For day tours that run every day

What a day tour operator needs

Day tours run on volume and timing. The same walk, food tour or boat trip departs several times a day, most days of the year, and many travellers book on a phone the evening before or that morning. What matters is an accurate seat count for every start time, a checkout that works on a small screen, clear directions to the meeting point and a quick start.

The risks are different from long trips. A double-booked last seat or a missed reminder costs you a review, not just a sale. Tourtify is set up so that schedules fill themselves, seats are counted live across your website, your team and your sales channels, and the guide starts with a scan instead of a printed list.

Schedules that fill themselves

A repeating schedule picks the weekdays, a start time and the seats, and keeps departures created ahead of time, from 30 days to a full year, topping them up every night. For several start times a day, add one schedule per time; an option can have up to 20. Each departure can still be changed on its own: more seats, a stop on sales or a blocked date for a holiday.

Worked example: a city walk at 09:00 and 14:00 every day, with 16 seats each, gives 32 seats a day and 224 a week. Set online booking to close one hour before each start, or anywhere from until departure to two weeks before. Your team can still add a late phone booking in the console, using the same seats.

A checkout built for phones

Travellers pick a date and time, add travellers and see the price update as they go. There is no account to create, seats are held for 30 minutes while they pay, and the confirmation arrives with a PDF straight away. Take a food tour at $45 per adult and $25 per child: a family of two adults and two children pays $140. With Add-ons & extras (Growth) they can add a $15 drinks pairing per traveller, $60 for four, before they pay.

Some travellers start and don't finish. Abandoned checkout recovery sends up to three follow-ups, by default one hour, 24 hours and 72 hours after the checkout expired, each with a link that restores their date and travellers. For walk-up style tours, Pay on arrival lets travellers book now and pay at the meeting point. By default it is offered to groups of up to eight and for trips within 30 days, and you can ask for a card to guarantee the booking, with a no-show fee charged only if you choose to.

On the day

Booking emails include the meeting point and what to bring, and the trip reminder goes out on the timing you set. With WhatsApp messages on, travellers also get confirmations and reminders on WhatsApp, including a pickup reminder with a map pin. At the meeting point, staff scan QR tickets with a phone. By default tickets scan from 24 hours before the start until 12 hours after, a second scan shows who already checked in, and a ticket for another day is caught.

The manifest for each start time shows how many travellers have arrived, what is still to collect and any dietary or emergency notes. Guides search by name or reference, check in a traveller, a booking or everyone at once, and can undo a mistake. If a traveller paid on arrival, the amount to collect shows on the manifest, so nobody has to look it up.

When weather or a closed road stops a departure, you can move every booking on it to another date of the same option, or cancel it with refunds of what was paid. Each booking goes through the normal change or cancellation, so travellers get the right emails and invoices follow. With Self-service changes (Growth), travellers can move their own booking within your rules, three days before departure by default.

More channels without overbooking

Day tours sell well on marketplaces. The Channel manager (Growth) connects GetYourGuide and Viator through their supplier APIs, and resellers that use OCTO, such as Klook, Headout and Tiqets. Their bookings take seats under the same locks as your own, and each channel can have a buffer, an allotment and a cut-off. Commission is recorded per booking, so the channel report shows what each channel really costs.

Closer to home, Resellers & agents gives hotel concierges a referral link ending in ?ref= and their code. Bookings made within 30 days of the click, by default, are credited to them at their commission rate. After the trip, travellers are asked for a review, and are offered your Google and Tripadvisor pages alongside your own site.

Switching from another booking system

Start with your tours: paste each tour page link to create a draft, then add options, traveller types and repeating schedules. Imported prices are never converted, so check them before you publish.

Then bring your future bookings across so seats stay correct. Exports from FareHarbor, Rezdy, Bókun, Peek Pro and Checkfront are recognised automatically, and the dry run lists any problem with its spreadsheet line number before anything is imported. If you sell on marketplaces, connect each channel once your departures are in place, so the calendar they see is already accurate.

Run both systems side by side for a short while if you need to. Because imported bookings take their seats on the right departures and send no emails, your calendar in Tourtify matches the old one once the import is done, and travellers keep the confirmations they already have.

Getting started

1. 1Create the tour and its options. Add traveller types and prices, and describe the meeting point and pickup.
2. 2Add repeating schedules. One per start time, with weekdays, seats and how far ahead departures are created.
3. 3Choose the booking cut-off. Pick how close to each start online booking closes.
4. 4Switch on tickets and reminders. Turn on QR tickets, check the reminder timing and add WhatsApp if your travellers use it.
5. 5Connect your channels. Link marketplaces and agents once departures are live, so they sell from the same seats.