Simulation mode

What simulation is

Simulation is the state every property is in from the moment it connects. Nothing you do at sign-up or at the connect step switches it off. It ends when a General Manager or Hotel Admin clicks Go live on the amber strip at the top of the dashboard and confirms, or when we switch it live at your request.

In simulation MAYA does everything it would do for a live property except the last step. About every five minutes it reads your bookings. About once an hour it reads your own rates for the nights ahead (Cloudbeds and ThinkReservations). Every cycle it runs every rule on the nights whose bookings changed, and once a day, just after midnight at your property, on every night from tonight to 395 nights ahead, and writes the result to the calendar and the change log. Then it stops. No price leaves MAYA.

So you can read each night's Current price on the calendar, open the change log, follow "Show the numbers" and answer the Rules that keep adjusting banner exactly as you would once live. The change log words every change as what would have happened, under a Simulation tag, and says "Nothing was sent to Cloudbeds." Your property system keeps the rates you have there.

Will MAYA change my prices the moment I connect?

No. Connecting starts the history import (Cloudbeds and ThinkReservations) and the first cycles, all in simulation. The rates in your system do not move until someone with General Manager or Hotel Admin access clicks Go live on the strip at the top of the dashboard and confirms, or we switch the property live at your request. Going live has the steps.

There is no test copy of your own property. Simulation is the look before you send: your own bookings, your own rules, real numbers, and nothing sent. To look around before your property is on MAYA, we send people on the waitlist a demo property: a made-up lodge with made-up bookings that stays in simulation for good (The demo property).

What runs, and what does not

Can I approve each price before it is sent?

No. There is no step where you approve single prices. Simulation and live are one switch for the whole property. In simulation nothing is sent, and you can see every price that would go out: each night's Current price on the calendar, and every change in the change log. Once you go live, every price your rules set goes out on its own, on the cycle it changes.

You still have the last word, in four ways:

• One night. Type a price on the Calendar tab. It becomes that night's price for that room type, replaces what your rules had already done there, and goes out now. It is not a lock: a rule that fires later moves the price on from your number.
• One rule. Turn it Off on the Rules tab. It stops from the next pricing run, and the prices it already set stay. In simulation that means they are sent when you go live with Send MAYA's prices now, and taken off when you go live with Start from your current rates. To undo them now, delete the rule instead.
• A new rule. A rule you save from the Rate Simulator tab starts switched off, so it moves nothing until you turn it on. A rule you add with Add Rule on the Rules tab is on once you choose Apply price adjustments or Skip price adjustments (or Turn it on, when no price would change) in the window that opens, which shows the days it will change.
• The whole property. Email us to go back to simulation. Pausing, or going back to simulation has every route.

The starter rules run in simulation

If MAYA built starter rules from your history (it needs at least 60 days of it), every one of them is switched on from the moment it is built. The review screen says so under the heading "While you were here, we built your first pricing rules". They fire, the change log records what they would have done, and the price they would have set shows on the calendar. Your system is not touched.

You can turn any of them off on the Rules tab before you go live, or delete them (all at once with Remove them and start with a clean slate at the end of the review), and the two are not the same. Off keeps what the rule already did to your prices, and those prices are sent when you go live with Send MAYA's prices now. Going live with Start from your current rates takes every rule's changes off, on or off (Going live). To undo what a starter rule did now, delete it with Delete Rule and Undo Its Changes. Your starter rules describes each one.

How to tell which mode you are in

The top of every screen of your property says it: each tab of the dashboard, the Billing and Team pages, and the review screen.

1. The strip at the top. While you are simulating, a slim amber strip across the top, with an amber dot, reads "Simulation · MAYA works out prices but sends nothing to Cloudbeds" (your system's name, or "your property system" with none connected). A General Manager or Hotel Admin sees a green Go live button at its right, which opens a confirm naming your property (Going live). Everyone else sees the strip without the button, and its ? says "A General Manager or Hotel Admin can switch this property to live." Once you are live the strip is gone, and a small green Live tag sits at the top right instead. Our staff, looking at your property to help, see the strip but never the button. On the review screen the strip sits at the top of the page's own column, with no Go live for anyone: its ? tells a General Manager or Hotel Admin "You go live from this strip on your dashboard, once you finish here."
2. The change log. A run made in simulation is tagged Simulation, says what would have happened, and says "Nothing was sent to Cloudbeds." Once you are live it says "Nothing was sent to Cloudbeds at the time.", and where the night still has that price, a second line says what became of it, such as "Sent to Cloudbeds after you went live." The moment someone went live is an item of its own, "Went live". A live change says whether its price was sent. The change log has the wording. A rule's fire log, behind its number under Fired on the Rules tab, tags each fire made in simulation the same way and words it the same way, even after you go live (The fire log).
3. The calendar. While you simulate on Cloudbeds or ThinkReservations, a small amber dot marks each night going live would change, a line above the calendar counts them ("Going live would change 37 nights in the next 90 days"), and each room type on a day card says what MAYA would send, such as "Cloudbeds $179.00 → MAYA would send $230.46", or why it wouldn't. None of it shows once you are live (What going live would send).
4. The review screen. Open maya-rms.com/onboarding/review. Besides the strip at the top, if it opens on "First: does this match reality?", click Continue to recommendations. Near the end, under "While you were here, we built your first pricing rules", the buttons Keep them and Remove them and start with a clean slate mean you are simulating. A green pill reading "✓ Live: your rules are now managing prices" means you are live. The box is there only when setup built starter rules for you. A Mews property never has it. The review has no Go live button: you go live from the strip on your dashboard once you finish the review.
5. The amber banner. Once three of a booking speed or pickup rule's changes are on a night, the Rules that keep adjusting banner says "would have 3 raises" or "would have 3 cuts" in simulation, and "has 3 raises" or "has 3 cuts" when live.

