With last minute cancellations and re-bookings disrupting the security of their cash flows, hotels are now looking at blockchain technology to resolve such primordial issue. To do so, they seek to leverage a new concept called ‘room-night tokens’ (RNTs), which essentially sees room-bookings manifest themselves as NFTs.
In the past, hotels would have to refund or rebook a customer’s stay upon request. However, with RNTs, they will be guaranteed revenue upon a room-booking being made – as it would be the customer’s responsibility to transfer, swap, or sell their RNT if they no longer wish to attend to it (in a similar way in which music or sports enthusiasts will go to StubHub to sell unwanted event tickets).
The platform leading the way within such niche is Pinktada, a marketplace which allows users to transfer, swap, and sell their RNT up to two days before the check-in date. In the future, the platform also plans on launching a function which will allow users to buy reservations (i.e. RNTs) in bulk, which they can then fragmentally sell for a profit.
Of course, like regular NFTs, the price of RNTs will highly depend upon the prices of the market in question. However, intuitively, they will also come with a dreaded expiry date.
As of now, it is unclear how many hotels/resorts are exploring the idea of RNT integration. One establishment firmly in-favour of the concept (and the Pinktada platform) is ‘Casa de Campo Resort & Villas’ in the Dominican Republic.
