The San Francisco Travel Association offers two housing services for conventions. One service provides a reservation system for group housing and monitoring room blocks utilizing multiple hotels; the second service specializes in booking and tracking hotel rooms after cutoff dates. See below for further details on each program.
Housing Reservations System
In partnership with Experient (formerly known as I.T.S), www.experient-inc.com, the San Francisco Travel Association offers a host of delegate housing services designed to make a meeting planner’s life easier. Attendees under our system have:
- A web-based system or toll-free reservation number.
- The option of making reservations by e-mail, telephone or fax.
- Email confirmation for any reservation, modification, or cancellation.
Meeting planners receive personal service from a dedicated housing professional working with them and also includes:
- 24/7 access to hotel pickup reports.
- Manage and monitor inventories.
- Develop housing instructions.
- Produce a camera-ready hotel map for reproduction.
- Assistance with adding overflow hotels if needed.
- Implement a deposit-based system that reduces “no shows.”
- Minimum per-reservation charge.
The San Francisco Travel Association will act as your housing agent provided you are using two or more hotels utilizing a minimum of 1500 rooms peak night. Should your group not qualify for Bureau housing, we can provide names of member organizations who offer housing services for smaller groups. Please contact convention-services@sanfrancisco.travel.
Effective July 1, 2012, San Francisco Travel Association is partnering with Convention Management Resources (CRM) to provide convention housing to groups. Officially called San Francisco Travel Convention Housing – Powered by CMR®, this new program will deliver a customized housing experience based on local expertise, provide international group coordination, on-site housing desk, audits for room block credit, among many other benefits. In return for using this service, groups will be able to select from a bevy of meeting enhancements and marketing services. Click here for more information
Book and Track Hotel Rooms After Cut-off
aRes Travel, Inc. has partnered with the San Francisco Travel Association to help meeting planners capture last minute hotel reservations. The post cut off activity gives the full picture of the total pickup of groups and tracks those attendees who make their reservations after the cut off date. aRes Travel has the capability to work with any housing company or third party, with no limitations to the size of groups, regardless of whether they use either single or multiple properties.
How it works:
At cut off or when an official block is sold out, the meeting planner will be provided with a toll free number and/or a link to the official San Francisco Travel Association housing website and assigned a group code. When the attendees call or login, they are asked which convention they will be attending. A housing reservation is made under the attendee's name and the reservation is tracked under the group code.
The aRes Travel Call Center is open Monday-Friday 6am-10pm, Saturday and Sunday from 8am-8pm Pacific Time. Online booking is available 24/7.
After the conference, an attendee list and room pickup by hotel - day by day - is provided to the meeting planner.
A final report is provided to assist with history, which reflects the post cut off activity to provide your future cities. There is NO COST to the planner or their attendees. It is a free service to assist with last minute requests and any additional movement after cut off and up to day of arrival.
ARES Housing Service - What are the benefits?
- There is NO COST to the planner or your attendees.
- After cut-off, last minute requests can be accommodated and tracked.
- A final report is provided to assist with history which reflects the post cutoff activity to provide your future cities.
Founded in 1995, aRes Travel, Inc. is an industry-leading provider of travel planning services. The entire aRes Travel Network is powered by proprietary technology, which offers reservation services for hundreds of lodging properties, car rental companies, major attractions, and local tour and transportation providers. aRes Travel works with the majority of hotels in the San Francisco Region and has one of the largest selections of hotel rooms in the San Francisco region, all at greatly discounted rates.
For more information, please contact Lauren Fisher - Account Services Manager, Advanced Reservations Systems, Inc at lauren.fisher@arestravelinc.com 415.227.2621 or convention-services@sanfrancisco.travel.