If you have typed a price for a real reason lately, its confirmation also said which mode you were in: it began "Saved (simulation: not sent to Cloudbeds)." in simulation, and "Saved. Sending to Cloudbeds now." (or "Saved. It will be sent once you reconnect." with the connection down) when live. While MAYA's work is paused over your subscription it begins "Saved. Nothing is sent while MAYA's work is paused." in either mode. Do not type a price only to test this. On a live property it sends the price, and it takes any booking speed or pickup change off that night for good.

One more check needs no MAYA screen at all. Compare a night's Current price in MAYA with the same night's rate in your property system. If they differ night after night, you are simulating (for Cloudbeds and ThinkReservations; nothing is sent to Mews in either mode). And you can always email us from your MAYA sign-in address and we will tell you.

On a demo property the strip is sky blue instead and reads "Demo property · Made-up bookings. Nothing is sent anywhere." A demo never goes live (The demo property).

The recipe Tell whether you are live or in simulation walks through these in order.

Finishing the review keeps you in simulation

Keep them, Remove them and start with a clean slate and Finish all end the review and take you to your dashboard, still in simulation. Nothing expires. The starter rules you kept keep running in simulation, the change log keeps filling, and there is no reminder and no deadline. A General Manager or Hotel Admin goes live from the Go live button on the strip at the top of the dashboard when you are ready, which is there for every Cloudbeds and ThinkReservations property while it simulates.

How long to watch

MAYA sets no rule about this and runs no timer. A week is a good minimum: it covers a weekend (Friday and Saturday nights) and the quieter nights around it, so you see both kinds of change. If your bookings arrive in a longer rhythm, watch a whole one.

Three things are worth checking while you watch: the Fired column on the Rules tab (which rule acts most; click a rule's number to see each time, worded as what would have happened), the change log a few times a day (it opens on the 10 most recent runs that changed a price, and Older reaches back 90 days) for prices stopped at a floor or ceiling, and whether the Rules that keep adjusting banner appeared. Each is a sign to change a rule, or a floor or ceiling, before going live. Change a limit in its box on the review: Set or change a floor or ceiling has that and the other ways. Its Get suggestions from my data step works while you simulate too.

Rates you change in your system while simulating

In simulation MAYA reads your own rate for every night in the window (Cloudbeds and ThinkReservations) about once an hour, and again when your hotel day changes. A rate you change in your system is picked up on the next of those reads and becomes that night's base rate: the number your rules start from. It does not become a manual price, and rules keep pricing on top of it.

This is true of every night MAYA has never sent to. For a property that has never been live, that is every night.

For a live property the same change on a night MAYA has already sent to is kept as a manual price instead, so your rules start from it rather than overwrite it. With MAYA's price wins on in Settings, MAYA sends its own price over it instead. Rates you change in your property system explains the difference.

So while simulating, change rates in your system wherever you like. When you go live, MAYA reads your rates once more before its first send, and your rules work from whatever you had at that moment. Going live does not put back a rate you changed while simulating. It builds on it.

Prices you type in simulation

You can type a price for any night from tonight up to 399 days ahead, on its own or as a range with through…. It is saved, it shows on the day card with a Manual badge, rules that had already moved that night pause for that room type, and the confirmation starts "Saved (simulation: not sent to Cloudbeds)." and adds how many rules were paused. Nothing goes to your system.

When you go live, a typed price inside the 396-night window goes out with the first send like any other price, whichever way you start. A typed price further ahead is sent when its night enters the window. Setting a price yourself has every confirmation line.

Mews

A Mews property is read-only: MAYA sends no prices to Mews, in simulation or live. From Mews' side the two modes look the same. There is no history import for Mews yet, so a Mews property has no starter rules, and the strip at the top has no Go live button: it reads "Simulation · MAYA works out prices but sends nothing to Mews", and its ? says there is nothing to switch on. MAYA refuses a go-live from your side for a Mews property too ("MAYA doesn't send prices to Mews yet, so there is nothing to switch on."). We switch one live only if you ask, and that sends nothing to Mews. It turns the strip into the Live tag (its ? says nothing goes to Mews, live or not), changes the banner's wording ("has raised" instead of "would have raised"), makes each live change in the change log say "Nothing was sent to Mews. MAYA doesn't send prices there yet.", and makes a typed price's confirmation read "Saved. MAYA doesn't send prices to Mews yet." Mews: what works today has the detail.