# Allotment, release period and stop-sale: controlling rooms you sell

> An allotment is the rooms a hotel holds for you, the release period is when the unsold ones go back, and a stop-sale closes a date whatever is left. How the three interact, a 10-room worked example, and which control to use when.

*Source: https://itravel.cloud/blog/hotel-allotment-release-period-stop-sale · published Nov 1, 2026 · topic: Hotels & inventory*

An allotment is a number of rooms a hotel holds for you each night. The release period is how many days before that night the unsold ones go back to the hotel. A stop-sale closes a date whatever is left. Between them they decide what your agents can book. Judge the release on the hotel's own calendar, night by night, and never let a stop-sale touch bookings already made.

## The four ways a hotel gives you a room

Each room type first needs one answer: how does the hotel give it to you? There are four, and they behave differently (the [travel trade glossary](/travel-trade-glossary) has the short definitions).

**Free sale.** The hotel holds nothing for you; you sell until it tells you to stop. Easy to load, and only as good as the hotel's habit of telling you when it is full.

**Allotment.** The hotel holds a number of rooms a night for you, and takes back the ones you have not sold a set number of days before each night. That number of days is the release period.

**Guaranteed.** You pay for the rooms whether you sell them or not, so nothing is released: the rooms are yours, and so is the bill.

**On request.** No rooms are held and every booking waits for a yes. A different selling model, covered in [on request or instant confirmation](/blog/on-request-vs-instant-confirmation).

These are contract facts, not preferences. Load what the contract says, the same way you load [rate plans and seasons](/blog/loading-contracted-travel-inventory).

## How a release period actually works

A release period of 14 days means: the rooms held for the night of 20 March can be sold up to and including 6 March. From 7 March they belong to the hotel again.

Three details decide whether a system gets this right.

**It is judged night by night.** The hotel takes rooms back one night at a time. A three-night stay arriving 18 March needs the nights of the 18th, 19th and 20th, and the 18th releases first, on 4 March. From 5 March that stay cannot be sold from the allotment, even though a one-night stay on the 20th still can until 6 March. A calendar showing the 20th as open does not mean every stay through it is.

**It is judged on the hotel's calendar.** "Fourteen days before" means fourteen days in the place where the hotel is. Take a hotel in Bali (UTC+8) and an agent in Dubai (UTC+4). The hotel's date turns over at midnight in Bali, which is 20:00 in Dubai. At 20:30 on 6 March in Dubai, it is already 7 March at the hotel and the night of 20 March has gone back. Neither the agent's clock nor your server's is the right one.

**Released means released.** If an agent cancels a room for 20 March on 9 March, after the release day, that room goes to the hotel with the others, not back on sale. Whether the hotel charges you is a separate question, answered by your contract and the [cancellation policy you sell](/blog/cancellation-policies-agents-can-read).

## A worked example: 10 rooms, 14-day release

Say a hotel gives you 10 Deluxe rooms a night for March, on allotment, with a 14-day release. Follow the night of 20 March.

| Hotel's date | What happens to the night of 20 March |
|---|---|
| Up to 6 March | Agents book from the 10 rooms held. Each booking takes its rooms under a lock: two agents cannot both take the last one. |
| End of 6 March | Six rooms are sold. This is the last day the night sells. |
| 7 March | The four unsold rooms go back to the hotel. The night stops selling to agents. |
| 9 March | An agent cancels one of the six. The room comes off the sold count and is counted as returned to the hotel: five now. |
| 20 March | Five rooms check in. |

Now change one thing. On 2 March the hotel calls: an event has filled the property and it can give you no more rooms for 20 March. You put a stop-sale on that night for the Deluxe room. The six rooms already sold stay sold, nobody new can book, and nothing is released on 7 March, because a closed night holds nothing to give back. If the hotel cannot honour the six stays, that is a conversation with the hotel and an action on each booking, not something the stop-sale does on its own.

## What a stop-sale should do, and what it should not

A stop-sale is the strongest instruction you have. It has to override rooms still held, a special price, a promotion and selling on request once full. If any of those can reopen a closed date, the stop-sale is only a suggestion.

What it must not do is reach backwards. A stop-sale, or a lower room count, refuses new sales and leaves every existing booking as it was. If closing a date quietly cancelled confirmed stays, a routine call from the hotel would become a crisis for agents whose clients already hold vouchers.

