OTA has ledgers not only for each property, but also separate ledgers for every booking. Because of this, paying owners is a two-step process. First you need to disburse all bookings from the booking ledger to the owner ledger (plus holding accounts) before paying out owners the balance of their owner ledger.

We recommend only disbursing bookings 48 hours after check-out, unless you know someone has been to the property after the stay and there is no issue that needs to be addressed. Once a booking has been disbursed, it cannot be reversed. Things can be fixed using journal entries, but it is important you look at every booking carefully before disbursing.

At end of month it is up to you whether you want to disburse bookings that have checked out on the final day of the month or leave them to the following month's disbursements. 


Log into OTA+ and go to Bookings > Booking Search F4. Then click on the Check Out column to sort in order of check-out date.


There are a number of different colours that represent the status of the booking according to OTA+:


 

If a booking is Blue, this means that OTA+ believes it is ready to disburse, ie:


- the booking has checked out

- all payments have been posted

- the payments match the total tariff

- all charge items are mapped items as per the Extra Services settings


If a booking showing as Orange this means that the payments do not match the total tariff. This will need to be fixed inside Felix and is usually caused by Stripe fees not being removed from a Duve upsell charge item (eg. pet fee, early check-in, highchair, port-a-cot, etc). This is because Duve does not pass Stripe fee data through their API. We are currently working on a solution to automate a fix for this.


Open the booking in OTA+ by clicking on the details tab on the far right of the booking line.


 

Open the payments tab, as well as opening the booking in Felix. Check for any differences between the accounts. If in the payments tab in OTA+ you see a payment for $57 for an early check-in, yet in the booking in Felix there is a $60 early check-in charge, this needs to be fixed.

Edit the charge item in Felix to match the payment amount in OTA Plus, then add a negative payment using the 'Stripe fees' payment description option to the value of the difference. The total charges and total payments should still match and should now match the total payments posted to the booking in OTA+. You will then need to push a webhook to OTA Plus by going to the Log tab of the booking and clicking on the 'Resend Booking Notify' button at the bottom of that page.

After 5 seconds, refresh the screen in OTA Plus to ensure the booking has turned blue and is now ready to be disbursed.


A booking will always be Purple if a refund has been paid on the booking, which does not cause an issue for disbursements. However, sometimes when a booking is Purple, there is a payment waiting to be posted which is in actual fact a duplicate and needs to be deleted.


Only bookings that are blue or purple are able to be disbursed.


Once each booking is blue or purple, open up the booking in OTA+ to check the relevant information prior to disbursing funds.


First you will need to check the Payments tab to ensure there are no duplicate payments which need to be deleted (making sure by referencing the booking in Felix that they are not actual payments which haven't yet hit the trust account - in that case the booking cannot be disbursed).


Next you want to check the Extra Services tab to ensure there are no double-ups of charges. This can occasionally occur if a charge item is simply deleted in Felix. This currently does not remove the item in OTA+ and therefore causes a duplicate. We are working towards an automated solution for this. Remove any duplicates by selecting the item and clicking on the 'Delete Selected Service' button.


Next check the Fees tab. Ensure all fees are present, eg. agent fees, management fees. If anything is missing (a fee may have been temporarily deleted), click on the Re-Apply Global Fees button and all fees will update/reappear.  


If it is a booking.com booking, you will need to calculate the correct booking.com fees. Locate the booking in Felix and note the amount in the Price section beneath the Payments section of the Charges & Payments tab. Calculate that amount times your booking.com commission % including GST. Click on the booking.com fee in OTA+ and then select 'Edit Selected Fee'. Change it to the correct calculation and then save. Once you return to the Fees tab, MAKE SURE YOU CLICK ON RE-APPLY GLOBAL FEES to recalculate the correct revised management fee.


Please note, we are currently working on an automated solution for this.


Finally, go to the Check & Disburse Funds tab.


1. Make sure all charges are going to the correct ledger or holding account. If necessary, edit the holding account setting for any extra service items via the Extra Services tab.


2. If required you can edit the disbursement date to backdate for end of month or end of financial year requirements.


3. Click on the disburse all unposted amounts button to disburse the booking.



Please note, while this seems like a lengthy process, you should quickly pick up on any issues and fix your settings. After a month or two, you should find yourself requiring minimal edits to bookings before disbursing.


Once we complete a few more automation solutions and you find all bookings able to be disbursed without edits, we can turn on a bulk disbursements functionality which will enable you to disburse all blue bookings with one click of a button.