Questions to Ask a Revenue Manager
Questions to ask a revenue manager at a hotel, for the general manager, owner or director of sales who is interviewing one or reviewing the year with the one already on the team. The list runs in the order the job does: how rates get set, how the forecast and the budget are built, where bookings come from and what each channel costs, how group business is weighed, the numbers and systems behind it all, and how the role works with sales and the front desk. Nearly all of them work both ways: ask a candidate about their last hotel, and ask your own revenue manager about this one.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Pricing
How do you decide what to charge for a particular night?
Why ask it
Listen for the inputs: what is already on the books, how fast it is filling compared with the same point last year, what else is happening in town, and how far away the date is. Then have them take one real night from the last month and talk through what they charged and why. Someone who can only describe the method in general has probably been loading rates that another person chose.
Which hotels do you count as our real competitors, and how would you pick a comp set?
Why ask it
The useful answer is built from the guest's side: the places a traveler would weigh against yours for the same trip, which is not always the nearest hotel or the one with the same star rating. Ask which property on the current list they would take off and which they would add. A candidate who studied your market before the interview will have an opinion ready.
When a date is filling slowly, do you cut the rate or hold it, and what decides that?
Why ask it
No single answer fits every hotel, so the reasoning is what counts. The distinction to hear is between a night when a lower price would win travelers who were headed to another hotel and a night when nobody is coming to the area at any price. What they try before touching the public rate, such as a package, a member offer or reopening a closed channel, shows how many tools they have.
On a night you expect to sell out, when do you set a minimum stay or close the cheaper rates?
Why ask it
These controls are how a hotel avoids selling a peak Saturday to one-night guests and leaving the Friday beside it empty. Ask for a recent weekend where they put a restriction on and what it did to the nights on either side. If they have never lifted one early because it was choking bookings, they may not be checking the effect.
What was the last pricing call you got wrong, and how did you find out?
Why ask it
Everyone in this job has held a rate too long or dropped one too soon. You want to hear how quickly they noticed, which report showed it and what they do differently now. Be wary of a story where the fault lies with the market, the owner or the sales team and nothing changed afterwards.
How often do you revisit rates, and what would make you change one in the middle of the day?
Why ask it
A daily review is a common rhythm, with closer attention on the dates nearest to arrival, but the right pace depends on how fast your bookings come in. The second half matters more: a sudden jump in pickup, a competitor selling out, a canceled flight, a storm. Settle who is allowed to change a rate on their day off, because a sold-out competitor will not wait for Monday.
How do you price our room types against one another?
Why ask it
Bring your own room list for this one. If the suites sit empty on nights the standard rooms sell out, the step up in price may be too steep, and if the better rooms always go first, it may be too small. One thing to settle is whether the gaps stay fixed or widen when the hotel is busy.
How much do our guest reviews affect what we can charge?
Why ask it
A traveler comparing two hotels sees the score beside the price, so the two get read together. Have them pull up your listing next to a competitor's and say whether your rate looks fair for the rating shown. A revenue manager who passes recurring complaints back to operations, such as slow check-in or tired rooms, is treating price and product as one job.
How would you handle a date a year out that you already know will sell out?
Why ask it
Think of a graduation weekend, a festival or a large convention. The risk is selling the whole house early at ordinary prices, so listen for a higher opening rate, minimum stays, limits on discounts and rooms held back from groups. Where they hear about such dates matters as much as the tactics, since a new event will not be in last year's numbers.
How do you make sure a promotion brings in new stays and does not just discount ones we would have had anyway?
Why ask it
Good answers include fences: a booking window, advance purchase, a minimum stay, or an offer shown only to members or to one market. Ask how they judged the last promotion they ran, and against what. 'It got a lot of bookings' is not a measure unless they can say what those nights would have done without it.
Forecasting
How do you build a forecast, and how far ahead does it run?
Why ask it
You should hear rooms on the books, pickup still expected, group blocks and how likely they are to fill, and some allowance for cancellations. Ask to see one, even with the hotel's name removed. The layout tells you whether it is a working tool that changes every week or a monthly exercise done for the owner.
How close have your forecasts come to what the hotel actually did, and how do you track that?
