On the Books

Definition of “outside” the hotel industry

In general, unless you look specifically at the hotel industry, “On the Books” has the following meaning:

“on the books” / “officially recorded”.

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However, it is also often used when you want to say that someone is officially employed in a company or is an official member of an organization. For example, you can say: “A ban on texting while driving is on the books in most US states” — There is an official/legal prohibition on writing messages while driving.

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OTB in the hotel industry

The meaning has changed somewhat here. This term describes bookings that are really fixed and confirmed. So it's in the books. In our case, this is Property Management System meant. You get the data from there.

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The key figure is used very often in forecasting. It therefore describes the current booking situation for a specific period of time. This means the number of rooms booked per day, the available bookings, the occupancy as well as the average price and the current rating.

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These are metrics that are used when it comes to seeing how occupancy or income is accounted for in a hotel.

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This shows the current pre-booking status for a period in the future. Of course, changing this pre-booking status is also of interest to every hotelier.

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As a term, “Business on Books” and “On the Books” are used interchangeably.