Become a Host

Become a host on LakeBooking

If you own or manage a fishing lake — a commercial day-ticket water, a small private pond, a hotel-attached lake, or a river beat — you can list it on LakeBooking, take bookings online, and skip the endless phone calls.

Most hosts finish the setup in 30–60 minutes, plus a quick verification step we usually clear in a day or two.

Free setup for our first 100 lakes

If your lake is among the first 100 on LakeBooking, setup, help and support are free — you don't have to build the listing yourself. From your dashboard, claim the offer (Claim free setup) and answer a short questionnaire — about 10 minutes on your lake, fish, swims, prices and rules. Our team then builds your profile, swims, packages and rules for you. If anything is unclear we ask in Messages, and nothing goes live without your review and approval.

Prefer doing it yourself? Follow the dashboard checklist and ask us anything along the way — help and support are free for you either way.

Who can list a lake

You're a good fit if you're:

• The owner of the lake, or
• The manager / lessee with permission to take bookings, or
• A fishing club, association, or hotel that controls the water.

We'll ask for your basic business and tax details during setup, and you can optionally upload a document to earn the Verified Host badge — see Step 2.

What it costs

Listing is free. There's no monthly fee, no listing fee, no premium tier.

Here's how the money works in plain terms:

• The angler pays a booking fee of 10% of the total online when they book. That's what they see at checkout — a fee that secures the booking and counts toward their total, not a charge on top.
• The remaining 90% is paid by the angler directly to you at the lake on arrival, in cash or on your own POS, exactly the way it's always worked.
• Behind the scenes, LakeBooking retains the booking fee as its commission — our compensation for booking facilitation, payment processing, customer acquisition, and platform operations. The Host Agreement (part of the Terms you accept at signup) spells this out so there's no ambiguity.

In settlement terms: nothing flows from us to your IBAN in the current model — you collect the remaining balance directly, and we retain the booking fee paid online by the angler.

The commission is a flat 10% of each booking, spelled out in the Host Agreement shown to you at signup alongside our Terms & Conditions — what we provide, how the commission works, and what you can expect from us. You confirm both with a single click. No separate contract, no paperwork by post.

What you'll need before you start

Just a few things:

• A way to invoice for the remaining balance you collect at the lake (in Romania: usually a PFA, II, SRL or ONG; elsewhere, the equivalent in your country).
• A bank account (IBAN) for later — when full online payments arrive in 2027, your payouts will land there.
• Your basic tax details (legal name, tax ID, address) — required before bookings can open.
• Optionally, an ID or registration document for the Verified Host badge (one of: ID card, title deed, lease, management contract, or ANPA authorisation).
• A few photos of the lake — phone snaps are perfectly fine, we'll help you arrange them.

That's it. No business plan, no inspector visit, no minimum revenue threshold.

The 5 steps

1. Create your host account

Sign up as a host → We'll email you a confirmation link. Click it and you're in the host dashboard.

2. Complete your details — once, lightly

Fill in your tax & compliance details (Account → Tax & compliance): legal name, tax ID and address. Uploading an ID or registration document is optional — it earns the Verified Host badge after our review. You can keep building the listing in parallel.

3. Build your listing

This is the fun part:

• Your lake. Name, region, water type, size, depth, access notes, parking, amenities (toilets, electricity, on-site shop, accommodation, anything else worth mentioning).
• Your swims. Each spot anglers can book — name or number, position on the map, photo, description. Capacity and rod limits live on the package, so one swim can serve several session types.
• House rules. Barbless vs barbed, no-kill or take, group caps, quiet hours, dogs, drones — whatever you'd want anglers to know before they arrive.
• Photos. Drag to reorder; the first one is the search thumbnail. Phone photos are fine to start.

4. Build your packages

This is the bit anglers actually book. A package bundles one or more swims with everything that comes with them — accommodation (if any), equipment rental, additional-guest rules, billing units (day-ticket, overnighter, weekend, carp week), and any seasonal pricing or promo discounts you want to run. You can have a single simple package per swim, or set up several side-by-side: "Weekend Carp", "Day Ticket", "Family Stay with Cabin", etc.

The dashboard walks you through it; no spreadsheet required.

5. Open for bookings

Once your checklist is complete and you've got at least one package with a priced billing unit, turn on Accept bookings in Lake settings. Your lake appears in search within a few minutes. You can also hit Request verification on the dashboard — after our team's review, your listing shows the public Verified badge anglers look for.

You'll get an email when the first booking arrives.

What happens next

The first week. Your dashboard tracks revenue, occupancy, bookings and reviews as they come in; first bookings usually arrive within the first week for lakes in well-populated regions.

The first month. We'll check in with you once during week two — a real human, not an automated survey — to ask what's working and what isn't. The answer shapes what we ship next.

Ongoing. Anglers leave reviews after their session; you can respond publicly to any of them. The dashboard handles your calendar, messages, angler list, and booking exports for your accountant.

What we ask of you

Three small things:

• Reply to angler messages within a day. Faster is better — anglers with an unanswered question simply book elsewhere.
• Honour the bookings the platform confirms. Anglers count on it.
• Comply with the fisheries rules in your area. ANPA authorisation, environmental permits, anything specific to your water — these stay your responsibility, as they always have been.

A note about online payments

For our first season, we're keeping things simple: anglers pay the 10% booking fee online (which we retain as our commission), and the remaining balance is settled with you in person at the lake. This works well for everyone and keeps the paperwork minimal.

In 2027, we'll roll out full online payments through Stripe Connect, so anglers can also pay the remaining balance up front by card if they prefer. The simple version will keep working alongside it — you'll be able to choose what fits each package.

A few common questions

Can I list multiple lakes under one account? Yes. The dashboard supports as many as you want; team members can be scoped per lake.

Do I have to accept every booking? No. Out of the box every booking is a request you confirm or decline from your dashboard (declining refunds the angler's booking fee automatically). When you're comfortable, switch your lake to instant confirmation in Lake settings → Booking preferences — anglers strongly prefer it.

What if something goes wrong with a booking? We help mediate. See the Refund Policy for how it works.

Can I list a private syndicate lake? Not yet as an unlisted/invite-only listing — every published lake appears in public search today. If you run a syndicate or members-only water, write to us and we'll figure out what fits.

Talk to us

If your situation doesn't quite fit the standard flow — a federation-managed water, a hotel-attached lake, a river beat — write to contact@lakebooking.com and we'll set up a short call before you sign up. Real people, no scripted reply.