Hotel and training centre, Melksham, Wiltshire
High quality accommodation for course delegates, business travellers and the leisure visitor too.

Home Accessibility Bedrooms Book Here The Mouth Facebook Resources Find Us About Us Contact
 
For 2023 (and 2024 ...) - we are now fully retired from IT training.
We have made many, many friends over 25 years of teaching about Python, Tcl, Perl, PHP, Lua, Java, C and C++ - and MySQL, Linux and Solaris/SunOS too. Our training notes are now very much out of date, but due to upward compatability most of our examples remain operational and even relevant ad you are welcome to make us if them "as seen" and at your own risk.

Lisa and I (Graham) now live in what was our training centre in Melksham - happy to meet with former delegates here - but do check ahead before coming round. We are far from inactive - rather, enjoying the times that we are retired but still healthy enough in mind and body to be active!

I am also active in many other area and still look after a lot of web sites - you can find an index ((here))
Well House - booking through agents

I would much rather delegates and their companies booked directly with us for their courses, as it ensures that we get to speak to people ahead of time who know what they need to learn. And I would much rather that potential hotel guests took a look at our web site, and decided whether to book based on what they see there, and any questions that they phone or email to ask. We have niche/quirky products - some customers love us, but what we offer simply isn't right for others.

Intermediates are often frustrating, because they take substantially more time to handle and process as they pass questions back and forth, and they're often doing no more than following a "Book Well House" instruction from a client who's company policy is "all training from X" or "all hotels from Y", so X and Y simply subcontract. And in the process they insist on charging us a percentage, and/or they charge the company they're booking for a fee. Commission.

And yet...

We've just had what is, I suspect, our largest ever commission bill from an intermediate booking company, and for once I'm celebrating. And that's because this one is different - the intermediate company has done what it's supposed to, and brought customers who wouldn't have come through our doors otherwise into Well House Manor, and it's fair that they get their fees - even though a higher percentage than we're used to - in this case.

We don't want many empty rooms. We don't want to turn people away - especially regulars or course delegates from rooms. And that gives us a small problem, because the two things we want naturally work against each other. Solution? Fill the gap that can't be easily bridged between the two requirements with another product. Thus - the decision to offer some of our accommodation on LateRooms.

Laterooms provides an easy interface through which we can advertise remaining space a few days ahead. We're using different booking terms - you'll need to pay when you book, and you'll probably need to stay for at least two nights, and the booking can't be cancelled for example. Customers won't be regulars - they'll be people who find us through the Late Rooms consolidation service, and they may not have heard of Melksham before - they may be here simply because we're a convenient touring base. There will be/often is additional availability on our own web site - you can see that at the Well House Manor web site. We don't offer rooms on Late Rooms until it's - err later in the booking window, and we'll always accept single night bookings direct on a "first come, first served" basis - that's our core business.

Am I worried about existing customers booking though LateRooms? Not really... corporate customers rely on being able to book fairly well ahead and occasionally amend their bookings. Many existing leisure guests want to just stay the one night. If the different product is the right different product for some of these groups - for example if they decide to stay on Friday or Sunday night as well as Saturday, that's good alternative business.

You won't find our rooms offered through any other consolidated booking sites. With our own booking plus LateRooms, we're currently near-full for the earlier part of each week, and for Saturday night, and we want to be able to offer our regular customers - our ambassadors - the reassurance of being able to get in.
(written 2013-06-23, updated 2013-06-29)

