Software for holiday cottages, campsites, and B&Bs: bookings and tourist tax

The channel manager connecting Booking and Airbnb is a purchased component; payments go through an approved institution. That leaves the pitch map, cleaning, guest dining, inspection records, and tourist tax, only distantly served by market software.

French publisher Elloha lists €49 per month for Connect and €59 for Magic without specifying whether tax is included (page consulted September 2, 2026). Smoobu starts at €29 per month per property. Sequoiasoft, Ctoutvert, and Amenitiz publish nothing. The state's public API lists 6,900 active campsites.

A profession nobody can count

The 6,900 figure covers only campsites and caravan parks. Holiday cottages and B&Bs fall under an activity code mixing them with urban short-term rentals, and no clean count could be established: federations and labels publish no usable online figures. Keep the campsite order of magnitude and know the rest of the sector has no public counter. For prices, two publishers display them, three send you to a custom quote, and Smoobu charges per property, changing everything for an owner of four cottages.

Three complaints, three dates

Dated French App Store reviews of elloha say the same thing in three forms. Operators return to their computers: 'important operations such as cancellations or viewing booking comments are not available in the app' (2 stars, August 11, 2021), and in March that year: 'you have to connect through a computer for some operations'. The product stops developing while subscriptions continue: 'App neglected for years. No improvements, missing almost all main features' (1 star, June 12, 2024). And support becomes unreachable at the wrong moment: 'Faced with an obvious billing error, customer service, difficult to reach, listens to nothing. I lost 1,000 euros' (1 star, October 6, 2024). An operator has little weight on a publisher's roadmap; they decide everything on their own tool.

The five tracking jobs that happen on site

The map of pitches and accommodation in their actual state: occupied, free, being cleaned, out of service, with stays moved between pitches, phone and counter bookings entered there instead of a notebook without a cent passing through it, and today's arrivals visible on the map. Cleaning and maintenance: daily rounds by team, checklists by accommodation type, timestamped before-and-after photos, tickets opened from the field for leaks or air conditioning, tracked until return to service. Legally usable compliance records: guest-dining temperature readings, cleaning plans, pool-water analyses, training certificates, deadlines and renewal alerts, exportable as a folder for surprise inspections. Guest dining and activities, with cover counts and rebilling on the stay bill. Finally, tourist tax, calculated per night per person according to category and exemptions.

The thresholds that change the business

A chambre d'hôtes stops at five rooms and fifteen simultaneous guests; beyond that the designation is prohibited and public-access establishment rules apply, including safety and accessibility requirements (official factsheet F17452, consulted September 2, 2026). Misusing the designation is a misleading commercial practice, punishable by up to €300,000 and two years' imprisonment for an individual. Table d'hôtes dining follows four rules: one menu, one table, service only to room occupants, preferably local produce; alcohol service requires an operating permit after seven hours of training. At least one person at the establishment must have completed at least fourteen hours of food hygiene training. Tourist tax is collected before departure, its rate displayed at the town hall and accommodation, with late-payment interest of 0.20% monthly. Police registration forms for foreign guests are kept six months. Have your municipality or adviser confirm your actual or flat-rate declaration regime.

Build from the line you do not cross

The most useful brief begins by explicitly stating what the tool will not do. The channel manager connecting Booking, Airbnb, and the more than sixty platforms elloha claims remains purchased: these are contractual connections nobody rewrites. The booking engine with payments, deposits, and balances stays with an approved provider, and invoices to groups, works councils, and tour operators will go through an approved platform from September 1, 2027 for very small businesses. Star ratings and labels come from accredited bodies. With that boundary explicit in the specification, Maurice lays foundations for the substantial remainder: grounds, cleaning, records, dining, tax. An agent team you direct builds that part step by step, each verified before the next. The AI budget depends on the assistant, its plan and the work requested. Our measured AI spending covers specific tests and does not set this tool's price. Also budget for your approval time, any hosting, external services and maintenance. Maestro access is free during beta; you request it, as entry is by invitation.

Where to start

Choose a peak-season week and note every time someone crosses the site to ask something whose answer already exists somewhere: is this mobile home ready, was this reading taken, has this stay been paid? That week's notebook describes your grounds better than any publisher's specification. The long-term calculation works like any industry subscription, and inspection-record logic matches a bakery or a restaurant.