A spreadsheet isn't a bad tool. For seven years I used one for bookings, guests, the tourist tax and expenses, and for a long time it was enough. I only built Ubyo once I had more apartments, more foreign guests and more fines within reach than I could keep track of by hand.

I'm writing this comparison as someone who sells the app, so some suspicion is in order. That's why I'll be specific: for each item I'll say whether a spreadsheet can handle it, what it costs, and where Ubyo adds nothing.

Where a spreadsheet is enough

• You have one apartment, mostly Czech guests and a few bookings a month. You report foreign guests by hand on the police website, calculate the tax with a formula, and keep the register as a sheet in the spreadsheet. It's an hour a month and it works.
• An overview of revenue and expenses for your tax return. With 60% flat-rate expenses you only keep a record of income and receivables. That's exactly what a spreadsheet is made for, and Ubyo won't free you from it — you'll export the data from it for your accountant anyway.
• Pricing decisions. Dynamic pricing, competitor comparisons, seasonal rate cards — Ubyo doesn't do that. A spreadsheet with prices by month is an equally good tool here.
• The calendar. Airbnb and Booking sync availability with each other via iCal, even without a third-party app.

If that's your whole operation and you do the four things in the next section on time, you don't need an app. Seriously.

Where a spreadsheet stops being enough

1. Reporting to UbyPort. Every foreign guest — a Slovak, a German, a child — has to be entered into the police form within 3 working days. By hand, that means copying the name with its diacritics, the document number, the country from the code list (Kosovo isn't RKS or XK, but XXK) and the purpose of stay. A spreadsheet doesn't hold the Doručenka (delivery receipt) you'll need when an inspection comes. The fine for an unreported guest is up to CZK 50,000.

2. Two registers with signatures. The law allows the evidenční kniha (guest register) to be kept electronically, but it must contain every field, including the type of identity document out of the nine legally defined types and the reason for any exemption from the tax, and it must be kept for 6 years from the last entry. The domovní kniha (house book) for foreign guests is also based on a form that the foreigner fills in and signs in person — a spreadsheet without a signature can't replace it; you need the signed sheets as well.

3. Poplatek z pobytu (tourist tax). A formula calculates nights times people times the rate minus children. What a formula can't do is keep track of the fact that Prague pays monthly to the city district and Brno quarterly, that the day of arrival doesn't count, and that the tax stops after 60 days. And it won't produce the report for the authority or a QR code for the payment.

4. Sanctions lists. You can't do this in a spreadsheet at all. Every guest should be checked against EU and Czech sanctions lists; nobody does it by hand, so it doesn't get done. Ubyo does it for every check-in.

5. Data protection. A spreadsheet with ID numbers sits in the cloud or on a laptop, you share it with the cleaning team, it has no access rights and it doesn't delete itself after six years. You anonymize old records by hand — which means never.

6. Time. An honest estimate from my own operation: one booking with foreign guests takes 10 to 15 minutes of work by hand — copying documents, the report, both registers, the tax. At 15 bookings a month that's 3 to 4 hours. Not ten hours a week, as the ads promise. Three hours.

Task-by-task comparison

What Ubyo doesn't do (on purpose)

• It's not a channel manager. It reads bookings from the platforms but doesn't write availability or prices to them. There are specialized tools for that, and Ubyo can connect to them.
• It doesn't do pricing. No dynamic pricing, no “raise your price by 12%” recommendations.
• It's not accounting software. It gives you the underlying data — income, commissions, DPH on commissions, expenses — but you can't file a tax return with it, and it won't replace your accountant.
• It doesn't chat with guests on the platforms. Guest messages go only through a connected PMS; Ubyo doesn't take over your Airbnb inbox.

These aren't features that are “coming later”. They're things others do better, and Ubyo sticks to what the state, the municipality and the police require of an accommodation provider.

What it costs and when it pays off

Basic costs CZK 179 per apartment per month, Profi CZK 436 (CZK 349 with annual billing), with a 20% discount from the fifth apartment. Prices are as of September 2026 including DPH, and the first 14 days are free, no credit card required.

The math is simple. If you value your time at CZK 300 an hour, Basic pays for itself with 40 minutes saved a month. One fine of CZK 50,000 for an unreported foreign guest equals 23 years of the Basic plan. I'm not assuming you'll get one — I'm assuming you don't want to guard against it by hand.

And, to be fair, the other side too: if you run the apartment on the side with five bookings a month and you're keeping up with everything, CZK 179 a month is an expense that won't pay you back. Stick with the spreadsheet as long as it works for you.