Define Folio

Folio is a pamphlet made of one or more full sheets of paper.

Define folio in hotels: A hotel folio is a bill or an invoice that lists all the charges of a guest posted during the stay at the hotel.

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What is a folio in hotel?

A folio meaning is an invoice or a bill that includes charges such as room, charges from hotel restaurants, telephone, minibar, spa, recreation, laundry, and any other additional purchases made by the guest during their stay. When the guest checks out, the hotel presents this hotel billing to the guest in the printed form of records containing these financial charges for collecting the payment.

Folio charges

Types of charges can be, revenue, non-revenue, adjustments, discounts, paid-outs, refunds, and payments.

• Revenue: Charges that contribute to the hotel’s revenue. For example, room charges.
• Non-revenue: taxes, because these are government levies. With every sale, the hotel collects taxes that will be given back to the government. These are collected as percentages of the sale as regulated by the local government.
• Adjustments (Also called, Allowances): These are charges posted to adjust an already posted charge by reducing or increasing. For example, a cashier posted $1000 instead of $100. Posting $-900 in this case to adjust.
• Discounts: Posted to reduce an already posted charge when it is needed to give guests a discount.
• Paid-outs: These are charges that are neither revenue nor taxes, meaning these charges don’t contribute to the hotel’s revenue or government levy. For instance, a guest in-house arrives at the hotel and he/she wants some local currency to pay taxi charges. He obtains this money from the front office cashier who will post a paid-out to affect his cashier float and take it later or at the checkout from the guest.
• Refunds: These are payments paid by the guest and when the hotel wants to pay back (return) for whatever reason.
• Payments: These are payments made by the guest. This includes deposits, additional payments received by the guest during the stay, or settlement payments. This includes, but not limited to, cash, VISA, MASTER, DINNER, or any other credit card or similar payments.
• Direct Bill: It is city ledger payment where the guest’s charges are transferred to his/her company account in the accounts receivable.

The purpose of folios

Hotel folios help:

• Keep a record of guests’ charges and track them for both hotels as well as the guests.
• Generate invoices upon checkout.
• Reconciliation of accounts and ledgers as posting charges is the first journal entry into the hotel’s accounting system.

What is a folio number?

A hotel reservation confirmation number is always one and unique for a booking. However, a guest can have multiple folios under his/her booking. For example, a guest can have a folio addressed to him/her and another folio that is addressed to his/her company. So, each of these folios has its own billing window and a unique folio number for tracking, retrieving, or reconciling folios from the system.

It is also called invoice number or bill number.