Rate comments, also called contract comments or contract remarks, are important information that the traveler should know when they book a hotel.
Some examples of rate comments are:
This information could be related to hotel operational but also to rate limitations or hotel rules. For this reason, it is important to show this information during the booking process.
Rate comments are sent on each booking operation, it is Availability, CheckRate, Confirmation and even Booking details operation.
Note: Depending on the operation, the information is represented differently (but contains the same information).
Next, an example of how rate-comments look like at Availability response:
[...]
<rate
rateKey = "20201205|20201207|W|256|217516|DBL.DX|GC-ALL|RO||1~2~1|6|N@05~~20c65~107727977~N~~~C8707DE2DC8C4F4159912750444500AAUK0200059001000021020c65"
rateClass = "NOR"
rateType = "BOOKABLE"
net = "101.12"
allotment = "37"
rateCommentsId = "256|24524|3"
paymentType = "AT_WEB"
packaging = "false"
boardCode = "RO"
boardName = "ROOM ONLY"
rooms = "1"
adults = "2"
children = "1"
childrenAges = "6">
<cancellationPolicies>
<cancellationPolicy amount = "75.54" from = "2020-12-02T23:59:00-08:00"/>
</cancellationPolicies>
</rate>
[...]As you can see in this example, the “rateCommentsId” tag under “rate” node returns one code (256|24524|3). To know the meaning of this code, you will need
to use the information from the Content API.
Example:
rateCommentsID = "1|92088|3"
Incoming: 1
Internal rateCode: 92088
Rate: 2
Check in date: 13th October 2016
In APItude CONTENT we could have:
Incoming Code Rates Date Start Date End Description
1 92088 1,2 1st May 2016 1st Sep 2016 "Minimum age of registration 19"
1 92088 3 1st May 2016 1st Sep 2016 "Minimum age of registration 21"
1 92088 1,2,3 2nd Sep 2016 1st Dec 2016 "Minimum age of registration 21"
Reviewing the incoming, the code, and the rates, we could have 2 possibilities, "Minimum age of registration 21" and "Minimum age of registration 19", but as the check-in date is 13th October 2016 the rateComment to display is "Minimum age of registration 21".
NOTE: If you find more than one description applicable to the check-in date, you would have to concatenate each rate comment and show it to the final passenger.
Full content regarding rateComments can be found in the content-API reference.
Next, an example of how rate-comments looks like at CheckRate response:
[...]
<room code="STU.ST" name="STUDIO STANDARD">
<rates>
<rate
rateKey="20190615|20190616|W|1|74400|DBT.ST|NRF-PVP-BB|BB||1~1~1|2|N@8C91991695504401542298099837AAES0000011000000001010b5"
rateClass="NOR"
rateType="BOOKABLE"
net="505.80"
sellingRate="562.00"
commission="56.20"
commissionVAT="0.00"
commissionPCT="10.00"
rateComments="Estimated total amount of taxes & fees for this booking:3.30 Euro payable on arrival. Key Collection 15:00-00:00.Check-in hour 15:00-00:00.Car park YES (with additional debit notes) 12.00 EUR Per unit/night"
paymentType="AT_WEB"
packaging="false"
boardCode="BB"
boardName=" BED AND BREAKFAST"
rooms="1"
adults="2"
children="0">
</rate>
</rates>
[...]The way that CheckRate operation shows rate-comments differ from availability. The two main differences are:
Taxes
Those can be retrieved from availability response, after the development of the tax breakdown, more information could be found here here
Issues
Those can be retrieved from content-API using hotels or hoteldetails operations under <issues> tag. More info here.
Some facilities
Those can be retrieved from content-API using hotels or hoteldetails operations under <facilities> tag and are identified using the value true on the "voucher" tag. More info here.
Contract comments: (those are the rate-comments that you can see in the availability step)
Those can retrieve the ratecommentid description using ratecommentdetails operation from content-API. More information here.
Note: It is not possible to get the full rate-comment description at Availability response as you would get it from CheckRate response.
As availability response only shows the rate-comments codes, in case you need the rate-comments meaning during your booking process, you need to implement of two Content API operations:
Use the “rateCommentDetails” operation:
This operation uses the rate-comments code and the check-in date of the availability request to return the rate-comments description. Check for more information here.
Use the “rateComments” operation:
This operation returns all rate comments of all hotels. Next an example of how it shows one rate-comments with this operation:
[...]
<rateComment incoming="102" hotel="14978" code="173049">
<commentsByRates>
<commentByRates rateCodes="2 0">
<comments dateEnd="2022-12-31" dateStart="2014-10-24">
<description>First child until 12 years old free in room only basis, sharing room with their parents, on request.
Cot from 0-2 years old free, on request</description>
</comments>
</commentByRates>
</commentsByRates>
</rateComment>
[...]To know how this match with codes sent at availability, use the following formula (taking into account the hotel selected):
rateCommentsId = incoming | code | rateCodes
Note: dateStart and dateEnd are used to know the time frame where this comments are appliable