 
Associated topics are indexed as below, or enter http://melksh.am/nnnn for individual articles
M102 - Well House Manor - booking system
  [864] Add to shopping cart - NO VACANCIES sign - (2006-09-13)
  [1084] Writing terms and conditions for conferences and other events - (2007-02-17)
  [1311] What do people look for on a hotel web site? - (2007-08-20)
  [1554] Online hotel reservations - Melksham, Wiltshire (near Bath) - (2008-02-24)
  [1815] Hotel Guest Surveys - (2008-09-28)
  [1907] Melksham Hotel Rates - (2008-11-25)
  [2377] Wiltshire / Melksham Weddings - guest accommodation - (2009-08-26)
  [2403] Hotel Booking Scam / Cost of calls to 070 numbers - (2009-09-12)
  [2436] Melksham Hotel Rooms - pictures - (2009-10-04)
  [2705] Hotel booking in Melksham made easy! - (2010-04-03)
  [3281] Does Well House Manor Hotel in Melksham offer lots of discounts? - (2011-05-07)
  [3825] Well House Manor - direct hotel bookings help us improve the customer experience - (2012-08-04)
  [3932] River nearly bursting its banks in Melksham - (2012-11-23)
  [3976] Easy pricing, quick and easy checkout - (2013-01-15)
  [4138] Should a hotel accept guests who book for just one night? - (2013-07-11)
  [4144] Getting the best hotel rates - customer and hotelier viewpoints - (2013-07-27)
  [4153] Rooms available tonight - how to code an algorithm from first principles - (2013-08-19)
  [4232] Not wanted here - hotel guests who will not be happy - (2013-12-30)

G301 - Well House Consultants - Booking a Public Courses
  [487] On line course booking - credit card protection - (2005-11-06)
  [664] Ruby course - oops - it's not happening - (2006-04-01)
  [1193] Dangerous Dogs and Hotel Marketing - (2007-05-19)
  [1555] Advanced Python, Perl, PHP and Tcl training courses / classes - (2008-02-25)
  [1634] Kiss and Book - (2008-05-07)
  [1693] July to December 2008 - Open Source training schedule - (2008-07-01)
  [1932] Training Passports - booking a training program - (2008-12-09)
  [2278] First courses for 2010 - (2009-07-10)
  [2352] Printed Directories - the start of the updating season - (2009-08-12)
  [2743] Public Open Source Training Courses running this summer and autumn in Melksham - (2010-04-27)
  [3180] Age limits for Well House Consultants Open Source courses? - (2011-02-22)
  [3600] Visa, MasterCard and American Express - changing payment profiles - (2012-02-01)
  [4602] Training course and hotel room prices - 2016 - (2015-12-31)


Back to
Has your Twitter feed stopped working? Switching to their new API
Previous and next
or
Horse's mouth home
Forward to
New timetables from 28th July - bus routes 271 and 272
Some other Articles
Where are we now? On holiday!
The first Luas of the morning
Chippenham - Melksham - Trowbridge bus changes next month
New timetables from 28th July - bus routes 271 and 272
Well House - booking through agents
Has your Twitter feed stopped working? Switching to their new API
American Circus in Melksham
Melksham - Flower Town
We not only teach PHP and Python - we teach good PHP and Python Practice!
Is Lua an Object Oriented language?
4759 posts, page by page
Link to page ... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96 at 50 posts per page


This is a page archived from The Horse's Mouth at http://www.wellho.net/horse/ - the diary and writings of Graham Ellis. Every attempt was made to provide current information at the time the page was written, but things do move forward in our business - new software releases, price changes, new techniques. Please check back via our main site for current courses, prices, versions, etc - any mention of a price in "The Horse's Mouth" cannot be taken as an offer to supply at that price.

Link to Ezine home page (for reading).
Link to Blogging home page (to add comments).

You can Add a comment or ranking to this page
Hello. I'm Graham Ellis. If you have a question about the hotel, please ask me or

 

then book here

© WELL HOUSE CONSULTANTS LTD., 2024: 48 Spa Road • Melksham, Wiltshire • United Kingdom • SN12 7NY
PH: 01144 1225 708225 • EMAIL: info@wellho.net • WEB: http://www.wellho.net • SKYPE: wellho

PAGE: http://www.wellho.net/mouth/4122_Wel ... gents.html • PAGE BUILT: Sun Oct 11 16:07:41 2020 • BUILD SYSTEM: JelliaJamb