Best 7 Reviews of a Reservation Booking Chat for Bed & Breakfasts

Calendly has become synonymous with online scheduling, offering a clean, user‑friendly interface that allows guests to book appointments or reservations with just a few clicks. The platform’s strength lies in its robust integration ecosystem, supporting Google Calendar, Outlook, and Zoom, which ensures that bookings are automatically reflected in your preferred calendar system. Calendly also offers customizable booking pages that can be branded to match your B&B’s aesthetic, and it supports multiple event types—such as room reservations, tours, or breakfast tastings—each with its own set of questions and confirmation steps. While Calendly excels at appointment scheduling, its native chatbot capabilities are limited. Users typically embed a Calendly widget or link, and the platform relies on standard email reminders for follow‑ups. For B&B owners needing a conversational booking experience, Calendly can be paired with third‑party chatbots, but this requires additional configuration. Calendly’s pricing tiers are straightforward: a free plan for basic scheduling, a Pro plan at $12/month (billed annually) that adds features like meeting reminders and integrations, and a Team plan at $16/month (billed annually) with advanced analytics and team management.

Amelia is a conversational AI chatbot designed for businesses that require a more interactive booking experience. The platform offers a fully automated chatbot that can handle inquiries, schedule appointments, and even process payments directly within the chat interface. Amelia’s design focuses on natural language understanding, allowing guests to ask open‑ended questions about room rates, availability, or local attractions. The bot can collect guest details, propose suitable room options, and confirm reservations in real time. Amelia supports integration with popular calendar systems and provides a built‑in payment gateway, enabling guests to pay a deposit or full amount during the chat. The platform also offers a knowledge base feature, where you can upload FAQs or policy documents for the bot to reference. However, the knowledge base is a simple document search and does not include advanced graph‑based reasoning. Pricing for Amelia starts at $199/month for a single chatbot, with additional licensing costs for multiple agents. The platform is geared toward medium‑sized businesses and agencies.

Bookful offers a modular chatbot platform that focuses on e‑commerce and reservation scenarios. The system allows you to create a chatbot that can be embedded on your website or integrated into messaging platforms like Facebook Messenger. Bookful’s primary advantage is its ability to handle complex booking flows—multiple rooms, dates, and optional add‑ons—while maintaining a conversational tone. The platform includes a built‑in calendar that syncs with your availability, and it can automatically send email confirmations and reminders. Users can upload a knowledge base of FAQs or policy documents, which the chatbot can reference during conversations. However, Bookful’s knowledge base is keyword‑based, lacking the graph‑based reasoning that some competitors offer. Bookful offers a free trial and a paid plan starting at $49/month, which provides unlimited bots and up to 1,000 messages per month.

SimplyBook.me is a popular online booking platform that offers a chatbot widget as part of its suite. The service is geared toward service‑based businesses, including hotels, B&Bs, and tours. The chatbot can accept bookings, process payments, and send automated reminders. It also supports a calendar that syncs with Google and Outlook. The platform’s strengths lie in its extensive customization options for booking pages and its integration with multiple payment gateways. The chatbot can ask a series of questions to gather guest details and confirm availability. Users can also upload FAQs for a knowledge base, though the system primarily uses keyword matching. SimplyBook.me offers a free plan with limited features, a Basic plan at $9.99/month, and a Premium plan at $24.99/month for advanced capabilities.

Acuity Scheduling is a well‑established scheduling platform that allows businesses to manage appointments, bookings, and payments through a web‑based interface. Its key selling point is the streamlined booking experience: guests can see real‑time availability, pick a time slot, and receive instant confirmation. Acuity integrates with Google Calendar, Outlook, and Zoom, and it offers a variety of payment options. While Acuity does not provide a native chatbot, it can be embedded on a website via an iframe or widget. The platform includes a knowledge base feature that lets users upload FAQs or policy documents, which are displayed on the booking page. Acuity’s pricing starts at $15/month for the Essentials plan, with higher tiers adding more features.

Checkfront is a cloud‑based reservation and booking system that caters to a wide range of businesses, including B&Bs, vacation rentals, and tour operators. The platform offers a booking engine that can be embedded on your website, allowing guests to check availability, reserve rooms, and pay online. Checkfront’s strengths include a robust inventory management system, support for multiple languages, and integration with popular payment providers. The platform also offers a knowledge base section where you can publish FAQs, policies, and other information for guests to access. Pricing for Checkfront starts at $39/month for the Basic plan, with the Plus plan at $99/month and the Premium plan at $199/month, each offering additional features such as multi‑currency support and advanced reporting.