Industries · Hotels and hospitality
Hotel maintenance software that fixes the room before the review
In a hotel, a broken air conditioner is not a ticket. It is a guest who checks out unhappy. FreeMaint gives the engineering team one place where every room issue, every preventive task and every inspection round is logged, assigned and closed — from a small boutique property to a resort with its own plant room, pool and laundry.
Free your maintenance · Free Core tier, unlimited users, no credit card.
In short
Hotel maintenance software, or a CMMS for hotels, records every fault reported by staff as a work order, sends it to a technician’s phone and tracks it to closure, while scheduling preventive maintenance on HVAC, boilers, pools, kitchens, laundry, generators and lifts. FreeMaint does this on a free Core tier with unlimited users, rooms and work orders, and staff can report issues by scanning a QR code without an account.
Updated September 27, 2026
What a hotel engineering team gets
Room issues reported by QR code, no login
Put a QR code in back-of-house areas, on a room’s fan coil unit or on the pool pump. Housekeeping, front desk or kitchen staff scan it, describe the problem, add a photo and submit — no account, no app to install. The request lands in the maintenance queue with the location or asset already filled in.
Included in Core (free)Rooms modelled as locations
Build the property as a tree: building, floor, room, plus the plant room, pool deck, kitchen and laundry. Each room keeps its own equipment and its full work order history, so the third complaint about the same shower in room 214 is visible at a glance.
Included in Core (free)Preventive plans for every critical system
Time-based plans create work orders automatically: quarterly fan coil filter cleaning, annual boiler service, weekly pool checks, monthly generator test, kitchen extraction cleaning. Nothing depends on someone remembering.
Included in Core (free)A mobile app that works offline
Technicians receive their jobs on their phone, sorted by priority and location, check the asset’s history and close the work with photos and notes. Basements and plant rooms without signal are not a problem: the app syncs when it reconnects.
Included in Core (free)Water-safety and pool rounds as inspections
Turn hot-water temperature checks, outlet flushing and pool readings into checklist templates with a monthly grid. Staff scan the QR code on the calorifier or the outlet and today’s round opens directly. Part of the Starter plan.
Included in StarterLift, boiler and fire-equipment certificates
Record statutory examinations and service certificates against each asset with an expiry date. FreeMaint warns you before the lift examination or the extinguisher service lapses, instead of an auditor pointing it out. Part of the Starter plan.
Included in StarterEnergy meters and tariffs
On the Enterprise plan, follow electricity, gas and water meters with their tariffs to see what the chillers, the laundry and the pool really cost to run.
Included in EnterpriseWhy hotel maintenance is different
A hotel runs 24 hours a day, every day of the year, and most of its equipment sits in rooms that are sold every night. When the air conditioning stops, the hot water runs cold or the guest lift is out of service, the guest notices before the engineering team does. The fault becomes a complaint at the desk, then a room move or a compensation, and sometimes a one-star review that stays online for years.
The usual failure is not technical. It is the chain of messages: a room attendant tells the housekeeper, who calls reception, who sends a WhatsApp to the duty technician, who is already under a sink on the fourth floor. Requests get lost between shifts, nobody knows what was actually done, and the same fault comes back two weeks later in the same room.
- Guest-facing breakdowns: HVAC, hot water, lifts, pool, in-room fixtures
- Communication gaps between front desk, housekeeping and maintenance
- Seasonal peaks: cooling demand in summer, heating and hot water in winter
- Lifts, boilers and generators with no scheduled servicing on record
- Several buildings or properties coordinated by phone and spreadsheets
From a room complaint to a closed work order
With FreeMaint, whoever finds the problem reports it once. Staff with an account create a request or a work order from the web or the mobile app. Everyone else scans a QR code and fills in the public request form, which opens in the language of their phone — useful in teams where several languages are spoken. The chief engineer approves the request, converts it into a work order and assigns it, or assigns it straight away when it is obviously urgent.
Priorities only help if they mean something. A practical hotel scale: Critical for a guest lift out of service or no hot water on a floor; High for an air conditioner not cooling in an occupied room or a water leak; Medium for routine repairs; Low for a lightbulb, a loose curtain rail or a TV remote. Keep High for what really is urgent: across FreeMaint workspaces, a work order marked High closes 53% slower than one marked Medium (FreeMaint Research, 2026), largely because too many jobs get the label and the queue loses its meaning.
When the technician closes the job, the work order keeps who did what, when, which parts were used and photos of the result. Standard reports show average completion time, overdue work and cost by asset or location, so you can see which rooms and which equipment generate the most calls.
A preventive plan built for a hotel
Reactive work never disappears in a hotel, but many of the breakdowns guests notice can be anticipated. The median FreeMaint workspace spends only 22.5% of its work orders on preventive maintenance, and 27.1% of sites log no preventive work at all (FreeMaint Research, 2026). A plan on the critical systems moves breakdowns out of occupied nights and into scheduled slots, ideally when the room is empty.
Typical time-based plans a hotel engineering team sets up in FreeMaint:
- HVAC: fan coil filter cleaning every quarter, chiller and heat pump service before each season
- Boilers and hot-water calorifiers: annual contractor service, monthly visual check
- Pool and spa: daily water readings, weekly pump inspection and filter backwash
- Kitchen: extraction hood and duct cleaning, cold room and freezer checks
- Laundry: washer and dryer belts, lint filters, drains
- Generator: monthly load test, fuel level and battery check
- Lifts and fire equipment: contractor visits and extinguisher service recorded against the asset
Legionella and water-temperature checks as inspection rounds
Hot and cold water systems in hotels carry a known legionella risk: long pipe runs, rooms left empty for days, showers, spa pools and cooling towers. Many operators follow a written water-safety plan — for example under the HSE’s ACOP L8 in the UK, or an ASHRAE 188-based programme in the US — that asks for regular temperature checks at the calorifier and at sentinel outlets, and flushing of little-used outlets.
