Hotel website chat: what it should answer

A hotel website chat should answer the questions that keep coming back, from what your site already says, and stop at anything that commits you: group prices, complaints, promises and allergies. For a hotel of twenty rooms the hard part is that stopping, and what happens to the question afterwards.

Tuesday, 23:40. Anna is asleep.

On the Hotel Kadeloft site, someone types whether the dog can come. The family leaves early tomorrow, they don't have a hotel yet, and Booking.com is open in another tab.

Anna won't see this until seven. Until then her website has two options: say nothing, or answer with what it already says. The house rules page has it in plain words: dogs welcome, €15 a night, not in the breakfast room.

Hotel Kadeloft, Anna and this guest are made up.

The questions it answers itself

These six keep coming back:

• Can I park, and what does it cost?
• Can I check in late, and how do I get in?
• Is breakfast included, and until when?
• Can the dog come?
• Can I leave my luggage after check-out?
• How do I get there from the station?

The answers are usually already on your website. A good chat uses them, word for word where it matters, instead of making something up. If a question has no answer on your site, that is worth knowing too: it shows you what your site is missing. Every question a chat can't answer is a line you can add, and then the next guest doesn't need to ask.

Where it should stop

A chat that always has an answer is the one to worry about.

There is a reason for that, and it has a case number. In Moffatt v. Air Canada, a Canadian tribunal held the airline responsible after its website chatbot told a customer he could claim a bereavement fare after booking, while another page on the site said otherwise. Air Canada argued the chatbot was a separate entity. The tribunal rejected that. It is one small-claims case in one country, so not a rule for your hotel. We would still plan as if what your chat says, you said.

What happens when it does not know?

This is where small hotels are different. There is no night desk to pass it to, so the handover has to reach the owner, wherever they are, and come back to the guest. On an ordinary evening at Kadeloft, that goes like this:

1. 21:12Guest"Do you have a charging point for the car?"
2. 21:12The chat"That's not on the site, so I'm asking Anna. Which address should the answer go to?"
3. 21:13Anna, on WhatsAppGets the question on her phone and types: yes, two on the quay.
4. 21:18Guest, by emailGets that answer in their inbox. The chat keeps it, so the next guest doesn't have to wait.

Be clear with guests about how the answer arrives. If it comes by email later, say so, and ask for the address. A guest can live with waiting until morning if they were told. A chat that goes quiet is what sends them back to the OTA.

That morning matters. You don't want your phone going off at 23:40 about a charging point either. Decide what can wait, and let the chat say so.

Should it say it's an AI?

Yes. In the EU, Article 50 of the AI Act asks that people are told they are talking to an AI, unless that is obvious. Tell them anyway: it sets the right expectation. A guest who knows it's a chat asks a short question and doesn't feel fobbed off when a question goes to you.

Taking the booking in the chat

Many hotel chat products can book a room inside the chat, usually tied to a large booking system. If you have one of those and it works, fine. For a small hotel we would ask a simpler question first: does the chat have a clear button to your own booking page? A guest whose question was answered is ready to book. Don't lose that moment to a link that goes to an OTA. It is one of six places to fix for more direct bookings.

Website chat or WhatsApp?

They do different jobs, and you can have both. If you have nobody at night and most questions come before the booking, start on the website.

Privacy

A chat does not need cookies to answer a question. Ask the guest before you keep their email address, and delete what you no longer need. Check this before you buy: plenty of widgets set cookies the moment the page loads, and then your cookie banner has to cover them. That banner is no small thing on a phone: on 8 of the 20 hotel sites we opened, it covered at least a quarter of the screen.

Six questions to try before you buy

Don't read the sales page. Open the chat on a site that already uses it, or on your own trial, and type these:

1. Ask something that's on the site. Does it answer from your own text, and can you see which text?
2. Ask for a price for a group of twelve. Does it stop?
3. Say you're allergic to nuts. Does it stop?
4. Ask something the site doesn't say. Does it admit that?
5. When it stops, where does the question land, and how does the guest get the answer?
6. Where does its Book button go, and does it set cookies?

Sources

• McCarthy Tétrault on Moffatt v. Air Canada, 2024 BCCRT 149
• EU AI Act, Article 50