A guesthouse website: bookings without portal commissions

A guest who found your guesthouse on a booking portal pays for the stay, but part of that amount stays with the intermediary. For a first stay, that’s a reasonable price for a new customer. It’s worse when the same guest comes back every year and the commission disappears from your bottom line every time.

In this guide, I show what a guesthouse website and an agritourism farm website need so that guests book directly: seasonal pricing, earnest money and terms and conditions, a calendar without double bookings, and visibility in Google. I also describe the new rules for the local tourist tax (opłata miejscowa), which take effect on 1 January 2027. In Masuria, where I work, many properties prepare for the season in winter: the summer photos are already there, and the inquiries about the May long weekend and the summer holidays are still ahead.

What a guest from a portal costs you

A portal’s commission depends on the contract. On Booking.com, you’ll find the rate in your contract with the portal and in the statements in the property extranet. In its help center, Airbnb states that under the model where the host pays the entire service fee, most hosts pay 15.5% (as of 30 October 2026). For a week-long stay costing PLN 2,000, that’s PLN 310 for the platform.

Work it out for your own property in three steps:

1. Add up the commissions you paid to portals last season (they’re in the statements in the portals’ dashboards).
2. Check how many guests had stayed with you before or came on a recommendation. They are the ones most likely to switch to booking directly.
3. Compare that amount with the cost of a website and a booking system spread over several seasons.

An important point that’s easy to forget. Since 14 November 2024, Booking.com, as a so-called gatekeeper under the EU Digital Markets Act (DMA), must allow properties to offer better prices and conditions in other channels, including on their own website. In a factsheet dated 28 September 2026, the European Commission adds that prices from other channels are not taken into account in Booking.com’s default ranking of offers. So you can give guests who book on your own website something extra: a lower price, a late checkout or breakfast included.

I’m not encouraging you to give up the portals. They bring guests who haven’t heard of you yet. The website is meant to take over the ones who already know you, come back or search for you by name.

8 elements a guesthouse website must have

1. Rooms with seasonal prices. Each room or cottage on a separate card: photos, floor area, number of beds, bathroom, view. Below it, a price table: high and low season, long weekends, minimum number of nights.
2. An availability calendar. The guest sees free dates right away, instead of writing “is anything available in August?” and waiting for a reply.
3. An inquiry or a booking with earnest money. I write about the choice in the next section.
4. A gallery. Real photos of the rooms, bathrooms, breakfasts, garden and surroundings, in winter too if you’re open all year. Don’t use stock photos from the internet, because guests will compare them with the reviews.
5. Local attractions. The lake, trails, kayak rental, restaurants and distances in minutes. This kind of content attracts people looking for a place to stay near a specific spot.
6. Terms and conditions. Check-in and checkout times, earnest money and booking cancellation, pets, quiet hours.
7. The local tourist tax. If your municipality charges it, give the rate per person per night below the price list. Details below.
8. Directions and contact. A map, tips for navigation (for example, “the last stretch is a dirt road”), parking and a phone number you can tap on a mobile.

If you host guests from abroad, add language versions with separate addresses for each language. I build a website with a panel where you can change prices and photos yourself as part of the Turnkey business website service, from PLN 4,900 net.

An inquiry or a booking with earnest money

The simplest version is an inquiry form: the guest chooses the dates and the room, and you confirm by email and give your bank account number. That’s enough for a few rooms, if you reply quickly. A booking with online payment is more convenient: the guest pays the earnest money with BLIK or a card, and the dates disappear from the calendar right away.

I set up a ready-made booking system from PLN 990 net, and a custom one from PLN 4,900 net. I connect online payments from PLN 490 net on a ready-made CMS or from PLN 1,490 net on custom code.

Earnest money vs. an advance payment

These words are often used interchangeably in Polish, but they mean different things. Earnest money (zadatek) is described in Art. 394 of the Kodeks cywilny (Polish Civil Code). Unless the contract provides otherwise, if the guest doesn’t perform the contract, you can withdraw from it and keep the earnest money. If you are the one who doesn’t perform the contract, the guest can demand twice the amount of the earnest money paid. When the stay takes place, the earnest money counts toward the price. The Civil Code doesn’t define an advance payment (zaliczka) separately, and as a rule it goes back to the guest if the contract isn’t performed.

Two practical tips. In your terms and conditions and in the booking confirmation, consistently use one word: “zadatek” or “zaliczka”. State the cancellation rules explicitly, for example until when you refund the payment in full, because Art. 394 allows the contract to provide otherwise.

