Ask Dr. Data

An Advice Column for Revenue Managers in the Hospitality Industry. To ask a question of Dr. Data, the revenue management specialist, send a message here. Dear Dr.Data: In order to get accurate REVPAR statistics I need to determine the number of out of order room nights for a given period -- usually a month. How do I do that? -- Confused in Columbus Dear Confused: This, indeed, is a difficult problem. The difficulty stemps from the fact that there is no transaction file similar to IN_TRN for out of order nights. There are no transactions. Luckily you can use the IN_UTYP2 table. It is complex but once you learn how to use it the table has a wealth of information. I have written a short paper describing the method and you can download it here. Dear Dr. Data: I need to create an export file with the names, addresses and email address of past guests. How do I do it? -- Stupefied Sales Manager in St. Louis Dear Stupified, Many HOST users have asked me to help them create a list of past guests with email lists that they can export to Excel and use to generate an e-mail marketing campaign. Here are the key steps: 1. Create a new, blank R&R report using the IN_GUEST table as your master table. 2. Select the guests that you want to market to using fields in the IN_GUEST table such as LSTSTAY, NITES, STAYS,LSTAMOUNT. 3. Insert all the fields that you need from the IN_GUEST table onto the record band line. 4. Create a new, calculated field called emailnk with the following expression: "G"+GUESTNUM Note: The letter G must be capitalized. 5. Click on the Join Table icon and use the field you just created as the linking field. 6. Find the IN_EMAIL table and pick it as the Related Table. 7. Use the IN-EMAIL.IDX file as the index. 8. Accept all the other defaults and save the join. Close the Join Table dialog box. 9. Position you cursor wherever you want the email field to appear and insert the EMAIL field from the IN-EMAIL table. Dear Dr. Data: Is there an easy way to find past guests who do not have a future reservation? --Puzzled in Pittsburgh Dear Puzzled, A rich source of future reservations is your database of past guests who have not made a future reservation. This can be combined with TechTip #1 to create a special email offer to those guests that have come in the past but do not presently plan to come in the future. Using the setup from TechTip #1 as a base, do the following: 1. Link the IN_GUEST table to the IN_RES table using GUESTNUM as the linking field and IN-RNUM.IDX as the index. Make sure that you pick SCAN relation in the relation type dialog box (step 4) and that you pick partial and enter 6 in the character match tab. 2. Add the following to queries to your filter: a. LEVEL is in the list"CNF","NEW" b. AND LSTSTAY <= date_rr c. AND UNIT is not in the list "CITY","MEMB" The LSTSTAY field is part of the IN_GUEST table and the query will only select those guests whose last stay was prior to the current date (or any date if you prefer). The resulting result set may have more than one record per guest. 3. Sort and Group on the GUESTNUM field. Create a group footer band line. Move all the fields to this band lime. 4. Suppress printing of the record bank or suppress its appearance.

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