Third party sites - payment processing - newbie question

Hi all,

Sorry if this is something that has already been covered, but browsing I couldn't find an answer.

I've just secured a location for my hostel (first-timer). It's an existing hotel that we are converting into a hostel. We were asking the owner about receiving payments through third-party sites and he said that it was so complicated for him that he decided not to secure online payments and instead have guests pay everything in cash in person when they arrive. This seems strange to me as you wouldn't then be able to collect on no shows and could lose business this way. Does anyone else do this?

I'm in the process of setting up business bank accounts etc., but I find that without setting up the accounts on third party sites (which I'm not quite ready to do yet) they provide little information on how they process payments. Does the hostel receive the payment directly from the guest and then pay the commission to the site, or does the guest pay the third party site and then the site pays the hostel?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Donna