For new hosts

Slowhop.com is a site to which we invite hosts of carefully selected accommodation. We follow a few simple, but important, guidelines when making our selections. We take into account the quality of the interior of the accommodation, the interesting surroundings, the possibility to indulge in local ingredients and food, the intimate character of the place, as well as guest reviews. At the same time, we try to find places where the hosts themselves create a wonderful and unforgettable atmosphere. We make sure that the offer on Slowhop includes only interesting or in any way exceptional places.

Step 1: Let us know about you

We have discovered and approached many places ourselves. And many more #slowtravel places have so far remained hidden to our eye. If you're one of them and you know your guests will find a nice interior and slow travel is your approach, be sure to let us know about you.

Fill out the registration form

Step 2: Read and agree to the terms of cooperation

If we decide to accept you into our growing Slowhop family, you will receive an email confirmation from us. What's next?

1. Log in to your Slowhop account.

2. Read and confirm the terms of cooperation in your profile under the "Settings" tab. Accepting the terms and conditions legally corresponds to signing the contract and only then will we be able to create your accommodation profile together.

At the beginning, you will need a few minutes at your computer to add the necessary information to your Slowhop host account. We know this part is tedious, but important. We have therefore tried to make it as easy as possible for you to complete everything. Once you sit down at your computer and log into your Slowhop account, please do the following:

Contact and billing details

We will send notifications to the email and phone number you have saved on Slowhop when guests create an inquiry or pay for a reservation. The billing information is then used to issue a commission invoice correctly. Both of these can be filled in on "Settings" - "Contact details".

Your profile as a host

Guests on Slowhop want to know who they are communicating with and who they are going to. That's why it's important to introduce yourself as a host with a few sentences and upload a photo. We kindly ask that you really introduce yourself and do not use a logo or photo of the accommodation - the accommodation itself is described in more detail in a different section. You can write a short text and upload your photo on the "Profile" tab.

Accommodation profile

This is where we'll need a bit of help from you - you know your accommodation the best, so you can easily "click" all the tags that will make it easier for guests to understand what you have in place. We also ask that you upload photos for each section.

Our copywriters will then sort, describe and, most importantly, prepare the text of your accommodation profile. They will contact you if they need any information - about the accommodation, the area or even about your story.

You can add your accommodation profile by clicking on "My offers" -> "Add offer". You can then edit the offer at any time right there.

Stripe account and payments

We use Stripe's payment gateway to process payments from guests. This way, the money paid by the guest is immediately available to you and you don't have to worry about commission payments either, everything is set up automatically. Guests pay the requested amount to your Stripe account created via Slowhop - the account is yours, it's similar as if the guests were paying to your bank account. This allows you to issue invoices to your guests for their bookings without any problems.

Stripe automatically does two things after receiving payment from the guest:

1) commission payment - the commission is paid into Slowhop's account. This is similar to how you would pay a commission by bank transfer. Slowhop issues a commission invoice for these payments at the beginning of the next month for the paid commission, so you don't have to worry about further payments.

2) Transfer to your bank account - Stripe will automatically transfer the remaining amount to your bank account within a few days. You can see everything clearly directly after logging into your Stripe account or on Slowhop in the menu under the "Payments" tab. You can easily create a Stripe account by going to "Settings" -> "Stripe Payment Account".

For each booking, you can require guests to pay either a certain part of the total price or the full price. This payment is then made by the guest via the Stripe payment gateway on Slowhop (card, bank transfer, Apple pay, etc.). You and the guest can then arrange to pay the remaining amount directly.

Once you have completed the previous steps, we are already immersed in the work. We want to describe your accommodation in the best possible way to your guests. We'll do a proper detective research on the place you're offering, including its history, the surrounding countryside, points of interest, non-point of interest and anything else that might excite guests.

During the process, we'll be in touch to help you describe your venue in detail, and most importantly, authentically. After all, only you know which neighborhood bakery has particularly delicious rolls or under which tree you can find the bravest mushrooms.

We also proudly present the "disadvantages" of the place. We never know if our guests are looking for a place where the floor creaks, where there is nothing but nature, or where a rooster will wake them up at 5 am. This is one of the reasons why we can ensure that our guests enjoy their stay and cannot be disappointed with the place.

