AugTool Documentation
Hostpitality Setup
We will go though all of the contents that need to be setup in the Bookings company prior to using a Booking Form. The Finance company that receives the commission, just requires the Chart of Accounts to be set up and an invoiceable item such as Rental Commission. The rest of the setup below is applicable to the Business Unit in which all the bookings are made.
Accommodation
It is important to understand availability as part of setup. Availability will be expanded on, in Booking Processes.
Apart from bookings which can affect the availability of a property, the Availability in Augtool is determined by the Availability Type that is setup when creating a Property. The 3 Availability Types are: None, Locally Managed - Daily and Externally Managed - Calendar.
None:
If None is selected as Availability Type for a property then that property will always be available. So even if a booking is already made for a specific date and another client wants to make a booking for the same property on the same date, they will be able to.
Locally Managed - Daily:
Property Rates must be setup in order for Locally Managed properties to show availability. The availability of the property will be for the period set in the Property Rate. So clients will not be able to make bookings if it falls in a date range outside of the property rates.
Locally managed Calendars in Augtool are fully managed by Augtool. These are the fastest availability types and provide the least amount of admin.
Externally Managed - Calendar:
Externally Managed is usually selected when bookings are managed by the owner who uses 3rd party websites or calendars primarily to advertise and manage bookings. In this case the agency will add the ICAL link of the owners calendar to the specific Unit in the Property via the External link. It will then block the dates of the bookings that were made per the owners calendar to prevent the agency from double booking. However should the salesperson responsible for that booking on the external calendar want to capture that same booking in Augtool, there is a special function called Override Availability that allows you to do this. This is explained in Booking Processes.
Multi Ical and Consolidation
Multiple external calendars can be added to an Accommodation Unit. This is usefull when you want to see multiple availability entries and bookings from multiple calendars you manage in one place and on one calendar.
You can add/remove Calendars on the Unit Edit screen.
Each calendar syncs separately but the log is merged.
The calendars are merged into one on the system for Availability.
The Automatic calendar syncs now handles multi calendar but syncs each separately so if one fails we don't lose data.
Availability Entries
The Availability Entries shows you all the bookings on the system as well as the property blocks. Should there be an External calendar it will show you the availability entries of the external calendar once it is linked. The Link Type and Link Name shows you if it is a booking, external booking or property block. You can also filter by State for Provisional, Confirmed or Blocked.
Booking Setup and Booking Terms in BU
Provisional Release:
The Provisional Release allows you to enter the number of hours before a Provisional Booking is released and rolledback to draft. 0 means Provisional Bookings are never released.
Vat Adjustment Item:
This is the item used for adjusting vat when invoicing guests. This must first be created in Items with Type 'Adjustment' and then it can be selected here. See screenshot below.
Booking Terms:
Booking terms such as deposits are setup here. Here you can specify the percentage and due date and other details of the deposit. This will then pull through to the booking.
As you can see below, you can set the deposit and balance terms of the approved hospitality terms in the system to be assigned to any accommodation you create.
Booking Types
Booking Types needs to be set up for the different types of bookings being offered such as Rental, Conference, Wedding or Shoots. You will be able to link the Booking Term Contents applicable to that booking type. Therefore when you select the Booking Type on the Booking form it will pull through all of the terms and conditions associated with that Booking type. This will then be pulled through to the booking form when it is generated and will be sent to the client.
Booking Form Contents
Terms and conditions of the property are setup here according to it's Content type. These terms are then linked to the property to which it is applicable to. Once it is linked to a property it will pull through to the booking form when it is generated.
Content Type
General Terms - Normally contains rules or content that are always going to print on the booking forms no matter what property or addon you add to the form. This is the content that will always show.
General Payment - This section is for information regarding payment options and payment terms.
General Banking - This is where you can request for client banking details to return the security deposit to if they were paying via EFT
General Pet Friendly - This is where you can put down the rules and conditions for pets on the property.
General Party Details - Party Details are editable. You can insert additional text here if needed.
