At 10.15 on a Friday morning, housekeeping finds water under the vanity in room 412. The room goes out of order, the supervisor tells the duty manager, and the duty manager leaves a message for the plumber. By 3pm the hotel is full except for that room, the front office still cannot sell it, and nobody can say whether the plumber is coming, has been, or was ever booked.
An out-of-order room is lost revenue every night it stays that way. In a hotel or motel group, those rooms are usually spread across several properties: a leaking shower here, a split system that will not cool there, a broken door lock, a cracked basin, a stained carpet after a spill. Each one is small. Together they can take a handful of rooms off sale across the group on a busy weekend, and the reasons sit in duty manager notes and text threads.
OpsChase puts every out-of-order room on one board: housekeeping raises the job with a photo, your contractors are offered it first and followed up until the work is done, and area operations sees which rooms are still waiting across every property.
From the housekeeping cart to a work order
Housekeeping and room attendants find most room faults first. With OpsChase they raise a work order from their phone against the property, the floor and the room: water under the vanity in 412, a split system blowing warm air in 207, a door lock that will not read a key card in 118. They add a photo and a short note, including whether the room has to come off sale or can stay in use until the fix.
Your front office keeps setting room status in the property management system the way it does now. OpsChase does not replace that system. It carries the repair: who is attending, when, and what proof comes back, so the room can go back on sale with the work actually done.
Your contractors per property and per trade
The plumber who knows the riser layout at the city hotel may not cover the airport motel, and the locksmith who services your key card locks is not the one for a jammed balcony door. Set the order of your contractors per property and per trade: the firm on your service agreement first.
The faults that take rooms off sale
- Water. Leaking showers, blocked drains, running toilets and cracked basins go to plumbing; grout and tile repairs in bathrooms go to tiling.
- Air. Split systems and fan coil units that will not heat or cool go to heating, ventilation and air conditioning.
- Power. Dead power points, lights and bedside switches go to electrical; portable appliance checks on kettles and hair dryers go to test and tag.
- Access. Door locks, key card readers and balcony doors go to locksmith; cracked windows and shower screens go to glazing.
- Finishes. Damaged walls and doors go to painting and carpentry; torn or stained carpet goes to flooring.
- Ceilings. Leaks from the floor above or the roof go to roofing and plumbing.
- Room readiness. Pest sightings go to pest control; deep cleans after a leak or a spill go to cleaning.
Attend-by times set by tonight’s arrivals
Every job carries an attend-by time that fits what the room is worth tonight: same day for a room needed for a full house, before the weekend for a room the property can hold back, within the week for a scuffed wall in a room still on sale. Late jobs show against your response targets, so area operations can see which rooms are off sale and why before the revenue meeting, not after it.
Contractor compliance before booking
Keep licence, public liability, induction and site-access details on file for each contractor through contractor compliance, so the team at each property can check them before booking. Hotels often have their own rules for working in occupied corridors, quiet hours and guest areas, so keep a note of which properties each contractor has been inducted for.
Proof before the room goes back on sale
Set proof templates per job type: before and after photos of the room, a note from the contractor, and a certificate where electrical or gas work needs one. With proof of completion on the work order, the duty manager can see the shower is fixed and the floor is dry before the room goes back to the front office, and housekeeping does not find the same leak at the next turnover.
Rooms that keep coming back
Some rooms are out of order every few weeks: the same shower, the same split system, the same lock. With Assets & planned maintenance switched on, each room and its fittings keep their own job and service history, and you can run planned maintenance such as split system cleans, lock servicing and shower resealing through scheduling on the same queue as breakdowns. When room 207’s air con fails for the third time this year, every visit is on the record, so the call between another repair and a replacement is made on what happened, not on memory.
What area operations sees on one board
With every property on one board:
- Housekeeping raises room faults with photos, the room number and a note on whether it is off sale.
- Your contractors are set in calling order per property and per trade.
- Attend-by times follow the rooms needed for tonight and the weekend.
- Photos, notes and certificates are attached to the work order.
- Area operations sees every out-of-order room across the group in one view each morning.
For guest-facing plant such as kitchen cool rooms, laundry and central plant, read hotels: guest plant fixed before check-in. For the wider picture across properties, read about multi-site maintenance.
Starting with one property
Pick the property with the most out-of-order nights last month. Import its floors and rooms, the contractor book and the trades each firm covers. Set roles for housekeeping supervisors, duty managers and area operations. Set proof templates for plumbing, heating and cooling, locks and finishes. Raise the next out-of-order room into OpsChase instead of a message to the plumber, then add the next property.
Read the hotels industry page or book a demo with your property list and contractor book. Check pricing when you are ready to put every property on one board.
A room that goes out of order at 10am should be back on sale before the evening arrivals, with the repair on the job and nobody guessing whether the plumber came.