Two smaller controls sit beside it:

- **Closed to arrival** or **closed to departure**: the date stays open for stays passing through it, but nobody may check in (or check out) that day.
- **Minimum stay on arrival**: arriving on that day needs at least N nights. Useful for peak dates without closing them.

And one trap with guaranteed rooms: **a stop-sale does not stop the bill.** Closing the date stops you selling them; you still pay for them.

## Which control to use when

| Situation | Control | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Hotel holds no rooms and tells you when it is full | Free sale | Simplest to load; you depend on its stop-sales arriving quickly. |
| Hotel holds rooms and takes back the unsold ones | Allotment with release days | You sell with confidence until the release day; then the risk is the hotel's. |
| You have committed to pay for the rooms | Guaranteed | Never released. The unsold room-nights ahead are your cost. |
| Every booking must be checked with the hotel | On request | No rooms held. The agent books, you confirm or decline. |
| Hotel is full or closed on some dates | Stop-sale on those dates | Overrides everything and refuses new sales. Existing bookings stay. |
| No check-ins on a changeover day | Closed to arrival | The date stays sellable for stays passing through it. |
| Peak dates need a longer stay | Minimum stay on arrival | Keeps the date open without one-night bookings. |
| Rooms held for one partner agency or a group | A room block | Kept apart from the general pool. See [group travel software](/group-travel-software). |
| A whole destination closes for a public holiday | Close many hotels at once | One step instead of one hotel at a time. |

## How a portal should behave

Whatever system you use, test these before you trust it with a peak season:

1. **Rooms are taken under a lock, inside the transaction that creates the booking**: checked when the agent sees the price, checked again at the moment of sale.
2. **A cancellation gives rooms back through one path**, read from what the booking took, not from today's settings.
3. **Release is judged per night, on the hotel's date.**
4. **A stop-sale refuses everything new and touches nothing old.**
5. **Agents see what is left** ("only 2 left"), and a reason when a night will not sell.
6. **What went back is recorded**, so you can show the hotel how much of the allotment you used.

These six are the core of a [B2B booking engine](/b2b-travel-booking-engine) for contracted hotels.

## Setting it up in iTravel

- **The room type** says how the hotel gives you the room: free sale, allotment, guaranteed or on request. An allotment room has a default number of rooms a night and a release in days before arrival; leave the release empty and the rooms are never released.
- **The availability calendar** sets, for a date range and chosen weekdays, a number of rooms held, back to the default, or a stop-sale, one room type at a time. A separate mode sets only the day's restrictions (minimum stay when arriving, closed to arrival, closed to departure).
- **Release is judged on the hotel's own date**, taken from the hotel's location, and each night of a stay is checked on its own. An hourly sweep records the unsold rooms that went back.
- **Bookings take their rooms under a lock in the booking transaction**; a cancellation gives them back through one path. The calendar never writes the sold count, so neither a stop-sale nor a lower count changes a booking already made.
- **Close and open dates across many hotels** at once, with a preview and one undo. Only the stop-sale changes; rooms held, restrictions and sold counts stay.
- **A rate plan can have its own block** inside its room's allocation, and **room blocks** hold rooms for one partner agency or price tier with their own release days.
- **The hotel's extranet**, a link with no login, lets someone at the hotel keep the availability calendar current, stop-sales included. Every change is shown to you.
- **The revenue view** shows rooms held against sold for the next 30, 60 and 90 days, and the rooms releasing unsold this week. Switch on the daily release mail for a hotel and its reservations office gets one mail a day, at or after 08:00 hotel time, listing the rooms that came back.
- **Supplier payment terms** can fall on the room's release day, if that is what your contract says.

How rooms, rate plans and seasons are loaded is on [hotel contracting software](/hotel-contracting-software).

## What to set up first

For every room type, before the first agent books:

- [ ] The allocation matches the contract: free sale, allotment, guaranteed or on request.
- [ ] Allotment rooms have a default number of rooms a night, and dates the contract treats differently have their own number.
- [ ] The release period is the contract's number, in days. Empty only if the contract really never releases.
- [ ] The hotel has a location, so its local date is the one release and stop-sales are judged on.
- [ ] Known closures and minimum stays for peak dates are entered now, not the week before.
- [ ] Someone at the hotel knows how to send you a stop-sale, or has their own extranet link.
- [ ] You have looked at the rooms releasing unsold this week, and decided whether to push them to agents first.
- [ ] For guaranteed rooms, you know how many unsold room-nights you are carrying: that number is your cost.