Why ask it
A revenue manager who measures their own accuracy can tell you the miss for a recent month and in which direction. Do not expect perfection, and do not ask for a single figure to hold them to. What you want is someone who compares forecast with result every month and can say what they learned from the widest gap.
How would you put together next year's rooms budget?
Why ask it
The budget is the number the hotel gets held to all year, so the method deserves a slow walk-through. A grounded one starts from this year's results by month and by segment, then adjusts for what is known to change: a new competitor, an event, a contract ending, rooms out of service. If the figure arrives as last year plus a percentage, find out who chose the percentage.
What do you look for in a pickup report?
Why ask it
Pickup is the count of rooms booked since the last time anyone looked, by stay date. An experienced person reads it for surprises: a quiet Tuesday that suddenly gained rooms, or a strong weekend that stalled. Their account of the last date that filled faster than expected, and what they did about it that morning, is the real answer.
When the forecast starts to fall short of the budget, what do you do and when do you tell me?
Why ask it
The budget was fixed months ago and the forecast is today's best estimate, so the two will drift apart. You are listening for early warning with a plan attached, not for someone who adjusts the forecast quietly or defends the budget past the point of belief. Agree here how big a gap is worth a phone call.
How do you forecast when history is no help, such as after a renovation or in a year unlike the last one?
Why ask it
Last year's pattern is the usual starting point, and sometimes it is useless: new rooms, a closed attraction, a competitor opening down the road. The substitutes worth hearing about are booking pace, what similar hotels did and plain conversations with local event organizers. An honest answer admits wider margins and a shorter horizon.
Who else relies on your forecast, and what do they do with it?
Why ask it
Housekeeping schedules from it, the restaurant orders from it and the owner plans cash from it. A revenue manager who knows this sends it on a fixed day in a form each department can read. If they treat it as a private document, ask how the executive housekeeper currently learns that next week is full.
How do cancellations and no-shows figure in your numbers, and what would you change about our policies?
Why ask it
Free cancellation fills the books early and can empty them late, so rooms on the books are not all equally solid. Ask which channels and rate types cancel most at their current hotel and whether they have tightened a policy or added a deposit for peak dates. What you may charge or keep varies by place and by contract, so have them say how they would check before changing anything.
What is your approach to overbooking, and how many rooms would you oversell here?
Why ask it
A careful answer starts from this hotel's own record of cancellations, no-shows and early departures, and from what it costs in money and goodwill to send a guest with a reservation elsewhere. What the hotel owes that guest differs by brand and by place, so how it works here belongs in the answer. If the front desk relocates people at midnight with no say in the number, expect friction.
Channels
What should our mix of channels look like, and how far is it from that now?
Why ask it
Your own website, the phone, online travel agencies, wholesalers and the brand's site each deliver a booking at a different cost. A candidate can only answer in outline, so judge the questions they ask you about the current split. From your own revenue manager, expect the present share of each, the share they are aiming for and the reason.
Which guest segments do you track separately, and which one are we underselling?
Why ask it
Segments are the kinds of business a hotel sells to: leisure guests on the public rate, corporate accounts, groups, government, crews, wholesale. How finely they split them shows how closely they look, because a total can hide one segment shrinking while another grows. For your own hotel, the answer to wait for is which segment has the most room to grow and what is holding it back.
What does a booking cost us on each channel once commissions and fees are counted?
Why ask it
Two rooms sold at the same rate can leave very different amounts behind. A revenue manager who tracks net revenue by channel can list what goes into the cost: commission, loyalty charges, franchise or reservation fees, payment costs. The figures depend on your own agreements, so the sum has to come from your contracts and not from memory of another hotel.
How do you work with the OTAs: what do you give them and what do you hold back?
Why ask it
A balanced view treats an online travel agency as paid reach, worth the commission on nights you cannot fill alone and costly on nights you can. The specifics to hear are which room types they list, when they join a promotion and when, if the contract allows it, they close availability. How often they speak to the hotel's contact at each agency, and what they last asked for, shows whether the relationship is managed or left to run.
How would you move more bookings to our own website and phone line?
Why ask it
Expect a mix of things within their reach, such as a member rate, a perk for booking direct and a booking engine that shows the same rooms and prices cleanly on a phone. Some of it belongs to marketing, so find out who they would need and what they would ask of them. One detail separates the thoughtful answers: how a guest who first came through a third party is invited to book direct next time.
