Constructed and operated by Macau Hoteliers and Innkeepers Association with the support from Macau Government Tourist Office (MGTO), "Macau Budget Hotels Site" is officially launched today (November 27) to help boosting local budget hotels' competitiveness and capability of operation as well as fostering the diversified development of tourist markets.

The web address of "Macau Budget Hotels Site" is www.macau-budgethotels.org , a non-profit website available in three languages, namely traditional Chinese, simplified Chinese and English. The website content includes information of the budget hotels, online room-booking service for direct transactions between consumers and operators, travel information, etc.

While some budget hotels are not prepared yet to run their operation electronically, 8 budget hotels have joined the online room-booking service at the first stage with the assistance of Macau Hoteliers and Innkeepers Association, with over 500 rooms available for booking, comprising one third of same-category rooms operated in Macau. With the trade and government's concerted efforts, it is believed that more accommodation entities can participate in the online booking service in the future. After receiving a booking confirmation from the hotels, clients can settle the payment upon check-in.

"Macau Budget Hotels Site" will also launch the online payment service soon. Clients can pay online through Visa, Master or Unionpay cards. Room payment can be refunded if booking is cancelled within the stipulated period.

In order to increase budget hotel operators and employees' competitiveness and also in accord with the website development, Macau Hoteliers and Innkeepers Association have progressively organized various kinds of training courses for the industry practitioners of budget hotels, e.g. sales and operation management, cleaning management, room product procurement, website back-end management, etc.

In order to facilitate the long-term goal of developing Macau into a "World Centre of Tourism and Leisure" as well as to cater for the demand of budget hotel market development, MGTO encourages and supports the trade to launch "Macau Budget Hotels Site", endeavoring to upgrade Macau budget hotels' capability of operation and competitiveness and to contribute more effort in promoting budget accommodation so that it can further diversify the tourist markets and fulfill various visitors' needs.

Budget hotels commonly refer to hotels rated two stars or lower as well as guest houses. Currently, there are 13 two-star hotels, 4 three-star guest houses and 29 two-star guest houses, providing close to 1,500 rooms.