PRINT REFERENCE · MAY 2026 · v1.0
Optimal RFP Send Windows · Europe 2026
When to send a hotel RFP for the fastest first-response. Based on 2,412 outreach events in the Easy RFP corpus (Jan 2025 to Mar 2026), seven countries. Latency is median business hours from send to first substantive hotel reply, in recipient local time.
The three rules to memorise
Rule 1 · Send
Tuesday 09:30 local recipient time. Wednesday 10:00 ties. Median 6.4–6.7 business hours.
Rule 2 · Never
Friday after 14:00 local. Latency triples to ~20 hours as replies slip to Monday morning.
Rule 3 · Schedule
Use timezone-aware scheduled dispatch. Beats hand-sent by 2.1 hours regardless of day.
Bonus · ES & IT
Shift one hour later: Tuesday 10:30 local. Morning shift starts later.
Day × Hour heatmap · all Europe · median business hours
|
08 | 09 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 |
| Mon | 10.4 | 8.1 | 8.2 | 9.1 | 10.8 | 12.6 | 11.4 | 12.2 | 13.1 | 14.0 |
|---|
| Tue | 7.8 | 6.4 | 6.5 | 7.0 | 8.4 | 10.1 | 9.6 | 10.4 | 11.2 | 12.0 |
|---|
| Wed | 7.9 | 6.7 | 6.8 | 7.4 | 8.7 | 10.4 | 9.9 | 10.8 | 11.7 | 12.4 |
|---|
| Thu | 8.4 | 7.3 | 7.5 | 8.0 | 9.5 | 11.1 | 10.7 | 11.5 | 12.4 | 13.2 |
|---|
| Fri | 9.0 | 8.9 | 9.1 | 9.8 | 11.7 | 12.4 | 17.6 | 19.8 | 21.4 | 22.1 |
|---|
By country · best vs worst send window
| Country | Best window (local) | Median | Worst window | Median |
|---|
| Germany | Tue 09:00–11:00 | 6.0h | Fri 15:00–18:00 | 21.4h |
| United Kingdom | Tue 09:00–11:00 | 6.6h | Fri 14:00–18:00 | 17.8h |
| France | Tue 09:00–11:00 | 6.5h | Fri 14:00–18:00 | 19.2h |
| Spain | Tue 10:00–12:00 | 7.1h | Fri 15:00–18:00 | 18.4h |
| Italy | Wed 10:00–12:00 | 7.3h | Fri 14:00–18:00 | 20.1h |
| Netherlands | Tue 09:00–11:00 | 5.9h | Fri 14:00–18:00 | 18.8h |
| Switzerland | Tue 09:00–11:00 | 6.1h | Fri 15:00–18:00 | 22.6h |
Practical tips
- Schedule, don't hand-send. Use a tool that dispatches per-recipient local time. The 2.1-hour advantage is consistent across the corpus.
- If your brief finishes Friday afternoon, queue it for Tuesday. Not Monday — Monday morning is backlog day.
- Last-minute (under 14 days)? The day-of-week effect compresses; send any business day 09:00–12:00 with an explicit deadline in the subject line.
- Multi-country send? Don't pick one timezone for all — schedule each recipient locally.