How do you handle rate parity, and what do you do when a lower rate turns up somewhere it should not?
Why ask it
A rate sold to a wholesaler for packages can be passed along and resurface online below your public price, which is a common source of a leak. They should have a way of spotting one, whether a rate shopping tool or regular manual checks, and a way of tracing it, such as making a test booking to see who sends the reservation. Which parity rules bind you depends on your contracts, your brand and local law, so ask how it works for this hotel before agreeing a policy.
How do you decide whether a negotiated corporate rate is still earning its place?
Why ask it
Each account should be judged on the nights it produced, which days of the week they fell on and what those rooms would have sold for otherwise. An account that fills midweek gaps can be worth more than a larger one that only books when you would have sold out anyway. The hard part is saying so to the salesperson who owns the relationship, so ask how that conversation went the last time.
What part do the loyalty program and the brand's own channels play in your plan?
Why ask it
This applies if the hotel carries a flag. Costs and rules for member rates, points and brand promotions differ from one brand and agreement to another, so have them explain how it works under yours and which brand offers they would opt into. For an independent hotel, turn it around: what would they build to bring a guest back with no program behind them?
Groups
How do you decide whether to take a group, and at what rate?
Why ask it
The term to listen for is displacement: the individual guests who would have paid more for those same rooms and now cannot book them. Hand over a real request, with dates and a room count, and ask them to talk through it aloud. The arithmetic matters less than whether they ask about the nights on either side and what else the group will spend.
What do you count besides room revenue when you weigh a piece of group business?
Why ask it
Meeting room rental, catering, the bar, parking and the chance of repeat bookings all belong in the sum, and so do commissions and any free rooms written into the contract. A group at a modest rate with a banquet every evening may beat a higher rate with no spend at all. Ask where they get the catering estimate and how often it turns out to be right.
How many rooms should sales be free to sell to groups on a given night, and what is the lowest rate they can quote?
Why ask it
A sales team that knows the room ceiling and the price floor for each date can answer a planner without waiting for permission. The guidelines only help while they are current, so find out how often they are refreshed and where a salesperson looks them up. A director of sales can put the sharper version: which dates next quarter have the most room to give?
What do you do with a block that is not picking up as its cutoff date approaches?
Why ask it
The answer should involve watching each block against its expected pace, having sales call the organizer early, and deciding ahead of time when unsold rooms go back on general sale. What you can release or charge for depends on the wording of each contract, so ask how they read the attrition and cutoff terms and who signs off on waiving them.
Tell me about a group you advised turning down that the sales team wanted.
Why ask it
You are checking two things at once: that they will say no when the numbers call for it, and that they can do it without making an enemy. What they offered in its place, such as different dates, fewer rooms or a higher rate, is the part to press on. If they cannot recall ever saying no, sales may have been setting the prices.
How fast can sales get a quote from you, and what do you need from them to give one?
Why ask it
A planner writing to several hotels often leans toward the first sensible reply, so the turnaround is worth pinning down in hours. The second half is the practical one: the details they want on every lead, such as dates, flexibility, rooms per night, catering and the group's history at other hotels. A director of sales can use that list to change the lead form the same week.
How do you handle a group that wants a peak night plus the quiet nights around it?
Why ask it
This is the common hard case, since the busy night costs you full-price guests and the slow nights are a gift. Three sound routes are pricing the stay as a whole, quoting a different rate for each night, and steering the group toward a pattern that suits the hotel. Whichever they choose, the test is whether they can explain it to a planner who wanted one number.
After a group checks out, what do you go back and look at?
Why ask it
Rooms occupied against rooms blocked, what the group really spent, and whether the nights it took would have filled anyway. That record is what makes the next quote for the same organizer a decision and not a guess. It only earns its keep if it is written down somewhere the sales team can open.
Metrics and systems
Which numbers do you open first each morning?
Why ask it
Expect yesterday's result, overnight pickup for the weeks ahead, and anything out of line with the forecast. The order shows their habits: someone who starts with last night's occupancy is looking back, and someone who starts with pace for next month is looking forward. Ask how long the routine takes and what would make them stop and act.
Between occupancy, ADR and RevPAR, which should we be chasing right now?
