Hotel RFPs: Why the Old Process Persists – and How We Can Finally Move Forward

Hotel RFPs: Why the Old Process Persists - and How We Can Finally Move Forward

Back in 2017, Business Travel News asked whether annual hotel RFPs were nearing the end of their useful life.

Eight years later, we’re still circling the same question – and in many cases, the same problems.

Earlier this year, our founder Gary Hurst, explored this very topic in a column for Business Travel News Europe, reflecting on why – despite progress in AI, automation, and real-time analytics; the hotel RFP has remained largely unchanged. That article argued that the problem isn’t awareness, but inertia. And that still holds true today.

Despite remarkable advances in automation, AI, and data analytics across almost every sector, hotel sourcing remains stubbornly traditional. Each year, buyers and suppliers go back through the same motions: refreshed templates, updated contacts, slightly adjusted rate caps, and countless hours reconciling spreadsheets. The process endures not because it works well, but because it’s the only structure the industry knows how to agree on.

The RFP, in its current form, is the industry’s paradox: everyone agrees it’s broken, but no one wants to be the first to abandon it.

At the time of writing, many travel buyers and hotel suppliers are right in the middle of this year’s RFP cycle – reviewing rate files, chasing data, and navigating the same challenges that have defined the process for decades. For all the talk of transformation, the lived reality still looks remarkably familiar.

The paradox of satisfaction

In a 2017 GBTA study, 66 per cent of travel managers described themselves as “satisfied” with the RFP process. But in practice, that satisfaction looked more like acceptance, a quiet tolerance of inefficiency.

It’s often easier to keep using a flawed but familiar process than to rewire one that touches every part of an organisation.
And yet, that inertia has a cost.

Every year, the same structural issues; data silos, disjointed systems, outdated rate models – drag down the progress both buyers and suppliers want to make.

Why change has been so slow

The problem isn’t a lack of technology. It’s a lack of connectedness.

Corporate accommodation is one of the most complex procurement ecosystems in the travel sector. A single chain can include multiple brands, owners, management companies and franchisees; each sitting on different property systems and distribution layers. On the buyer side, sourcing often depends on third-party platforms and legacy data feeds that still struggle to integrate cleanly.

Even the smartest tools can’t make real progress if the data they need lives in separate silos. So each RFP cycle begins the same way:

• Hotels re-entering property details already stored elsewhere.
• Buyers requesting the same performance data from multiple sources.
• Both sides rebuilding the picture from scratch rather than building on shared intelligence.

That’s why the annual RFP feels like a loop – because it is one. Every year the process resets, not evolves.

The hidden cost of disconnection

This disconnection has real operational and financial consequences.
Without connected data:

• Buyers negotiate on incomplete insight – often relying on historic averages rather than current performance.
• Suppliers face delayed decisions and opaque rationale for inclusion or exclusion.
• Rate audits become reactive rather than preventative, creating compliance leakage throughout the year.

And because each system; sourcing, booking, auditing, reporting – still operates independently, no one has the full picture until it’s too late to act on it.

A shift that’s finally real

The good news is that a genuine shift is now underway – not because the industry suddenly decided to modernise, but because it can’t afford not to.

AI-driven analysis, live rate verification, and direct booking integrations are making it possible to connect the dots between what used to be standalone stages.

The goal isn’t to replace the RFP overnight, but to make it part of a continuous ecosystem – one where data flows naturally between sourcing, booking, and verification.

That’s the foundation of Optimise by mysa: an interconnected set of modules designed to make each future RFP simpler precisely because the system never loses context.

From data to decision: how a connected ecosystem changes the game

Think of each component not as a standalone tool, but as a circuit in a single loop:

• OptimiseIQ provides the intelligence layer before any RFP begins – transforming basic spend data into clear, location-level insight. Buyers can identify rate opportunities, simulate savings, and test “what if” scenarios before any negotiation starts.
• SourceIQ manages the structured side of the RFP – but without the administrative drag. With consistent property profiles, transparent terms, and comparable data, both sides see exactly what’s being proposed and why.
• BookIQ bridges the space between sourcing and fulfilment. It enables direct, compliant booking of preferred hotels and real-time rate auditing – giving hotels control over their distribution while protecting buyer rate integrity.
• VerifyIQ underpins the ecosystem with continuous verification and assurance – from sustainability credentials and brand compliance to health and safety validation. It ensures trust and transparency are embedded at every step, not added after the fact.

Together, they turn a disconnected cycle into a connected continuum. Data captured at one stage is immediately available to the next. Every new RFP builds on the foundation of the last …no more starting over from scratch.

From process to partnership

This is the real opportunity: to shift the RFP from an administrative burden into a living, strategic function.

Instead of focusing on spreadsheets and deadlines, buyers and suppliers can focus on outcomes — value, traveller wellbeing, sustainability, and operational efficiency.

Hotels can showcase verified credentials and rate consistency without filling out repetitive forms. Buyers can move faster because they trust the integrity of the data. And when the next RFP comes around, much of the groundwork — hotel profiles, compliance information, historical performance – is already in place.

In this sense, the RFP doesn’t disappear. It simply becomes smarter, lighter, and far more collaborative.

Why an ecosystem mindset matters

Every major shift in business travel, from distribution to duty of care, has started not with new tools, but with new mindsets.

For accommodation, that shift is toward interconnection: recognising that sourcing, booking, verification, and optimisation are not separate disciplines, but parts of one flow of data and decision-making.

When systems are built to share that flow, change stops feeling disruptive. It becomes natural.

Moving forward – together

So, will the annual hotel RFP ever end? Probably not entirely. For many programmes, a structured cycle will always make sense.

But what’s finally changing is the context. The RFP no longer needs to be a bottleneck. It can sit within a continuous ecosystem – one where connected data, verified information, and real-time insights make every future cycle easier than the last.

The evolution we need isn’t about tearing down the old. It’s about wiring the new connections that make progress sustainable.

At mysa, that’s what we’re building; an ecosystem designed to evolve with the industry, not disrupt it. Because real transformation doesn’t happen when systems compete; it happens when they finally work together.