Contents12
- 1. The one-off hotel software costs at the start
- Setup, implementation or onboarding
- Data migration
- Training
- Hardware
- 2. The costs that scale with your property
- 3. The costs that arrive as "modules"
- 4. The contract terms that cost the most
- 5. Compare hotel software on three-year total cost, not monthly price
- The email to send before you sign
- Where Stayvieo stands
- Frequently asked questions
Comparing hotel software on the monthly price is like comparing hotels on the room rate. It tells you something, but it isn't what you end up paying.
This isn't usually deception. Software built for 200-room properties genuinely does carry implementation costs, and vendors who serve that market price for the work involved. The problem starts when a twelve-room guest house reads the same pricing page, sees "from £X per month", and budgets for exactly that — then meets the setup fee, the training day and the per-channel charge on the first invoice.
If you are still working out which category of system you need, start with hotel management software, reservation systems and channel managers. For the headline numbers, our guide to what a hotel PMS actually costs in the UK sets the baseline. This piece is the next step: the charges that don't appear on the pricing page, and how to get them in writing before you commit.
Here's what to look for in hotel software pricing, in the order it tends to catch people out.
1. The one-off hotel software costs at the start
Setup, implementation or onboarding
A charge for configuring the system — room types, rate plans, tax settings, user accounts. Sometimes that's real engineering work. Often it's a form somebody fills in on your behalf.
Ask: Is there a setup fee? What exactly does it cover, and what happens if I'd rather do that configuration myself?
Data migration
Moving your existing reservations, guest records and rate history across. This is the fee that quietly traps people in a system they've outgrown, because moving is charged at both ends — to get out of the old one and into the new one.
Ask: Is importing my current bookings included? What formats do you accept, and is there a limit on the number of records?
Training
Sometimes bundled, sometimes billed per session, per user or per hour. Watch for training that is free only during onboarding — the cost reappears when you hire a receptionist in eight months' time.
Ask: Is training included for new staff later, or only at launch?
Hardware
Less common with cloud systems, but check whether card terminals, key encoders or printers must be bought through the vendor at their price rather than your own.
2. The costs that scale with your property
This is where a cheap-looking hotel software plan becomes an expensive one.
Per-room pricing. Common, and not unreasonable in itself. What matters is the shape of the curve: your bill grows every time you add a room, including rooms that aren't earning yet. Tiered or flat pricing behaves differently — check where the next tier starts, not just what today costs.
Ask: What does this cost at my current room count, and what does it cost if I add five rooms?
Per-channel connection fees. Some setups charge for each booking site you connect, or an activation fee per connection, or both. List on five channels, pay five charges. Some also charge to change a connection later.
Ask: How many channels does my plan include, is each additional one charged, and is there a fee to swap one after launch?
Commission or per-reservation fees. A percentage of each booking, or a flat fee per reservation processed — on top of what the OTA already takes. On direct bookings this is the one worth modelling carefully, because it converts a fixed cost into a variable one that grows precisely when business is good.
Ask: Is there any commission or per-booking charge, on any booking source, including direct?
Payment processing. Card processing has a real cost, so a fee here is expected. The question is whether the software adds a margin on top of the payment provider's rate, and whether you can bring your own merchant account.
Ask: What's the processing rate, is it the provider's rate or marked up, and can I use my own processor?
3. The costs that arrive as "modules"
A base plan that looks affordable sometimes excludes the very thing you were buying hotel software for. The usual candidates:
Reporting and analytics — occupancy, ADR and RevPAR sold as a premium tier
Housekeeping — room status tracking as an add-on
Guest messaging — automated confirmations and pre-arrival emails priced separately
A booking website for the property — your own direct-booking page sold as a separate product, occasionally with its own commission on the bookings it brings in
The mobile app — the same system on a phone, behind a higher tier or a per-user licence
Multi-property — a second property billed as a second subscription rather than a second entry on one account
API access — charged, or restricted to enterprise plans
Additional users — per-seat pricing that bites when night staff need their own logins
Support — a paid tier to reach a human, or guaranteed response times behind an SLA
None of these are unreasonable to charge for. They're only a problem when the plan you were quoted doesn't include the feature you're buying the system for.
Ask: Which of the features I saw in the demo are on the plan I've been quoted — including the app and a booking website for the property?
4. The contract terms that cost the most
The fees above are money. These four hotel software contract terms are leverage, and they matter more.
Minimum term. Twelve, twenty-four or thirty-six months. If the system doesn't suit you in month three, you pay for the rest of the term anyway. Longer terms are often traded for a discount, which is a fair deal once you know the software works for you. Before you've run it in your own property, it's a bet.
Auto-renewal and the notice window. Many contracts renew automatically unless cancelled within a set window — commonly 30, 60 or 90 days before the renewal date. Miss it by a week and you've committed to another full term. Put the date in a calendar the day you sign.
Annual price uplift. A clause allowing the price to rise each year, sometimes indexed to inflation, sometimes at the vendor's discretion. Check whether there's a cap.
