The hold on the card is the complaint the hotel did not see coming

A hold is not a charge, and guests cannot tell

To a hotel a pre-authorisation is routine and reversible. To a guest looking at a banking app it is money that has gone, at a moment when they are abroad and counting. The explanation takes two sentences - what it is, that it is not taken, and when it falls away - and those two sentences placed before arrival prevent a conversation at the desk that nobody wins.

Four facts, and most hotels publish none

The amount or how it is calculated, when it is taken, how long after departure it is released, and whether a debit card is treated differently. That last one matters more than hotels think: a hold on a debit card is a guest's actual spending money, and a traveller who knows in advance brings a different card. Publishing it is the difference between a precaution and an ambush.

Release timing belongs to the bank, so say so

A hotel can release a hold the moment a guest leaves and the money can still be invisible for days, because the timing after that is the issuer's. Say both halves: we release on checkout, your bank may take up to a stated number of days. A hotel that explains this is believed; a hotel that says "it should be back immediately" is blamed for somebody else's process.

What software may say about a particular card

Nothing specific. An assistant can explain the policy, the amount and the timing as published, and it must not confirm whether a named reservation has been charged, held or released - that is a payment record, it changes, and being wrong about it is worse than being silent. Route it to a person and say that is what is happening.