An advance deposit received before the guest arrives is not a payment on their account. It's a liability: the hotel collected for a stay it hasn't provided yet and, if the reservation is canceled, that money is refunded or recognized as a cancellation charge, but in the meantime it is not revenue, and it is not a payment on the folio.
Containn credits it to Advance deposits (Anticipos de reservas). On the day the guest arrives, the deposit is transferred to the guest's account: it leaves the deposit ledger and enters the folio. That transfer is a transaction with its own date and the person responsible, and in the books it becomes two lines of the póliza (the Mexican term for a journal entry): a debit to Advance deposits and a credit to the guest's account.
Why it's a transaction and not a subtraction
If the system decided “this is a deposit” by comparing the payment time against the check-in time every time someone opened the screen, that comparison would never stop being true and the deposit would never be applied: the folio of a reservation paid in full would print a balance due forever. That's why applying a deposit is a fact that gets written down, not a comparison that gets repeated.
The cutoff is the day, not the clock
A guest who pays at ten in the morning and checks in at three in the afternoon the same day doesn't create a deposit: by the time that day closed, the stay had already begun.
How it looks on the daily sheet and in the póliza
| Moment | On the daily sheet | In the daily póliza |
|---|---|---|
| Payment before arrival | The payment line reads “depósito de estancia futura” (deposit for a future stay) | Debit cash or bank, credit Advance deposits |
| Guest arrival | A pair of lines for the same amount: out of the ledger, into the folio | Debit Advance deposits, credit Guest ledger (Clientes · huéspedes en casa) |
The transfer travels as a pair so the day's balance doesn't move by a single cent. In the Movement journal it shows as “Traspaso de depósito” (deposit transfer) and “Depósito aplicado al folio” (deposit applied to folio), with the name of whoever checked the guest in or, if there isn't one, “Traspaso del libro de depósitos” (deposit ledger transfer). The póliza finds both accounts by their role in the chart of accounts: there's no concept to map.
For example, a guest pays 3,000.00 MXN by bank transfer on October 10 to arrive on the 15th. The póliza for the 10th debits the bank 3,000.00 MXN and credits Advance deposits 3,000.00 MXN; the póliza for the 15th debits Advance deposits 3,000.00 MXN and credits the guest's account 3,000.00 MXN. Each night is recognized as revenue that night, on the room revenue line.
Today the transfer only happens when the arrival is recorded. If the reservation is canceled, the deposit doesn't leave Advance deposits on its own: your accountant records the refund, or its application as a cancellation charge, with a manual póliza. And if your chart of accounts has no account with the advance deposits role (in the base chart it's 206-01 Anticipos de reservas), a day with deposits gets signed but its póliza isn't generated, and the month-end close lists it as a signed day without a póliza. See Why a póliza isn't generated.