Paying Travel Advisors on Time Is a Commercial Strategy, Not Back Office

In early July, Rocco Forte Hotels became the first luxury hotel brand to adopt Sion, a platform created to manage and pay travel advisor commissions.

While the announcement was covered as a payment upgrade, there is something larger at play. When Sir Rocco Forte stated that travel advisors are fundamental to the group’s business and deserve a payment process that reflects their value, and that his aim is to make Rocco Forte Hotels one of the easiest luxury brands for advisors to work with, it showcases the fact that the company understood immediately that commission settlement affected its relationships with partners.

And yet, a month later, no other major hotel group appears to have followed.

Why? Hotel brands already spend heavily on agency relationships, and the technology to shorten payment cycles already exists. But for some reason, commissions remain buried in finance departments, disconnected from the commercial value of their most important channel.

The channel keeps growing, even without being repriced

The agency channel is growing at roughly twice the rate of the two online groups that still dominate the hotel distribution conversation. According to figures Onyx CenterSource provided to Hospitality.today, commissionable room nights rose 11.8% year over year in the first half of 2026. Over the first quarter, Booking Holdings and Expedia Group each reported 6% growth in room nights. 

Hotels achieved that growth with almost no increase in unit cost. Average commission per commissionable room night rose 0.8%, while the average daily rate on those nights increased 1.4%. Total commissions were approximately 13% higher, almost entirely because agencies generated more bookings.

The economics look very different elsewhere in distribution. Hotels can pay a higher commission to improve their position on Expedia. Booking.com sells additional exposure through its Visibility Booster and Preferred Partner Program. In both cases, additional demand carries a higher unit cost.

On the other hand, agencies delivered close to 12% more room nights while the average commission per night rose by less than 1%. For hotels accustomed to paying progressively more for growth, that alone should command their attention.

As said earlier, luxury hotel groups already spend heavily on the relationships generating this business. They participate in roadshows, host dinner, organize activations at trade shows, and invite agency partners to sporting events and concerts. Luxury travel runs on personal relationships, and brands understand the value of remaining close to the people who advise their clients.

Commission settlement forms part of that relationship. Flawless execution for the client, followed by prompt and trouble-free payment, gives the agency team confidence in the partnership.

Hotels are already paying for that loyalty, and paying well. Settling commissions on time produces the same effect at no additional cost.

Millions earned and still outstanding

For an agency, the booking does not always end when the client checks out. It can enter a second life as a receivable.

During the first quarter of 2026, the average hotel commission reached the agency 39 days after checkout. Each commission averaged $21.50 per room night on a commissionable average daily rate of $217. Individually, these are modest amounts. Across thousands of bookings, they become a substantial pool of revenue sitting outside the business that earned it.

The processor’s clock starts only after the hotel has approved the commission and provided the necessary data and funds. Onyx says it can submit payment within 72 hours of that point, with agency payments generally issued weekly. How soon the process begins depends heavily on the hotel’s funding method. Only 52% of hotels use direct debit where it is available. At the remaining properties, someone must initiate the payment manually before processing can begin. And for hotels outside its payment network, Onyx estimates an average collection period of 140 days based on its own commission-chasing work.

With this in mind, it is no surprise that many of my peers across the luxury market are carrying millions in unpaid hotel commissions.

Globe7 has now approved a financial controller position with responsibility for the continuous recovery of outstanding balances. Reaching the point where specialist headcount is required to collect revenue already earned says something important about the economics of this channel. Commission chasing has become an operating cost in its own right.

Nobody owns the complete process

There are smaller hotels where commission settlement is easy and fast. Large chains operate through an enormous structure of properties, regional offices, finance teams, and established approval processes. The commission takes longer to travel through that structure because almost every other process does too.

Finance owns the payment inside the hotel. The agency relationship sits elsewhere in the organization, usually with a commercial team that may never see when the payment is made.

The delay therefore belongs to everyone and no one. With no one responsible for the complete process, the urgency disappears between departments.

Every additional day before a commission is paid keeps that cash in the hotel’s bank accounts. The working-capital benefit is immediate and visible. Any damage to the agency relationship emerges later and is far more difficult to quantify.

Everyone is watching Rocco Forte

What Rocco Forte has done is a major step, and the agency market is watching closely because the group has put clear commitments behind its relationship with advisors.

Rocco Forte Hotels approves the booking and releases the funds, the payment platform, Sion, typically delivers the money within 24 to 48 hours of processing. Because the 24-to-48-hour window only begins after processing, it should not be confused with the total time elapsed since checkout.

The published policy also resolves situations that often create uncertainty for agencies. Rocco Forte pays commission on cancellation fees retained by the hotel and on additional nights when a guest extends a stay, even when the extension was arranged without the original advisor.

While this is an undeniably important development, Rocco Forte's footprint, which consists of 14 properties, most of them in Italy and some in the United Kingdom, Belgium and Germany, remains too small to reset expectations across the global market.

On a larger scale, things will start changing when a large global group adopts fast settlement across its portfolio. Competitors will watch how the agency market responds, and others will begin to follow. Once most leading groups have moved, those left behind will have no other option.

Put settlement on the commercial agenda

Hotel brands are already fighting for the loyalty of agencies and spending serious money to earn it. Commission settlement should be treated as part of the same commercial investment.

Finance should continue to verify and execute payments, with someone responsible for the agency channel owning the complete outcome. Hotels also need to know how many days pass between guest checkout and the release of the commission at every property.

Ultimately, while a hotel that treats settlement as an accounting task may not lose a booking immediately, it simply fails to build the partnership its commercial team has been paying to create.