A guest who books accommodation online for specific dates does not have 14 days to withdraw from the contract. Art. 38(1)(12) of the ustawa o prawach konsumenta (Poland’s Consumer Rights Act) excludes this for accommodation services if the contract specifies the date or period of the stay. So what happens on cancellation is decided mainly by your terms and conditions. Before booking, also show the total price and all extra charges, for example for cleaning or a pet.

The booking form and GDPR

Ask only for what you need: first and last name, email, phone, dates and number of people. Below the form, add a link to information on data processing (Art. 13 GDPR, RODO in Polish): who the controller is, for what purpose you process the data and how long you keep it. You process booking data in order to conclude and perform a contract (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR), so you don’t need consent for it. Separate consent is only needed for sending offers by email or text message.

The local tourist tax from 1 January 2027

This is the biggest change for the 2027 season. An act of 18 September 2026 (Dz.U. 2026 poz. 1354, Journal of Laws of 2026, item 1354), which changes the rules for the local tourist tax, has been published in the Dziennik Ustaw (Poland’s Journal of Laws). The current rules apply until the end of 2026, and from 1 January 2027:

• The property collects the tax. The collecting agent (płatnik) is the entity providing accommodation services. The act also covers guest rooms rented out by farmers on their farms, that is, typical agritourism.
• The rate is per night. At most PLN 5.00 per night, and PLN 5.50 in a spa protection zone. The spa tax (opłata uzdrowiskowa) can be up to PLN 6.86 per night.
• The municipal council (rada gminy) decides in a resolution in which localities the tax applies and how much it is. It can vary the rates, for example by type of property, part of the year or length of stay. The existing resolutions on the local tourist tax expire, so check the rate for 2027 in your municipality’s new resolution.
• The collecting agent’s obligations: a payment confirmation for the guest, a register kept separately for each property (including the guest’s first and last name and address, the number of nights and the amount collected), and, by the 15th day of the following month, a report to the municipality and payment of the amounts collected. For timely payments, you’re entitled to a fee: 10% of the collected tax, unless the municipality sets more.
• Exemptions cover, among others, children and school students in organized groups with supervisors, people with a severe degree of disability with one accompanying person, and stays longer than 29 consecutive nights.

What does this mean for the website? Below the price list, add a sentence such as: “We add the local tourist tax under the municipal council’s resolution to the price: PLN X per person per night.” The booking system can calculate it automatically, and you can fill in the guest’s address for the register at check-in. This is not legal or tax advice: I describe the law as of 3 November 2026, so confirm the details of the settlements with your municipal office.

One calendar for your website and the portals

When you sell rooms on your website, on Booking.com and on Airbnb at the same time, the biggest risk is a double booking. You have two solutions:

• Calendar synchronization via iCal. The portal gives you a calendar export link, and the system on your website imports it, and vice versa. It’s simple, but it works with a delay: Airbnb states that an imported calendar updates automatically every 3 hours.
• A channel manager, that is, software that sends availability and prices to all channels in real time. It costs a subscription, but it makes sense with more rooms and sales channels.

The principle is the same one I described in the guide Booksy or your own website: one calendar is the source of truth. You also enter bookings taken over the phone straight into it, not into a notebook.

Google: Business Profile and free booking links

Many guests start by typing the name of a town and the word “noclegi” (accommodation) into Google, or with Google Maps. That’s why a complete Google Business Profile is just as important as the website itself: the right category, current photos, a link to the website, a phone number and replies to reviews.

In accommodation results, Google also shows prices from various websites. Next to the portals, your official website can appear there thanks to free booking links. In its help on free booking links, Google writes that you don’t pay for clicks on them. Prices and availability must, however, reach Google on an ongoing basis. If you use a booking system, your provider may already be connected to Google and can set up the links for you. So before choosing a system, ask the provider whether it works with Google and whether it supports your type of property.

A plan for winter: checklist

1. Pull the total commissions for the last season from the portals’ dashboards.
2. Make a list of regular guests and ask whether they’d rather book directly.
3. Prepare a seasonal price list and terms and conditions with clear rules on earnest money and cancellation.
4. Check with your municipal office whether a local tourist tax applies to you from 2027, and how much it is.
5. Choose a booking system that syncs the calendar with the portals.
6. Connect online payment of earnest money and test the whole booking on your own phone.
7. Complete your Google Business Profile and ask your system provider about free booking links.
8. Leave a card in the rooms with the website address and a QR code, so guests know where to book their next stay.

Summary

Portals bring new guests, and your own website lets you keep the ones who already know you, without a commission on every subsequent stay. Before the 2027 season, prepare a price list, terms and conditions with earnest money, one calendar for all channels and information about the local tourist tax under the new rules. If you want to work this out for your property, write to me: I’ll prepare a quote within 24 hours, and new clients get 20% off their first order.