Hostaway vs Elina
This article examines Hostaway vs Elina by concentrating on the main features that a hospitality management software should offer. The data has been collected from Hostaway’s and Elina’s websites and help articles. We also checked their reviews at Capterra to find the aspects that the actual users are emphasising.
Guest Review
In Capterra, Hostaway has a rating of 4.7, with the highest score for Customer Service.
Trustpilot introduces Hostaway as an Excellent tool with a 4.7 TrustScore.
In Capterra, Elina has a rating of 4.5, with the highest score for Customer Service and Value for Money.
Hostaway sends out automated messages called “Native Messages” to the guests based on the reservation event. These auto-messages will be sent to channels like Airbnb, and the guests receive them on Airbnb. You can set messages in Hostaway and send them out for Expedia, HomeAway, TripAdvisor, and Booking.com.
Regarding payments, if the channels do not process them, they will pass you the card details, and you can charge the cards to proceed with the payment through your Stripe account.
Elina offers an Online Check-in feature which makes the booking process easier. With this feature:
- Guests can check or change their personal information and details needed for their stay.
- You can gather particulars about the guest, such as the flight number, or even personal info, including diet preferences, room temperature, or sorts of pillows.
- You can ask for an e-signature for your terms and conditions.
- You can ask for the upload of ID documentation.
- You can request and collect a photo of the lead guests.
Elina also allows you to upsell extras/add-ons on your bookings.
Hostaway offers integration with top channels such as Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia, HomeAway/Vrbo, 9flats.com, and Innclusive (which provides a commission-free listing for the owners). Hostaway also offers iCal integration with other channels such as OwnersDirect, Tripping.com, Widmu, Perfect Places, and OneFineStay.
Hostaway:
- Pushes rates and availability in real-time and makes sure that those are up to date across all channels.
- Enables you to export your listings (calendar and content) from Hostaway into HomeAway/Vrbo if you have five or more active listings, and they are listed on HomeAway/Vrbo.
- Offers a manual iCal synchronisation when you have less than five listings for TripAdvisor and Flipkey. If you have five or more listings, Hostaway offers a 1-way API integration.
- Lets you export your listings to Booking.com if you have more than five listings. However, you can only export one listing per address.
- Sets channel mark-ups.
- Sets a “booking window” at channel level.
- Notifies you if there is a “modified reservation” by using the “Airbnb Pro” connection. You can also manage “Special Offers” in your Hostaway account.
Elina offers a 2-way XML connection for rates, availability, restrictions, and reservations. So, you can integrate with major OTAs, including Booking.com, Airbnb, HomeAway, Expedia, Agoda, HRS, Ctrip, Silverdoor, Mr and Mrs Smith, and Tripadvisor.
Elina’s channel manager updates the max length of stay automatically to remove split bookings. It also lets you control price mark-up by adjusting prices for OTAs and managing your availability per channel, using withholding rules and rolling booking windows.
Hostaway gets help from cleaning services through integrations with Properly and Doinn. You can export your listings into these platforms.
- In Hostaway, you can set up cleaning tasks before arrival and after check-out.
- The housekeepers have access to the tasks on both the dashboard and their mobile app, where they can attach photos and leave comments.
Elina’s Task management includes:
- Daily housekeeping to-do list.
- Accessing future housekeeping tasks by days.
- Viewing order delivery list.
- Creating and managing maintenance requests.
Hostaway integrates with Operto. Operto sends the access codes to the guests after you set a message in Hostaway to allow it to send those codes.
Elina offers an Online Check-in feature that allows guests to have an easy verification process using their reservations ID and email.
Elina integrates with some door access and room control providers, such as My Booking Portal, Dissolving, and Livion Key to provide a convenient check-in and check-out experience for the guests.
- Hostaway allows you to choose the subdomain’s name for your direct booking website, select the listings you would like to be published on the website, and add titles, content, background images, and social media contact information.
- Your Stripe account will be connected to your website.
- You can use the WordPress plugin to connect your website to Hostaway’s website.
- Hostaway’s Open API option enables you to integrate your Hostaway software with any other website.
- Elina offers the Easypro Websites for an extra fee.
- Elina sets up your secure SSL with a top-tier provider.
- You can unlock these websites to continue editing the design and coding.
- EasyPro automatically syncs all your content from Elina into your website.
- Their website is mobile-friendly.
- Ther website is PCI-compliant with secure payments.
- Elina’s built-in booking engine comes with extra fees.
- Elina integrates with Google Analytics, enabling you to track website performance.
- Elina provides three different account logins for the guest, the company/manager, and the rental owner.
Elina also offers a web design service for hotels, serviced apartments, and vacation rentals. The Elina website team build your direct booking website using the Umbraco content management system. They can also code, maintain, and host your website.
- Hostaway allows you to set weekly and monthly rates and push them to the channels.
- You can set rates for all the connected channels by editing them on the calendar.
- You also have the option to import rates from your Airbnb account into Hostaway and send them to other channels.