We'll let you know as soon as your profile is complete. If anything needs to be clarified or we've gone completely wrong with our description of the atmosphere of the place, there's definitely room for subsequent editing. The main thing for us is that our guests always read the complete truth.

Since we take the preparation of the profile really honestly, we can't rush it. Therefore, we ask for patience if we happen to have multiple sites signing up at the same time. In that case, it may take a few weeks to prepare, but if you are in a hurry for the profile, we can always make arrangements. Feel free to write or pick up the phone and let us know. In the future, if you have new photos, a new horse in the barn, start a new breakfast or the roof collapses, be sure to let us know as soon as possible so we can keep your profile up to date. You can also make some changes to your Slowhop profile yourself.

We'll let you know as soon as the profile is complete. Your feedback is extremely important to us - after all, this is a presentation of your place and you know it best. Please be honest and let us know if the text matches what you actually offer to your guests.

Last steps before launch:

1) Update your calendar on Slowhop as soon as possible.

You can manage your calendar manually and under the " Calendar " tab, select the booked dates. Or make your job easier and link the calendar to your other availability calendars (e.g. Booking, Airbnb, etc.). You will save yourself and your guests a lot of time and nerves by not receiving requests for days that are already booked. For instructions on how to link your calendars using iCal, click here. 

2) Set prices and payment conditions

Guests on Slowhop can see the total price for their stay when they select a date. While you still have to manually confirm their request, your pricing and payment terms are already automatically loaded. Please set these prices and conditions for the various periods as " The Rate Plans" (you can find them in the menu under this name). You can set, for example, a different minimum length of stay, a different prepayment amount and different permitted arrival and departure days for New Year's Eve and a different one for the summer holidays or the rest of the year.

Once the calendar has been updated (or connected) and the prices and conditions have been added, there's nothing stopping you from launching your profile. From the moment you let us know that you are ready, we will start showing you as "New" on Slowhop and you can look forward to your first enquiries or bookings. We will also prepare posts on our social media sites in the days following the profile launch.

We are aware that our website will never be perfect, but we constantly work to make it user-friendly, simple and attractive for our customers and hosts. If you have an idea for improvement, or if something about Slowhop annoys you downright, let us know about it in good conscience at hop@slowhop.com. We'll definitely give it a look and we often improve Slowhop based on this feedback from our hosts.

Features we've added thanks to feedback from hosts:

Last-minute offers - when you have a few rooms left (or become available) at the last minute, you can add a last-minute offer to Slowhop. Guests can then find it on the site in the "Last minute" category and they can book and pay for it without sending you an enquiry. You can easily add such offers under "My offers" -> "Add last minute offer".

Automatic processing of payments from guests and Slowhop commission payment - to avoid the hassle of issuing advance invoices to guests, waiting for payment and then paying Slowhop commission by bank transfer, we use a simple feature from Stripe. The guest pays to your Stripe account (created via Slowhop) -> you have the money immediately available on your Stripe account or within a few days on your bank account -> Stripe automatically pays the commission to Slowhop for you -> Slowhop issues the commission invoice (which is already paid) at the beginning of the next month.

Communication with guests - you can easily communicate with your guests directly in the specific booking on Slowhop and agree with them on the details. Once the guest has paid the amount you requested and the booking is confirmed, you will see the guest's contacts and they will see yours. You can then finalize everything together. We also kindly ask you not to send your phone number, email address or your website to the guest before confirming the booking.

A free booking tool for your website - hosts who have joined Slowhop can also use a simple booking tool for their website (or link to it from Facebook). Bookings are entered into your calendar on Slowhop (and from there, they are transferred to your other calendars when connected). There are no fixed fees and hosts only pay a 4% net commission for processing the booking.

Be proud of your hosting on Slowhop. We carefully select which places and which hosts are featured on Slowhop, and we know that this is the quality guests are looking for on Slowhop.

Don't be afraid to spread the word about your hosting on Slowhop on your website, Facebook or Instagram. You can use the hashtag #slowhop. This way, our fans who search for interesting accommodations on social media by using this hashtag will also find you.