BE). 
• John states that he is guaranteeing the reservation with his credit card
• We input manually the cc details in John's profile
• We add John as Booker to the reservation, and fill out in the notes that John is guaranteeing the reservation.

We then could pre authorize Johns’ given card but a standard authorization is only valid for max 28 days or so - so a future booking would still be open without authorization, and a 0 euro authorization is also not possible..  

But the primary issue here is that we don’t like having the hotels asking for cc details, because of () mistakes are being made over the phone, as well as issues with people giving these numbers out via email. 

So we want the booker to input these details themselves, also ensuring that the two factor authentication etc is triggered.. but to do that, we would need something like the magic link.. without a reservation being made… 

HOW?