Set up rooms and categories correctly

Define the target structure before entry

Start with two lists: products guests can buy and every physical room with number, floor, beds and occupancy. Do not copy an old portal structure without checking it.

Hotel Nordlicht uses 16 physical rooms in four sellable categories. Every number appears once. Non-guest spaces stay out; temporary renovation is handled by a dated block.

Build a signed target inventory before changing STRYK. List every sellable category and every physical room with room number, floor, capacity, bedding, accessibility, special equipment, current use and whether it may be sold. Separate guest-facing category features from internal room facts. Reconcile the list with real doors, fire or maintenance plans and the property’s existing booking commitments. Decide stable category names and room identifiers; renaming later can confuse operations and future channel mappings. Identify units that are inactive, under renovation or permanently removed without pretending they belong to another category. Record who approves the target and the effective date. The mapping is ready when each physical unit appears exactly once, category totals equal the real property and management can explain every exception. Entering data before this reconciliation merely digitises uncertainty and risks incorrect availability for a small hotel where one room materially changes capacity.

Create clear sellable categories

Open Rooms → Rooms & categories and create categories first. Use a short unique name and stable code. Separate categories only when guests and staff can explain the difference reliably.

Maintain short and long descriptions in every language you sell in (STRYK supports 18 languages). Use concrete facts such as bed, occupancy, size, bathroom, location and included amenities.

Create categories as clear sellable promises. Use a concise guest-facing name and define occupancy, bedding, size or meaningful differentiator without marketing exaggeration. Maintain short and long descriptions in every language you sell in from the same verified facts. A category should group rooms that can fulfil the same core promise and rate logic; do not combine unlike accessibility, capacity or equipment merely to simplify the list. Conversely, do not create a category for every cosmetic difference that can be handled as a room feature. Keep names understandable across reception, Booking Engine and connected sales channels. Review sort order and active state, then reopen the category after saving. Compare the public wording with real photos and physical rooms. Category setup passes when a guest can choose confidently, reception can offer an equivalent room within the group and management can price the group without hiding a materially different unit.

Maintain capacity, amenities and photos as sales truth

Enter standard and maximum occupancy according to real preparation and sales rules. Verify adults, children and extra beds with front desk and housekeeping.

Select only amenities available in every unit of the category. Use real photos in a useful order and ensure imagery and copy promise the same product.

Treat capacity, amenities and photos as sales truth. Set maximum adults, children and total occupancy according to the real bedding and approved operating rules. Do not increase capacity because a room has floor space if the property cannot legally or operationally provide the bed. Maintain active amenities centrally and select only those consistently available for the category; a feature belonging to one physical room may need room-level handling rather than a category promise. Use approved images of the actual category, with a representative first image and no borrowed stock room. Review crop and clarity on desktop and mobile Booking Engine views. Translate amenity labels and descriptions into every language you sell in, where supported. Test party combinations at capacity boundaries and confirm unsuitable combinations remain unavailable. This section passes when public search results, category detail and the room a guest receives all tell the same story about space, beds, equipment and appearance.

Assign every physical room exactly once

After categories, create every physical room using the number used on doors, keys and housekeeping lists. Assign exactly one category and correct floor.

Compare displayed room count with the target list. Keep history intact and use dated blocks for temporary unavailability.

After every change, confirm again that each physical room is assigned to exactly one active category. This keeps sellable inventory clear after renovations or category changes.

Create every physical room once and assign it to one current category. Use the real operational room number, not a temporary sequence, and add floor, location or internal facts needed by reception and housekeeping. Verify that the room is active only when it may participate in operations and inventory. A room move between categories is a controlled inventory change: review future bookings, pricing, capacity and guest promises before applying it. Do not clone a room to represent renovation, and do not reuse an old room identifier for a different door because historical bookings and audit context must remain intelligible. Expand each category in Rooms view and compare the visible room count with the signed target inventory. Test a search and booking selection for the new unit. The assignment passes when no door is missing or duplicated, every room inherits the intended category logic and future room-type-level inventory can map without ambiguity.

Separate room state from inventory block

Housekeeping states describe preparation and do not replace availability blocks. A dirty departure room remains part of inventory and returns to ready after cleaning.

Technical defects, renovation or owner use require a dated block with reason. Verify the exact unit and dates, then check availability.

Separate operating condition from sellable inventory. Housekeeping states describe cleaning and occupancy workflow: work started, done, Ready or stayover service completed. A technical defect, maintenance, renovation, out-of-order period or deliberate service withdrawal belongs in Rooms and blocks because it must affect availability and Booking Engine. Ready is only for a vacant, cleaned and checked room; it is not a shortcut for an occupied stayover. A block needs concrete rooms, dates, reason, owner and release check. Deactivation is for a deliberate master-data decision, not a temporary repair. Test each case: a housekeeping update must not change sellable inventory, while an active block must remove the intended room nights from sale. Reopen calendar and availability after saving. The separation passes when reception sees the real room condition, sales sees the real inventory and neither team uses a convenient status to imitate the other system.

Verify pricing and availability with test stays

Open Pricing and verify each active category has a traceable base price and a real bookable rate. Calculate one test stay per category.

Also test maximum occupancy and one guest above it. Create an internal test booking and, where configured, verify the draft booking-page preview.

Verify the structure with controlled stays before approval. Search one, two and several nights across each active category, including dates around a season boundary and a period with one blocked room. Test single, double and family occupancy at the capacity limit. Confirm category availability equals active physical rooms minus bookings and blocks, not a manually entered guess. Select a physical room and ensure it remains conflict-free for the full stay. Review the rate plan and nightly totals so category changes did not disconnect pricing. Open the draft Booking Engine preview and compare names, descriptions, photos, amenities and capacity without publishing incomplete data. Use a negative test for an oversized party or blocked last room and verify no booking can proceed. The test passes when PMS availability, pricing and Booking Engine preview agree for positive and negative cases and every result can be explained from rooms, bookings, blocks and rules.

Approve inventory and control later changes

Complete approval with management, front desk and housekeeping. Count categories and rooms, test price, occupancy and availability, and verify operational clarity.

Later changes require a reason and impact check. Renaming, occupancy and reassignment affect sales and future bookings; never “clean up” history by deletion.

Approve inventory with a signed count and a controlled change process. Review every active category, its room count, capacity, descriptions, amenities and image set; expand every room row and confirm identifiers and category assignment. Save the approval date and responsible manager. For later changes, first describe the reason and impact on future bookings, availability, rate plans, Booking Engine and future channel mapping. Make one change, wait for STRYK confirmation and repeat the relevant positive and negative test. Never edit live room inventory casually during a busy shift or delete history to make the list shorter. Use blocks for temporary outages and planned deactivation for permanent decisions. Schedule a periodic audit and investigate any difference between physical rooms and system count immediately. Inventory remains approved when every change is traceable, connected systems are retested and the sellable count continues to match the property’s real doors and promises.

For proof of receipt, create a concise, dated inventory matrix: category name, number of active physical rooms, room numbers, maximum occupancy, basic bedding, active photos, and last successful positive or negative search. The matrix is not a second master data source, but an audit report; continue to carry out all repairs in the responsible area of STRYK. Open a future reservation per category with a sample and check that the room characteristics, guest promise and capacity can be fulfilled even after the modification. If the quantity, public description or price of a category differs from the approved status, stop the related publication, name the source error and repeat the full inventory test. Thus, the subsequent change will not go unnoticed, but with proven new adoption.

Record the date and person responsible for the next regular audit in the same place, so that the match between the physical number of rooms, the STRYK set and the public offer is not a one-time project, but a permanently checked hotel standard.