Why ask it
Occupancy is how full you were, ADR is the average rate paid per room sold, and RevPAR is room revenue spread over every room you had to sell. Chasing either of the first two alone is easy and often costly, so listen for an answer tied to the season and to what an occupied room costs you. If you are an owner, say which one you have been watching and ask whether it is the right one.
How do you tell whether a good month was your pricing or just the market?
Why ask it
A rising market lifts every hotel in it, so growth on last year proves little taken alone. The fairer test is how the hotel did against its competitors over the same weeks, and whether particular decisions can be pointed to. With a candidate, this is the check on any result they are proud of: have them say what the hotels around them did in that same period.
How do you read our standing against the comp set, and what would you do about a weak index?
Why ask it
If the hotel subscribes to a benchmarking report, it sets your occupancy, rate and RevPAR against the comp set's as an index. A low occupancy index with a high rate index is a different problem from the reverse, and they should be able to say what each calls for. A good reader also questions the report itself: whether the comp set is right, and whether one hotel's renovation is bending the average.
Do you look beyond room revenue, to total revenue or profit per available room?
Why ask it
A full hotel of low-rate guests who never eat on site can earn less than a slightly emptier one that fills the restaurant and the spa. Ask what they track beyond rooms and whether they see the cost side: commissions, cleaning, breakfast included in the rate. In a hotel with little besides rooms, a short answer here is fine.
Which systems have you worked with: revenue management, property management, channel manager?
Why ask it
Names matter less than depth: what they configured themselves, what they had a vendor change, and how they would get up to speed on the ones you run. Someone who has switched systems before tends to pick up another without much trouble. For the revenue manager you already have, the version to put is which feature the hotel pays for and never uses.
When the system recommends a rate you disagree with, what do you do?
Why ask it
Two poor answers sit at the ends: accepting every recommendation, and overriding most of them. A fair override rests on something the software cannot know, such as a new event or a road closure, and the best habit is going back later to see who was right. Skip this one if the hotel sets its rates by hand.
What do you still keep in a spreadsheet, and why?
Why ask it
Most revenue managers have at least one, often for pace by segment, group tracking or the owner's report. It shows you where their systems fall short and how much of the hotel's method lives in a single file. Ask who else could open and run it if they were away for two weeks.
What reports would you send me, how often, and what do you expect me to do with them?
Why ask it
A general manager and an owner need different things, so say which you are. A strong answer is short: a weekly page with pace, forecast against budget, and the decisions they made or need from you. If the current pack runs to twenty tabs, ask which three they would keep.
How do you check that rates and availability are loaded correctly everywhere we sell?
Why ask it
Mistakes here are quiet and costly: a rate plan left open on a sold-out date, a decimal in the wrong place, a room type missing from one site. A sound routine has a fixed day for the audit and includes searching as a guest would, on a phone. An honest story about an error that got through is a better sign than a claim that none ever has.
Sales and team
How do you run a revenue meeting: who is there, and what gets decided?
Why ask it
A meeting worth holding ends with decisions on named dates, each with an owner, and not a reading of last week's figures. An agenda or the notes from a recent one will show which kind theirs is. Check the attendance too, since leaving out sales, the front office or reservations tends to mean decisions that never reach the people who carry them out.
What do you do when the director of sales wants a rate you think is too low?
Why ask it
Both sides are doing their jobs: sales is paid to bring business in and revenue is paid to price it. Listen for showing the trade-off in numbers, offering another route to yes, and knowing when the general manager should make the call. If you are the director of sales asking, say how you would like to hear a no.
How do you work with the front desk on upgrades, walk-in rates and oversold nights?
Why ask it
The desk is where pricing meets the guest, so the daily guidance matters: which room types to offer as a paid upgrade, the lowest rate for a walk-in, and the plan if the hotel is oversold. A revenue manager who never talks to the front office manager is setting prices that may not survive check-in. Your own front office manager can tell you afterwards whether the answer matches what reaches the desk each morning.
How would you explain a rate decision to an owner who thinks we are priced too high, or too low?
Why ask it
Owners often judge by one night they noticed, a sold-out Saturday or an empty Tuesday. A good revenue manager answers with the whole picture for that date, including what was turned away or what the alternatives would have earned, in plain words. If you are that owner, bring the night that has been bothering you and see how it goes.
What would you look at first, and what might you change, in your first 90 days here?