FreeMaint does not certify compliance with any of these frameworks, but it gives the checks a structure and a dated record. Build an inspection template with one line per checkpoint, attach it to the calorifier or to a location, and record each reading in the monthly grid. A failed reading can open a work order automatically. Weekly flushing of empty rooms fits well as a weekly preventive plan. The monthly grid is on Starter; weekly and daily monitoring grids are on Business.
Certificates work the same way: lift examinations, boiler and pressure-vessel inspections and fire-extinguisher services are logged against the asset with their expiry date, and FreeMaint reminds you before they lapse.
One property or several — and what FreeMaint is not
Each hotel is a branch of the location tree, so a group can run several properties in one workspace, give each site its own team and still see all open work in one list. Technicians only see what their role and scope allow.
FreeMaint is a maintenance system. It has no housekeeping module and does not connect to your property management system: rooms are locations, not reservations. That keeps it quick to set up, and it sits alongside whatever the front office already uses.
Set up your hotel in five steps
- 1
Create the property and its rooms
Add buildings, floors and rooms as locations, plus the plant room, kitchen, laundry and pool. If you already have a room list in a spreadsheet, import it.
- 2
Register the equipment
Pick the Hotels sector during onboarding to start from example equipment — central HVAC, guest elevator, pool pump, backup generator, laundry machine — and a weekly pool maintenance plan, then replace them with your own.
- 3
Print the QR codes
Label rooms, equipment and back-of-house areas so any staff member can report an issue without an account.
- 4
Schedule the preventive plans
Start with what guests feel first: HVAC, hot water, lifts and pool. Add the kitchen, laundry and generator next.
- 5
Review every week
Look at overdue work, repeat calls per room and completion times, then adjust priorities and plan frequencies.
FreeMaint compared with the usual alternatives
| Criterion | FreeMaint | Phone, WhatsApp and paper log | All-in-one hotel operations platform |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reporting a room issue | QR code or app, with a photo, no account needed | Phone call or message, easily lost between shifts | Usually inside a staff app that needs an account |
| Preventive maintenance on HVAC, boilers, lifts | Time-based plans create work orders automatically | Depends on memory and a wall calendar | Varies, often basic |
| History per room and per asset | Complete and searchable | Scattered across notebooks and chats | Often task-centred rather than equipment-centred |
| Water-safety and pool checks | Inspection templates and monthly grid (Starter) | Paper sheets filed in the plant room | Generic checklists |
| Technician app offline | Included in Core | None | Depends on the vendor |
| Pricing model | Free Core tier, paid plans per company per month, never per user | Free, but paid for in lost requests | Often per room or per user |
| Housekeeping and PMS link | Not included: maintenance only | Not applicable | Often the heart of the product |
Frequently asked questions
How do hotel staff report a maintenance issue?
Front desk staff with an account create a request or work order in seconds by choosing the room, describing the issue — air conditioning not cooling, blocked toilet, water leak — and setting the priority. Housekeeping, kitchen or night staff without an account scan the QR code in the area and fill in the public request form with a photo. Technicians are notified on the mobile app.
Can FreeMaint track HVAC units across 100 or more rooms?
Yes. Rooms and assets are unlimited, including on the free Core tier. Each room can hold its fan coil or split unit, its bathroom fixtures and its appliances, and a preventive plan can schedule the filter cleaning of every unit monthly or quarterly, creating the work orders before problems start.
How does the mobile app help the maintenance team?
Technicians see their work orders sorted by priority and location, open the room or asset history, take before-and-after photos and close the job on the spot. The app works offline in basements and plant rooms and syncs when the connection returns.
Does it work for a hotel group with several properties?
Yes. Each property is a branch of the location tree in the same workspace, with its own team if you want. Managers see open work across all sites, while each team works on its own property. Pricing is per company, so adding a property does not add a per-user fee.
How do we schedule preventive maintenance for HVAC and lifts?
Create a time-based plan per asset or group of assets — for example “fan coil units, quarterly filter cleaning” or “guest lift, monthly contractor visit” — and FreeMaint generates the work orders on schedule. Lift examinations and other statutory certificates can be tracked with expiry alerts on the Starter plan.
Does FreeMaint make us compliant with legionella or lift regulations?
No software can guarantee compliance on its own. FreeMaint records the checks your water-safety plan or your lift contractor requires — temperature readings, flushing, examinations — with dates, names and results, so you can show what was done. The obligations themselves come from your local regulations and your risk assessment.
Does FreeMaint include housekeeping or connect to our PMS?
No. FreeMaint is dedicated to maintenance: work orders, requests, assets, preventive plans and inspections. There is no housekeeping module and no property management system integration. Rooms are modelled as locations so maintenance history stays attached to them.
How much does hotel maintenance software cost with FreeMaint?
The Core tier is free forever with unlimited users, rooms, assets and work orders. Inspection rounds and certificates are part of Starter at $29 per month per company, and energy management is part of Enterprise at $299 per month. Prices are flat per company, never per user.
Related pages
Put your hotel’s maintenance in one place
Start on the free Core tier: add your rooms and equipment, print the QR codes and schedule your first preventive plans. You can log your first work order the same day.
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