Guest messagesGroup enquiry
We’re planning a birthday dinner for 16. Is the private room available?
Of course. Let’s work out the details.
Birthday dinner · 16 guestsPreferred time · 19:00
Guest Experience / Group & Function Enquiries
Group bookings. Restaurant enquiries in one thread.
A party over your online limit becomes an enquiry, and one thread takes it from first message to confirmed booking.
Restaurants & venues
Group & Function EnquiriesInside Gaplessly
Illustrative product preview.
The big picture
Group & Function Enquiries, at a glance.
Group bookings, restaurant functions and private dining requests run through your one booking form in Gaplessly. When a party is bigger than your online limit, the form takes an enquiry instead of turning them away, you hold the tables in the thread so nobody else can book them, and you confirm without retyping the guest's details. Parties just under the limit can wait for your approval first, and a room marked private hire sends its enquiries to the same form, with a minimum spend shown as text and paid at the venue. The online party limit comes with Venue Growth and Venue Pro, and no booking carries a commission.
Why group bookings do not fit a normal booking form
Every restaurant and venue caps how big a party can book online, and for good reason. A table for two to six is a simple slot on the floor plan. A table for twenty, or a function, needs answers a form cannot give: which tables go together, what else is on that night, whether the space is even free.
The usual fix is to switch the form off above a certain size and send the guest to a phone number or an enquiry email. The guest leaves your booking page with nothing confirmed, and the enquiry ends up in a different inbox or on a different list from your regular bookings, where it is easy to lose on a busy night.
With Gaplessly the guest stays on the same booking form. You set the largest party you accept online in your booking rules; above that number, submitting the form sends an enquiry, and the enquiry lives in Gaplessly with the rest of your bookings. Until you set a limit there is no cap, and no enquiry step.
How a group booking enquiry arrives
Your booking page offers a "More than" option for bigger groups. The guest picks their date, then gives the number of guests, their name, email and phone, and a message about the occasion, dietary needs or timings. On Venue Pro, or with the Intake and consent forms add-on, you can add questions of your own to that form. The form does not try to confirm a table on the spot.
The enquiry arrives as a thread in your Gaplessly Inbox, the same place guests' booking messages land, with the guest's details attached from the start. Your admins get an email about it with a button to reply from the dashboard, and the guest gets an email saying their enquiry is in.
Holding tables while you sort out the details
Once you have read the enquiry, you reply to the guest from the thread, and they get your reply by email, or by text if your plan includes texts. Alongside that you hold the tables you are thinking of giving them, for a date, a time and how long they will stay.
Held tables come off public availability straight away. Someone browsing your booking page cannot book a table you are holding for a function, the same protection a confirmed reservation gets. You can spend a few days settling dates, numbers and layout with the guest without the tables you plan to offer being booked by someone else.
- You hold the specific tables you pick, up to every table in a room at once, and the rest of the floor stays bookable.
- A held table comes off availability the same way a confirmed booking does, so guests never see a separate hold state to be confused by.
- A hold has no expiry. It stays in place until you confirm the booking or release the tables yourself, and the guest is not told about it.
Confirming the booking from the thread
When the details are settled, you pick the final tables and confirm the booking from the same thread. The guest's name and contact details from the first enquiry go straight onto their client record and the reservation, their message goes into the booking notes, and you can adjust the party size if the numbers changed. Nothing is typed in twice.
The thread ends with a line saying how many are booked and when. That booking sits on the same floor plan and in the same list as everything else you have on that night.
Confirming does not email the guest a confirmation or ask them for a deposit, so tell them it is booked, and arrange any deposit, in your reply.
Common questions
Set a limit for online bookings, anywhere from 1 to 30 guests. Below it a guest books a table directly and it confirms straight away. Above it, the same form sends you their date and party size as an enquiry, and you hold tables and confirm from that thread.
No. They fill in the same public booking form as everyone else. A normal booking confirms on the spot, and a large party's request lands in your Inbox as an enquiry for you to reply to.
Yes. Holding is a step you take from the enquiry thread once you have read it, before the party size, date or exact tables are locked in. It is there so you can protect the space while the conversation is still going, and it lasts until you confirm or release it.
No. Held tables come off public availability the moment you hold them from the enquiry thread, the same way a confirmed booking would, so nobody browsing your booking page can take them.
No. The name and contact details from the original enquiry carry straight into the reservation when you confirm it, along with their message as a booking note.
It covers the enquiry, the table hold and the final booking: a private dining or function request above your online limit comes through this same thread, and you can hold every table in a room at once. Quotes and run sheets for functions and events are not built yet, so menus, pricing and the run of the night are agreed with the guest in your replies.
No. Enquiries belong to the hospitality side of Gaplessly, built around tables and party size. Salons, clinics and spas book by service and team member, so this flow does not apply to them.
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