Refinar

Hostel management system
for college and school hostels

Rooms and beds, who sleeps where this term, the night roll call, hostel and mess fees, out-passes parents can see, the visitor log and complaints. Start from a working school app and describe your hostel.

Start your hostel app

What it starts from

This page starts the School starting point. A college hostel runs on the same records a school does: residents with their parents, a daily register, fees with receipts and notices. Rooms, beds, out-passes and the gate are what the pre-filled request adds.

See the School starting point

Already in the starting point

  • Students with admission number, class or course, and their parents' phone numbers.
  • A daily register with present, absent, late and excused, which becomes the roll call.
  • Fee plans charged to a group at once, payments with receipt numbers, part payments and the overdue list.
  • A parent login that shows each family only their own child, and notices for everyone or one group.
  • Roles for admin, staff and view-only office, and imports from Excel.

What the first request asks Refinar to add

  • Blocks, rooms and beds with their capacity and type.
  • Room allocation for the term, with a history of room changes.
  • Out-pass requests the warden approves, visible to parents.
  • A visitor log at the gate.
  • Room complaints, from a broken fan to a leaking tap, with their status.

What the hostel office gets

Rooms, beds and who is where

Every block, room and bed with its capacity, the empty beds at a glance, and each student's room for the term with any changes kept in a history.

Night roll call in two minutes

A register per block with everyone marked present, so the warden only marks who is missing. Students on an approved out-pass are not counted absent.

Hostel and mess fees

Room rent and mess charges billed to everyone at once, payments with receipt numbers, part payments, and one list of who still owes.

Out-passes parents can see

A student asks to leave for the weekend, the warden approves, and the parent sees the dates on their own login.

The gate and the visitor log

Who visited whom, when they came and when they left, written at the gate instead of a register nobody can search.

Complaints that get closed

Room repairs and requests with their status, so the warden sees what is open and the student sees when it is done.

The tables behind it

Real Postgres tables you own. The solid ones come with the starting point; the dashed ones are what the pre-filled request adds.

students · guardians

In the starting point
  • residents with admission number and course
  • parents linked to their child, with a login

attendance

In the starting point
  • student_id → students
  • date
  • status: present | absent | late | excused
  • note, marked_by

Used as the night roll call, one row per student per night.

fee_plans · fee_charges · fee_payments

In the starting point
  • hostel rent and mess fees
  • charges with a due date
  • payments with receipt number and method

rooms

Added by your first request
  • id
  • block
  • number, floor
  • capacity, type

allocations

Added by your first request
  • student_id → students
  • room_id → rooms
  • bed_no
  • from_date, to_date

outpasses

Added by your first request
  • student_id → students
  • leaves_at, returns_at
  • reason
  • status, approved_by

visitors

Added by your first request
  • student_id → students
  • visitor_name, relation, phone
  • in_at, out_at

complaints

Added by your first request
  • room_id → rooms
  • raised_by → students
  • category, details
  • status, closed_at

How it works in 3 steps

  1. 01

    Start from this page

    Press Start your hostel app. The School starting point is picked and your hostel is described in the first request, ready to edit.

  2. 02

    Your app runs in about a minute

    Refinar creates the app with sign-in, residents, the register and fees, then adds rooms, allocation, out-passes and the gate in a live preview.

  3. 03

    Import your residents, then launch

    Bring the resident list in from Excel, ask for more in plain sentences, such as a mess menu or a gate pass QR, and press Go live. The code and the database are yours.

Which kind of hostel

This is for hostels that house students: a college or school hostel, a university residence, a working women's hostel or a paying guest house with long stays. The residents, fees and roll call are the work.

It is not a booking system for backpacker hostels. There is no online booking engine, no channel manager for Booking.com or Hostelworld and no nightly rates. Those hostels need a property management system built for travel.

Questions

What is a hostel management system?

Software that runs a hostel's day: residents and their rooms, fees and receipts, attendance at night, leave and out-passes, visitors and complaints. In a college it is often part of the campus ERP; here it is an app of its own.

Can it allocate rooms automatically?

The pre-filled request makes allocation a quick manual step with empty beds shown. Rules such as "first years together" or "by course" can be added by describing them.

Does it handle mess fees?

Yes, as fee plans billed to all residents, with payments, receipts and the overdue list. A mess menu or meal attendance is one more sentence.

Do parents get an SMS when their child leaves?

Not in the starting point: parents see out-passes on their login. Sending SMS needs an SMS provider connected to the app, which you can ask for.

Building a hostel system as a college project?

See the hostel management system project page: features, an ER diagram and a viva checklist.

How much does it cost?

Building the app and changing it use credits from your Refinar plan, and hosting is part of going live. There is no fee per resident. The details are on the pricing page.

More starting points

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