Manual do Hóspede

Format guide · division of labor

Printed or digital guidebook: the wrong question

Host forums frame it as a duel. In practice every stay has two distinct moments — walking in with luggage, and everything else — and each format owns one of them.

Who wins at each moment

Judged by the only test that matters: does the answer arrive before the message to you does?

Moment of the stayPaper on the tablePage behind a link
Before arrival (what to bring, how to get in)Doesn't exist yet — the guest hasn't arrivedWins by default: the link rides the confirmation message
First ten minutes (Wi-Fi, lights, AC)Wins: zero friction, already on the table, no dead batteryLoses: the guest hasn't saved the link and won't scroll for it
Mid-stay (restaurants, trash day, checkout time)Loses: nobody carries the card to the beachWins: it's on the phone, which is on the guest
When the Wi-Fi password changesLoses badly: reprint, re-laminate, drive overWins: one edit, live for the next guest
Appliance walkthroughs with photosCramped: photos cost paper areaWins: photos are free and zoomable

Scored across the whole stay it's a draw on purpose — each format covers the other's blind spot.

The setup that uses both

One evening of work, using the free template as the source text.

  1. 1

    Print one A5 card, not a binder

    Wi-Fi network and password, AC in two lines, checkout time, your phone number — and a QR code to the full manual. Laminate that one card. The twenty-page binder is exactly what guests have voted against for years by messaging you instead.

  2. 2

    Put the full manual behind the QR and behind a link

    Everything else — entry photos, appliance guides, rules with reasons, the neighborhood — lives on the page the QR opens. The same link goes into your booking-confirmation message, so pre-arrival questions die before check-in.

  3. 3

    Let each channel advertise the other

    The card says 'everything else: point your camera here'. The digital page's first screen repeats the Wi-Fi password, because half the scans happen for exactly that. Neither channel assumes the other was read.

The digital half can be a PDF, a Google Doc, or a purpose-built page — the trade-offs of each live on the landing page. The paper half is a ten-minute print job either way.

Edge cases

My guests are older and don't scan QR codes.
Then your split shifts toward paper: print the appliance photos too, keep the card A4 instead of A5. But still send the link before arrival — the adult children who booked the stay for them will read it.
Isn't a laminated binder more charming?
Charm is real and reviews mention it — a handwritten welcome note on the card delivers more of it than twenty laminated pages. Charm the guest with one page; inform them on the phone.
What about guests with no mobile data?
The QR-to-Wi-Fi trick solves the bootstrap: the card gets them on the network, the network gets them to the manual. Put the Wi-Fi QR above the manual QR on the card, in that order.
How often will I be reprinting the card?
Almost never, if the card is designed right: it should carry only slow-changing facts — checkout time, your number, the QR codes. Anything that rotates (door codes, seasonal notes, the occasional Wi-Fi change) belongs on the digital side, where an edit costs nothing. If you find yourself laminating monthly, the card is holding content that was assigned to the wrong channel.