Initial setup
Access: the person who created the organisation. Members invited later land straight on the dashboard.
After creating your account, a wizard walks you through four screens: create your organisation, connect your PMS, choose your subscription, see the result. A Step 1 of 4 counter at the top of the screen shows where you are. Verifying your email address happens before this, on its own screen (see Sign in and account): it concerns your personal account, not yet your property.
Where it starts
Right after signing up (and verifying your address, or choosing to put it off), you land on the wizard, which opens directly on creating the organisation.
Step 1: create your organisation
The organisation is the account your properties are attached to. Two fields are asked for.
| Field | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Organisation name | The name of your company or your hotel. |
| Contact email | The organisation’s public address. Guests see it on their booking, and their replies land there. |
The contact email is not prefilled with your account address: it is meant to be published, so the choice is yours to make.
Advanced options
Two settings sit folded under Advanced options. Both are already filled in, so open them only if the proposed values do not suit you.
- Web address: the address of your booking engine. It follows the name you type until you edit it; from then on it stays exactly as you wrote it.
- Language for staff emails: the language of the emails sent to your team. It picks up the language you are browsing in. Guests always receive their emails in their own language. This setting only appears when creating the organisation, and can be changed afterwards from Settings, field Staff email language.
If the web address is already taken
Your web address has to be unique: it is what points guests at your engine, so two establishments cannot share one. If the address shown is already in use, or is one the platform keeps for itself, the form says so on that field and nothing is created: pick another, then submit again. Nothing is renamed on your behalf, the address shown in the field is the one that will be claimed.
The organisation name and the contact email are yours to repeat. Two establishments can be called the same thing, and a group can run several properties off a single reservations mailbox.
Create creates the organisation, with you as its owner, and the wizard moves to the next screen.
Step 2: connect your PMS
This is where your properties, rooms and rates enter the platform. Nothing is typed in by hand: it is all imported from your PMS.
Connect Apaleo opens Apaleo’s authorisation page, where you sign in with your Apaleo account and grant access. You are then brought back to this screen automatically.
Choosing which properties to sell
Once connected, the screen lists the properties on your Apaleo account. Tick the ones your booking engine should sell, then Save and continue.
- At least one property is needed: without it your engine would have nothing to offer.
- Unticked properties stay in your PMS, they are simply not put on sale.
- This choice can be changed at any time afterwards from General information.
Saving starts the import: room types, rates and services for the ticked properties are pulled from Apaleo. It takes a few moments.
This screen cannot be skipped: as long as no property is on sale, the wizard does not offer to go further.
Step 3: choose your subscription
This screen shows the available plans (monthly, annual), their pricing and the free trial in progress (14 days on the annual plan, 7 days on the monthly plan), straight from our payment platform. See Subscription for pricing and billing details.
Since your PMS is already connected, billing starts from the number of rooms actually put on sale on the previous screen, minimum of 50 rooms per property included.
- Choose a plan and click to continue
- You are redirected to a secure payment page to enter your card details
- Once the payment is confirmed, you come back to this screen automatically, which shows your subscription confirmation (or your free trial)
This screen cannot be skipped: without an active subscription, the wizard does not offer to go further. If the confirmation is slow to arrive after a payment, a message tells you so; it normally arrives within moments, and you can try again if needed.
If you have already had a subscription in the past (for example after a cancellation), this screen does not appear: you are redirected to the reactivation page, with no new free trial. See Inactive subscription.
Step 4: see the result
Preview my booking engine opens your engine in a new tab, at the web address you chose, the way a guest will meet it. You keep your place in the wizard.
Your rooms are on sale this time, since your PMS was connected at step 2. What is left to do (photos, wording, payment settings) happens from the dashboard, your engine being functional already.
Finish setup closes the wizard and takes you to your dashboard. You are not sent back to it afterwards.
Going back, picking it up later
Back returns to the previous screen without saving anything. On the organisation screen your details are then shown as they were saved. If you edit a field, Reset restores the saved values and Save and continue applies the change. With nothing edited, the button simply reads Continue.
Changing the web address once the organisation exists breaks the links you have already given to your guests.
The wizard takes over the whole screen and has a single way out: Sign out, top right, next to the address of the signed-in account (handy if you signed in with the wrong one). As long as the setup is unfinished, your next sign-in takes you back into the wizard. Before the organisation exists, it is the dashboard card that puts you back on track.
What comes next
- Adjust which properties are on sale, or run another import at any time: see General information.
- Invite your team: see Invite a member.
- Find your subscription at any time from Settings > Subscription, to change plan, update your card or cancel: see Subscription.