Guide

The travel agency accounts sheet: what belongs in it, and where it stops working

Almost every agency starts in Excel, and for a while Excel is the right answer. This is the column set a booking sheet actually needs, followed by an honest look at the point where the sheet starts to cost you money instead of saving it.

The columns a booking sheet needs

If a sheet is missing any of these, the gap usually shows up as a payment nobody chased or a margin nobody checked.

  1. Booking reference

    One ID per booking that appears on the voucher, the invoice and the supplier confirmation, so three people can discuss the same trip without confusion.

  2. Client and contact number

    The WhatsApp number matters more than the email in this market. Keep it in its own column, in full international format, so it stays dialable.

  3. Travel dates

    Departure and return as real dates, not text. Text dates are why sheets cannot tell you what departs next week.

  4. Pax

    Adults and children split out. A single total hides the pricing difference and makes the rooming list guesswork.

  5. Supplier and cost price

    Who you are buying from and what you owe them. This is the column most sheets keep somewhere else, which is how supplier balances drift.

  6. Selling price and currency

    What the client pays and in which currency. Mixed EGP and USD bookings in one column make every total meaningless.

  7. Payments received and balance

    Deposit, instalments and the remaining balance with its due date. The balance should be a formula, never a typed number.

  8. VAT

    In Egypt, 14%. Record it as its own line rather than folding it into the selling price, otherwise the filing is a reconstruction every quarter.

Where the sheet stops working

  • Two people edit two copies. The moment a second staff member needs the file, you have two versions of the truth and no way to tell which one is current.
  • Nothing chases a balance. A due date in a cell does not call anyone. Collection depends on someone opening the file and noticing.
  • Supplier balances go stale. Client payments get updated because money arrives; supplier costs get updated when someone remembers.
  • There is no audit trail. When a price changes, the previous value is gone — you cannot see who changed it, when, or why.
  • Reporting is always retrospective. Answering "what is our margin on Nile cruises this quarter" means an afternoon of pivot tables, so the question stops being asked.

Questions agencies ask

Is a spreadsheet enough for a small agency?

For one person handling a few bookings a month, yes — a well-built sheet is cheaper and faster than any system. The break point is usually a second person needing the same file, or the first time a balance goes uncollected because nobody saw it.

How should 14% VAT be recorded on a travel booking?

As its own column, calculated from the taxable amount rather than typed in. Folding VAT into the selling price means every quarterly filing starts with unpicking what the tax portion was, booking by booking.

Can an existing sheet be moved into SavvyHost?

Yes. Clients, bookings and outstanding balances import from a spreadsheet. The columns above map more or less directly, which is why they are worth keeping clean even while you are still in Excel.

What about supplier accounts, not just client accounts?

Both sides belong in the same place. SavvyHost tracks supplier balances against the same booking as the client payment, so the margin on a trip is a fact rather than a calculation you do later.

When the sheet runs out

SavvyHost keeps the same columns — bookings, client and supplier accounts, balances, VAT — and adds the parts a spreadsheet cannot do: one shared record, automatic balance reminders on WhatsApp, and margin you can read without building a report.

Talk to us about your sheet

No sales deck. We look at how your agency runs today and tell you straight whether this fits.