Hotel Cash Flow Template

Set up the OTA & Channel Settlement Tracker with your current channel mix — what percentage of revenue comes from direct bookings, Booking.com, Expedia, corporate accounts, and other sources. Enter each channel's typical settlement timing. Once set up, this sheet feeds settlement timing into the Weekly Cash Flow sheet automatically and shows you when OTA remittances will actually arrive. Pay particular attention to periods after high-occupancy months: the cash from a full October doesn't arrive from OTAs until mid-to-late November, which can create a misleading picture if you're only looking at occupancy and ADR.

The cash dynamics that matter most in hotels are occupancy-driven but not occupancy-correlated in real time. Your labor costs — the largest cash outflow category at 30-40% of revenue for most full-service properties — run on a weekly payroll cycle regardless of how last week's occupancy looked. Housekeeping hours scale with rooms cleaned, but front desk, maintenance, and management labor are relatively fixed. Franchise fees, typically 5-10% of room revenue, are due monthly based on the prior month's performance, adding a one-month lag to a cost that's already occupancy-variable. Understanding these timing relationships is what separates hotels that manage cash proactively from those that are perpetually surprised by the gap between their RevPAR report and their bank balance.