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- Hostaway facilitates guest experience through integration with YourWelcome and Wishbox.
- Through Hostaway, you can send messages automatically, thanking the guests for reservations, welcome messages, and post-check-out messages and trigger them according to the channel, listing, or event type.
- You can choose templates from the system and set this automation for all channels or all listings, one listing, or one specific channel.
- You can set triggers and send the message based on the reservation status, arrival/departure, enquiry, and pending reservation. You can pause, cancel, or edit these “scheduled messages” and send them manually.
- The “Native Messaging” feature enables you to send the message to Airbnb and Booking.com, and these channels will send the email to the guest.
- The “Guest Reviews” feature of Hostaway allows you to receive reviews from the guest from the top channels, and you would be able to reply to the reviews that come from Airbnb and Booking.com.
- Elina’s booking engine includes a guest lounge. Guests obtain access to this lounge via a link in account activation.
- Elina PMS enables you to have as many automated emails as you want, including booking confirmation, guest login, travel directions, check-in info, terms and conditions, and pre- and post-arrival emails.
- Elina allows you to store marketing preferences.
- Elina also gives you access to pre- and post-stay contact info to build solid relationships with guests.
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Elina’s Online Check-in enables you to gather details about the guest, such as the flight number, or even personal info, including the guests’ photo, diet preferences, room temperature, sorts of pillows, etc.
This PMS allows you to:
- Access detailed guest info.
- Track guest preferences.
- View reservation history and the number of times a guest has stayed or booked.
Hostaway:
- Connects to Properly and Doinn, so if you have an account on these platforms, you can outsource your maintenance operations.
- Allows assigning tasks to the user, supervisor, and teams, which can be managed from both the system and the mobile app.
- Lets the cleaners attach photos or leave comments so that you will be informed about an issue.
Elina provides connections with Breezway and Room Checking for maintenance management and housekeeping.
Hostaway’s app is useful for hosts and staff members.
- The team members can see the tasks that they have been assigned to. They can also check all the tasks related to their team and “accept” the task to complete it.
- Using the filter options, the staff member can search the tasks in their app and choose the one that applies to their role.
- The cleaners can upload photos as attachments on their mobile app.
Elina is a web-based platform and has not developed a mobile app yet.
- Hostaway offers a tagging system that allows you to add tags to the listing to make filtering easier.
- In each listing, you can create a “Custom Field” and configure detailed information about the units.
- For manually creating a listing, you can add rooms and beds. The bed-type export feature is available for HomeAway and Booking.com.
- Some settings (content) in Hostaway can be exported to Airbnb such as discounts, minimum and maximum stay restrictions, check-in & check-out time, cleaning fee, extra guest fee, etc.
- The system allows you to cross-list the properties, and you would be able to set bookable properties as separate units and together as a whole.
Elina can work with properties all over the world. Each place can be set up differently, allowing you to have properties in any format you need. These are managed by categories known as “areas” and “types.” Typically, an area would be a city or district, and then within those areas, a type would stand for either a single property or a group of similar properties.
- Hostaway allows you to create general tasks and reservation-based tasks and assign them to the team members. The assignee will get notified via email. As the manager, you will be provided with an overview of all tasks in some categories such as “to do,” “accepted,” “in progress,” and “done,” and you can see them on the calendar (tasks that are linked to reservations).
- The system allows you to put the staff into groups and assign a supervisor. The tasks can be allocated to the listing, channels, or both.
- The tasks are based on the listings and events, and you can create them both manually and automatically. The manual task option is handy for not recurring tasks, and you can use the available options in the software to set them. The assignee can start and end the task from both the platform and mobile app. The system also allows you to set recurring tasks.
- There is a Time Report option that tells you how much time was spent on the task.
- You can add the following options to your tasks: a checklist, costs, resolution notes (giving and leaving feedback), and attachments (cleaners can upload images before and after cleaning).
- You can give permissions to the users to “view, modify, delete, and edit” the tasks. If the modification is done through the mobile app, any reservation changes would not be applied to the task.
Elina’s centralised management system keeps you in control of reservations, operations, and finance via single or multi-locations.
Operation tasks, such as invoicing, updating OTAs, guest communication, room pricing, and payments are automated by Elina.
Notes are allowed on Elina, so you can:
- Create and manage notes on reservations and internally assign to persons, and label key info.
- See notes history on the booking calendar.
- Attach notes to reservations, guests, companies, and properties.
In Hostaway, you can give owners access to the system by setting an email address and password and defining the properties they are allowed to see. The system enables you to let the owner see the listings, reservations, calendar, or all of them. You can allow them to modify, create, or delete listings and reservations, as well.
Elina PMS allows you to create accounts for owners, so they can manage availability on their rentals, view their properties’ performance, and see bookings.
You can view owners’ profiles, including standard information, documents, multiple addresses, and notes history.
You can set up fixed, or percentage withholding and use this in monthly reports to property owners.
Depending on the configuration, you can give owners a number of free nights to take back without approval or upon request.