Data export on exit. The most important clause in the contract and the one nobody reads. If you leave, can you take your bookings and guest records with you, in a usable format, at no charge? If the answer is unclear, assume it's no — and price the cost of being unable to leave into the deal.
Ask, in writing: What's the minimum term, what's the cancellation notice period, is there a cap on annual increases, and what does it cost to export my data if I leave?
5. Compare hotel software on three-year total cost, not monthly price
The only honest comparison is total cost over the term you'd realistically stay. Build this for each shortlisted system:
Line | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
Subscription (× 12 months, at your room count) | |||
Setup / implementation | — | — | |
Data migration in | — | — | |
Training (launch + new staff) | |||
Channel connection fees | |||
Commission / per-booking fees (estimate at your volume) | |||
Payment processing margin above provider rate | |||
Add-on modules you actually need | |||
Additional users | |||
Annual uplift | — | ||
Total |
Then add one line underneath: cost to leave — remaining term liability plus any data export charge.
Two hotel software systems quoted at a similar monthly price routinely land thousands apart on this table. It takes an afternoon to fill in, and it's the highest-value hour in the whole buying process. Our PMS selection checklist covers the rest of the shortlisting work.
The email to send before you sign
Copy this, send it to every hotel software vendor on your shortlist, and keep the replies.
Before we proceed, could you confirm the following in writing?
Total one-off costs to go live — setup, configuration, data import, training.
Whether the plan quoted includes reporting, housekeeping, guest messaging, the mobile app and a booking website for the property, or whether these are add-ons.
Any commission, per-booking or per-reservation fee, on any booking source.
Card processing rate, and whether it's marked up above the payment provider's rate.
Cost per additional room, user, property and channel.
Minimum contract term and cancellation notice period.
Whether prices can rise during the term, and any cap.
What it costs to export our booking and guest data if we leave, and in what format.
A vendor who answers all eight plainly is one you can plan around. Hesitation on question eight in particular tells you most of what you need to know.
Where Stayvieo stands
We'd rather answer our own eight questions than make you ask them.
£29 a month on Starter, up to 10 rooms. £79 on Growth, up to 50. Both are published on the pricing page — no quote required to find out whether we fit your budget.
No commission on your bookings. Not on OTA bookings, not on direct ones.
No lock-in contract. Monthly or yearly, cancel any time, no exit penalty.
A 14-day free trial that needs no card, so you can run it in your own property before you commit to anything.
Live in a day, not a multi-week implementation project.
Two-way channel sync with rates, availability and bookings on one calendar — two connected channels on Starter, unlimited on Growth.
A direct-booking website for the property, so the cheapest booking channel you have is the one you own.
Our add-on list and full comparison table are still being finalised, and we'd rather say that than imply everything is included. If a line changes, it changes on the pricing page before it changes on your invoice — and if there's something you need answered before the trial, ask us on the demo page and we'll put it in writing.
Frequently asked questions
What is a typical setup fee for hotel software? It varies widely by segment. Systems aimed at larger properties commonly charge a one-off implementation fee running into the hundreds or thousands of pounds, reflecting genuine configuration work. Systems built for small independents more often include setup, because the configuration is a short exercise. Neither approach is inherently better — what matters is that the fee is disclosed before you sign.
Do hotel management systems charge commission on bookings? Some do, as a percentage of booking value or a flat fee per reservation, and it can apply to direct bookings as well as OTA ones. This is separate from the commission the OTA itself takes. Always ask explicitly whether any per-booking charge applies to direct bookings — that's the case people assume is exempt. Stayvieo charges no commission on any booking source.
Do I pay extra for the mobile app or my own booking website? Often, yes. A phone app is frequently a higher tier or a per-user licence rather than part of the base plan, and a direct-booking website for the property is commonly sold as a separate product, sometimes with its own commission on the bookings it brings in. Both get demonstrated and rarely itemised, so name them in the quote.
Can I be charged to get my own data out? Yes, in some contracts — either as an explicit export fee, or in practice, by only offering data in a format nothing else can read. Check the exit terms before signing rather than at the point you want to leave, when you have no leverage. A vendor confident in the product usually has no reason to make leaving difficult.
What is a reasonable minimum contract term? For a small independent property, none is entirely reasonable — cloud software carries no per-customer setup cost that a long term is needed to recover. Where a term exists, twelve months is common and often discounted. The question worth asking is what happens in month three if it doesn't suit you.
Why do vendors advertise "from £X per month"? Because the lowest plan at the smallest property size is the most attractive number available, and pricing pages are marketing. It isn't dishonest, but it does mean the advertised figure rarely matches a specific property's bill. Ask for a quote at your room count, on the plan that includes the features you saw in the demo.
How much should a small UK hotel expect to pay in total? It depends on room count, channel mix and which fees apply, so a single figure would mislead. The useful exercise is the three-year table above — fill it in for each shortlisted system and compare totals rather than headline rates. Our UK PMS pricing guide walks through the main pricing models.
