Expedia is launching Expedia QuickConnect, a reservation system interface that enables independent hotels and small- to medium-size hotel chains to link property management and central reservation systems to Expedia. Through Expedia QuickConnect, hotel partners can now easily automate the exchange of room availability, rate and booking information with Expedia, Inc. sites. 

Expedia QuickConnect allows a wider range of hotel partners to benefit from the cost, speed, accuracy and security advantages of direct connectivity with Expedia’s reservation system and enables hotel partners to strategically manage their reservation office by monitoring their room inventory more accurately in real time. In addition, Expedia QuickConnect increases customer bookings to a property by allowing the hotel partner to offer a wider range of room types and decreases labour costs by eliminating the need to input bookings from fax reservations.

“We are thrilled to be one of the first PMSs to provide seamless connectivity to the Expedia platform for our hotel customers using Expedia QuickConnect,” said Jan-Willem Moors, operations manager at LodgeGate?. “Using the Web site provided by Expedia, we found all the information we needed to deliver our side of the interface quickly and with minimal effort. We have had the interface live with hotels since the beginning of May 2007, and we look forward to rolling this out further to our current customers and are confident it will be a significant value-add to attract new customers.”

Developed to be lighter than industry-standard Web services architecture, the Expedia QuickConnect platform eliminates the complexity of customized integration projects. The new platform, designed with independent hotels and small- to medium-size hotel chains in mind, enables all qualified Expedia Special Rate hotel partners to quickly and easily access a full-featured application programming interface (API) with searchable specifications and sample XML code to facilitate deployment.

“The Expedia QuickConnect solution with LodgeGate significantly increases our efficiency,” said Wynand de Graauw, managing director of Aeon Plaza Hotels. “Our staff reaps the benefits of this and as a result, they can focus even more on delivering service to our guests and centre their efforts on delivering consistent quality in the Die Port van Cleve Hotel. The fact that rates are easy to load and that our guest have access to last-minute availability unquestionably adds value to us.’

“We’re excited to offer Expedia QuickConnect to our hotel partners, tailored to meet the needs of our hotel partners in the small chain and independent segments that prevail in the European market,” said Murad Hajeebhoy, vice president of lodging and destination services for Expedia EMEA. “Providing a seamless interface that replaces the manual tasks of maintaining rates and inventory and entering reservations will greatly simplify their daily tasks and enable them to focus more time on their customers and their core business.”
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