Hostaway’s payment partners are Stripe and Braintree (Braintree does not pre-authorise the deposit).
- You can specify whether you process the payment by credit card or send an invoice to the guests with the payment instructions manually.
- When the invoice is created, you can charge your guests directly from the invoice; their credit card will be charged, and the amount will be managed on your Stripe account.
- You can set automatic invoices for new reservations and decide whether they will be created for all channels or only for a specific one. You can also link the invoices to some or all listings. You can set up auto-charge and split charge by scheduling the triggers (based on reservation, check-in, and check-out). You have the ability to pause or edit a charge at any time.
- Pre-authorisation only works for auto-charge and auto-invoices.
- You should manually mark the invoice as fully or partially paid.
You can make payments both online and in person by using ElinaPAY’s leading technology.
- Sends secure payment links
- Allows you to collect card and/or payment in the booking engine.
- Enables you to use online check-in to take payment from the guest before arrival.
- Lets you charge imported cards automatically, when the charge is due, or manually when required.
- Provides portable card payment terminals (PDQs) for in-person payments.
Hostaway provides you with reports that you can view based on listing level and channel level.
Through these graphics, you can see:
- Rental revenue per channel.
- Booking nights per channel.
- Rental revenue per reservation per channel.
- Daily reservation received per channel.
- Reservation per channel.
You can use the sample formula included in the system or create your calculations by selecting some values related to taxes like city tax, sales tax, and other values related to reservations like Damage Deposit and Additional Cleaning Cancelation Fee. After creating this, you will be able to check the Financial Report.
The Occupancy Report gives you information about days available, days booked, total check-ins, revenue, revenue/days booked, revenue/days available, cancellations, etc.
Elina’s Today Dashboard shows:
- Today’s arrivals, departures, orders, and notes.
- Reservations made since yesterday, with a filter to see which are arriving today.
- Sources of bookings.
- Recommended actions.
Elina’s Yesterday Dashboard shows:
- Payments and invoices info and actions.
- Review of revenue and add-ons.
Elina’s Performance Dashboard shows:
- Monthly overview of occupancy, RevPAR, and ADR.
- Last month, current month, and next month’s bookings.
Hostaway has integration with Pricelabs, Beyond, and Wheelhouse.
Elina offers dynamic rate management using which you can edit rates, create dynamic rates, and link rates together.
In addition, Elina integrates with dynamic pricing tools, such as Beyond, PriceLabs, and OutPerform to eliminate manual rate updates.
Hostaway facilitates being in touch with the support team and receiving assistance for most of the updates and configurations. They hold webinars when there is an update, and guides for setting up the system are available.
There is a fixed charge for the setup.
Elina’s built-in support is accessible from the Smarter PMS.
There are hundreds of step-by-step guides, videos, tips, and pointers.
Also, the system shares the new improvements, shows the product roadmap, and unveils the latest updates on partner services.
In Hostaway, if you want to integrate with your accounting system, you can use an Open API.
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Hosaway’s unified inbox offers two views, which are the inbox and the guest conversation.
The inbox can be filtered by all listings, all channels, recent activity, and reservation status.
In the conversation page, you can find information such as the guest name, channel name (Airbnb only), check-in and check-out, name of the property, and the number of the guests. Some options link you to the calendar, booking page, and guest portal.
The guest portal contains the reservation details, photos, and Google Maps, and you can share its URL with your guests. The guests can also access the invoice, and they can leave a note for you.
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Pricing
Hostaway pricing offers different options. To get an accurate quote, you should contact them for your customised pricing plan. Hostaway charges 367.80 GBP ($500) as the setup fee. Typically, the price starts at 25.75 GBP ($35) per listing, but it drops down as the number of units increases.
There are two options for paying Hostaway subscriptions:
- Commission-based (2% of monthly revenue)
- Flat rate
Based on a rough calculation for a business operating around 200 units, Hostaway pricing would be about 14.71 GBP ($20) per listing. Another estimation for four units with a different combination of features would be 11.03 GBP ($15) each and 183.90 GBP ($250) of setup fee.
You can get a pricing quote by giving some information about your business on Elina’s pricing page.
Features like the booking engine, channel manager, online check-in, and direct booking website come with extra fees.
Hostaway vs Elina: Which Property Management System to Choose?
Hostaway enables the user to advertise and list their properties on top channels easily. The company is looking to improve by adding new features. Hostaway communicates with its clients and develops what the users need or suggest. If you aim to concentrate on some channels, especially Airbnb, Hostaway provides you with a smooth synchronisation. However, Hostaway does not offer many tools to improve your direct bookings.
Elina is a comprehensive software that effectively manages hotels, vacation rentals, and serviced apartments. Its user-friendly interface enables staff to navigate the system quickly and easily. Elina offers a variety of features, including real-time inventory management, automated invoicing, and reservation tracking, which boost property managers’ productivity and save time. However, Elina’s price is higher than other property management systems, as some features come with additional charges. Besides that, the absence of the Unified Inbox feature in Elina may make you reconsider choosing this software.
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