HOLIDAY & TOURISM MARKETING, IS HEBERI THREAT TO TOUR OPERATORS?

HEBERI seems to be something interesting on the Holiday & Tourism Market. What is it about exactly?

Well, there are Online-booking platforms such as booking.com, expedia.com, trivago.com, etc. and there are many Tour operators like TUI in Germany, Thomson in the UK, Fritidsresor in the Scandinavia, TEZ TOUR in Russia, etc. in holiday & tourism industry. So the first part is the Online Booking Platform and the second group is Tour Operators. HEBERI is neither of them but is a marketing platform. It is not the same as any of those mentioned.
 

Ok so to which one of those categories Heberi is closer then?

If you need to place close to one category, it is far closer to Tour Operators. It is more helpful for Tour Operators. We believe a very big percentage of the holiday industry flows through Tour Operators. We built HEBERI to support their marketing challenge.
 

So, to better understand; can you give me a live example to clarify its position. For example, how helpful HEBERI is for TUI? Why should TUI use?

Well, when you mention the name TUI, let me give you an example with TUI then: TUI has hotels in destinations and works with agents across Germany to find clients. For TUI, it is not important where or which particular HOTEL the client goes on holiday. In terms of profitability, they are almost the same for TUI. And TUI makes marketing in Germany to find clients for Holiday and mainly they find clients through Agents, right? TUI pays certain percent as booking commission for every booking they make anyway. Until here, things are clear;
 
Now, assuming TUI works with HEBERI; hotels that work with TUI can also make their marketing to agents too in addition to TUI`s marketing. They can offer and pay an extra commission from their side, apart from TUI`s commission payment. And can ask agents to recommend his hotel for bookings. In that case, not only TUI is searching for clients but Hotels are also searching for clients and both are searching clients for TUI. Hotels search for booking on themselves but via TUI because TUI is the authorized Tour Operator in Germany. This is why we call it helpful for Tour Operators. This is something new.

 
When you talk about marketing, what exactly you mean? How a hotel can make marketing to agents?

Well, that is another unique function of HEBERI. Traditionally, marketing takes place via fairs. You print brochures, posters and during fair organization time, you try to deliver as many brochures as possible to agents/clients attending and expect them to choose your hotel for booking.  We made this online. We brought Hotels as one user and Booking Agent as the second user. The Hotel can prepare its advert on his own and send it to all booking agents in the system.
 
In HEBERI, there are ready professional templates for Hotels to use. They just need to select a template, a few of his hotel's best images, and the most eye-catching facility/features. Then send it to agents of the country you want. His advertising will be sent instantly to all agents in the country he selects. And they can use the marketing 7/24 anytime they need.

 
Well, it seems Hotels can use marketing to find clients for themselves, but why should Booking Agent use? What is his advantage in using HEBERI?

Look, no one is using HEBERI to make us or you a favor. The hotel needs to use it to make marketing, to catch clients. Because for Tour Operator; A hotel and B hotel is almost the same. But the hotel owner wants clients for his hotel only.
 
Tour Operator needs to use HEBERI to increase the marketing with the help of Hotels. It simply a marketing supplement to his.
 
And Agent will use to increase his commission income. TUI pays a certain percent of commission anyway. And agent gets this without us. But let's be clear, every hotel owner wants the client to his hotel only. Now, what is wrong if the Hotel owner pays an extra commission from his end? Is this something wrong?
 

So, an extra commission from the Hotel is an extra income for Agent. What is the rate, how much the Hotel will pay?

Well, that’s what the Hotel Owner will decide. Neither to pay/don't pay nor its rate. We don’t have interference on this point. However, if they set an offer and agent makes a booking based on a predefined commission offer, it MUST be paid within 24 hours from the client’s check-in date.
 

What if he doesn’t pay then? What happens then?
The hotel owner's entire account will be locked automatically. Hotels in his account will automatically be converted offline and will be prevented to appear for new bookings, he will be prevented to make marketing until the pending balance is closed.
 

Is EXTRA commission from hotels the only new additional activity for Booking Agent? Do you have something else on HEBERI?

An extra commission from the Hotel for agents is something new with HEBERI. Agents can make excursion bookings too with Heberi and get its booking commission. Holidaymakers go on multiple excursions during their holiday. For the vast majority of clients, the holiday is not only staying a hotel, but they also explore the region. So actually, the agent increases his booking commission sharply. The agent can also make bookings for clients shopping and receive another commission.

 
Well let me ask you a question about payment on HEBERI; we all know that there are serious question marks about holiday booking platforms payment system in terms of user's credit card security. How secure your payment system is? Can you guarantee user's credit card security?

Yes, you are right. Online Holiday booking platforms have a very serious problem with the reliability of user's credit card credentials security. Coming to HEBERI: We work with PayPal for payments. All payments are taking place on PayPal`s payment page. When you go on payment and click the PAY button at the end, it is redirecting you to PayPal`s payment page. So you make the payment on PayPal`s payment page, no payment is being initiated on our page. And receiving payments by agents is available with a valid PayPal account only. No payment is sent to his bank account directly from us.
 
Actually it is PayPal`s responsibility to secure the user's credit card/PayPal account credentials security. But we all know that PayPal is the biggest online payment system in the world and user's payment security is their top priority. Therefore, we give a 100% guarantee for their PayPal account/Credit Cards credentials security.

It is also clearly mentioned on our page, we don`t collect or transmit user's credit card details. We collect payment only and in terms of HEBERI, PayPal collects our payments.

 
Final question sir? Assuming a hotel did not make commission payment on time and his account is locked. What happens then, do you send lawyers or sue them to court? How does the procedure work?
 
Well, thanks for asking this question. Let me be very clear. There isn`t and will not be any legal procedure to take place for not paid commission payments from HEBERI. No lawyer will be authorized for such cases. However, the entire account also will not be reopened unless the pending balance is online paid. Hotels in the account will be prevented to appear for new bookings and to conduct marketing until the pending balance is closed. Eventually, when he pays the pending balance, the account will turn online automatically. This is how our system works.
 

Well, that was supposed to be the last question but let make one last question. What do Hotels need to be most careful about when using HEBERI?

There is only one thing to be careful about. The APPROVAL of booking. Because no automatically approved booking will be received by hotels or other service providers. They will receive Booking Requests only. And that request needs to be APPROVED manually within 24 hours from its receiving time. If the Booking Request is not approved, it will be rejected automatically. There is no commission payment for rejected bookings and the account will not be locked for rejected booking requests. Commission payment is for approved bookings only.  So when you receive a booking request you MUST approve it within 24 hours. Otherwise, Agent will see it as rejected and naturally will make the booking on some other hotel.
 
When a hotel receives a booking request, our system fires a notification email to his user email saying there is a new booking. But, we can’t guarantee to receive that notification email, because his email server may reject receiving emails from us, may redirect to spam/junk folder, etc. So we suggest users checking their HEBERI account once a day at least.
 
Thank you very much. The very interesting system indeed.