Why ask it
For a candidate, a sound plan begins with learning: the segments, the contracts, the system settings and the people. Be cautious about anyone promising a rate increase before they have seen your data. For the revenue manager you already have, ask the other version: what would they change now if nobody objected?
If you look after more than one hotel, how do you divide your attention between them?
Why ask it
Many revenue managers cover a cluster of hotels or work remotely for several owners. Ask how many properties they carry, how much time yours would get each week, and who watches rates when two hotels have a problem on the same day. If this is an outside service, ask to speak with another property they work for.
What do you need from me that you are not getting?
Why ask it
Save this for the person already in the job, or for the end of a final interview. Common answers are access to data, a say in group decisions, a seat in the right meeting or authority to change rates without sign-off. Whatever they name, tell them by when they will hear whether it can be done.
How to interview or review a hotel revenue manager
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Setting up the conversation
Decide which conversation this is
An interview and a review put the same questions to different use. With a candidate you are asking about hotels you cannot see, so ask for one dated example each time and listen to how they reasoned. With your own revenue manager the data is in the building: put the pace report or last month's results on the table and ask the question about a particular week.
Bring three dates of your own
Pick one night that sold out, one that disappointed and one in the future that worries you. Almost every question under Pricing, Forecasting and Groups gets sharper when it is about one of them. A candidate will not know your hotel, so give the facts in a sentence: the room count, the day of the week, what was on in town and what you charged.
Send a candidate something to read
If you can share a few lines about the hotel beforehand, such as the number of rooms, the main guest segments and the systems you run, the interview stops being a quiz on general knowledge. What a candidate does with that information, and what they looked up on their own, tells you more than any definition they can recite.
Choose a dozen, not the whole page
The whole list would fill an afternoon. For an hour's interview, take two from each group and keep the rest for a second round or the reference call. For a regular sit-down with the person in the job, one group per meeting is plenty.
Which groups matter most from your seat
General managers
Your interest is the whole operation, so lean on Forecasting and on Sales and team. You need a forecast the departments can staff from, and a revenue manager who can disagree with sales without the argument landing on your desk every week.
Owners and asset managers
Start with Metrics and systems and with the channel cost questions, and give the most time to the one about telling pricing apart from the market. You do not need to learn the vocabulary first: ask for each term in plain words, and notice whether the explanation gets clearer or foggier. Then ask what they would report to you, since that page is most of what you will see of their work.
Directors of sales
Go to Groups. The speed of a quote, the floor on rate and the way a no is delivered will shape your team's days more than anything else on the page. It is fair to say what you need as well as ask, because the two of you will be judged on how this relationship works.
What a strong answer sounds like
A date, a number and a reason
Good revenue managers talk in particulars: the second weekend of the month, the rate they opened at, the pickup that made them move it. If an answer stays at the level of 'optimizing' and 'maximizing', ask which night they have in mind.
The trade-off said out loud
Nearly every decision in this job gives something up: rate for occupancy, individual guests for a group, commission for reach. Listen for the person naming what a choice cost as well as what it gained.
Questions coming back at you
Someone who prices for a living cannot say much without data, so a strong candidate will ask about your segments, your booking window, your contracts and your comp set. Treat those questions as part of the answer and not as stalling.
Words a front desk agent could follow
Much of the job is getting other people to act on a pricing decision. If the explanation of a stay restriction or a displacement sum would lose your front office manager in the interview room, it will lose them on a busy Friday as well.
Where these conversations go wrong
Hiring the software and not the person
Experience on the exact system you run is convenient, and the advantage does not last long. A candidate who reasons well about demand and can show how they learned their last system is a safer choice than one who knows every screen and cannot say why a rate changed.
Judging on a full house
A hotel can sell every room and still have left money behind, and it can run emptier at a rate that pays better. If occupancy is the only number you praise, occupancy is what you will get. Ask about rate, channel cost and what was turned away before you draw a conclusion.
Asking for a strategy without showing the data
Pressing a candidate to say what they would charge next month, with nothing to go on, rewards confidence over judgment. Share some figures, or ask how they would find out.
Treating the answers as promises
Markets move, and a forecast is an estimate. Hold a revenue manager to the quality of the reasoning, the speed of the warning and the follow-through on decisions, and agree together which results they can fairly be measured on.