Booking Form Completed - This is where you can thank your customer for their business and any other concluding statements.
Booking Type Terms - You may have different terms that are specific to different types of venues such as a conference room or wedding shoots or reception etc. This can be specified here. Once the Booking Type is selected on the Booking, the terms setup here will pull through to the Booking Form.
Accommodation Terms - Here you can specify rules regarding the accommodation such as pets, smoking and max no. of guests etc.
Bookable Extra Terms - The terms for any optional bookable extra's offered are set here and will be pulled through to the booking form when it is selected on the booking.
Additional Content Template - Should you have additional terms and conditions or special terms and conditions not covered by the the above categories, these can be added here and selected and edited on the fly in the booking proces.
Booking Form Configuration
Here you can structure the layout of your terms and conditions on your booking form.
a) Alphabetical Order
Once you have created your Booking Form Config you will be able to select it as a dropdown option in Configuration when generating the booking form. The Booking Form Configuration appears in alphabetical order in the drop down selection, on the booking form.
b) Custom CSS
You will be able to style your booking form with Custom CSS. In the Booking Form Configs and Portal styling, the text has been enhanced to now shows using the Custom CSS. This affects the view and the TinyMCE editor in edit. This means it will show more accurately as to how it appears on the portal.
c) Auto Generate Booking Reference Number on the booking form
A special character has been added to Booking Configs that is used to display the Actual Booking Number of the booking.
The following [[BookingNo]] can be inserted into the Banking Details or Indemnity sections of the booking configuration and this will be displayed with the current booking number on the booking form.
Booking Form: Party Details
a) Number of Guests
The system has been enhanced to remove the ability for guests to add or remove party details from the booking form. This is to prevent situations where the guest could add more people than was actually booked by the agent and could also exceed maximum occupancy in a property. So any changes made to the number of guests by the client will first need to go through the agent who will amend the booking and send an updated booking form to the client.
The booking form will show the number of guests created by the agent on the booking. The remove icon has been removed from the booking form that the client sees.
When editing a booking, the system assists by automatically adding lines to the party section to match the number of guests in the property. If however the no. of guests is changed to a lower number on the booking the system does not automatically remove lines, the agent will then need to remove the lines in this case. The max pax has been made to show the number of party members the agent setup (even if blank).
b) Party Details Edit
The system allows you to add content under the heading to this form.
Added a new type for Booking Content > General Party Details. This allows you to set the Heading and Content. If the Heading is blank, the booking form will display "Your Party Details" as normal. If there is content under the heading, the system will display the content under the heading, on the booking form.
Booking Payment Options
The various payment options can be set up here. This can also be filled in by the agent when creating the booking form and the client will then need to check that it is correct. You can mark any of the payment options with Banking Required. This will then make this field mandatory so that the client will not be able to submit the booking form unless this is completed.
Special Days
The rates for a property are setup under Property Rates. However there might be certain days or periods where different rates are applicable such as Public Holidays or the Festive Period. These rates are referred to as Special Days in Augtool and setup under Special Day Groups.
Special rates can be used in conjunction with normal rates. The system will override the normal rate with the special day rate for any days that the special rate applies to in a booking. For example you may have a special day rate for 09 August 2024 and have a booking from 07 August 2024 to 12 August 2024. The system will apply the normal rate to all the days in the booking except for 09 August 2024 where it will apply the Special Day rate.
Property Categories
You might offer properties that are similar to each other or differ significantly to each other. These can be grouped and setup as categories under Property categories.
Properties
In order to setup a property, you need the following setup first.
Organisation
Booking terms on BU
Tax Code for property and rental commission
Invoiceable Items
Rental commission item
Security Deposit item.
Property invoice item
Accommodation Categories
Accommodation
a) Organization:
Before creating a property we suggest that you setup the owner first. The owner is setup by creating an Organization. When creating a property the owner organization must be selected. Then when the invoices are generated on the booking it will pull through the owner organization.
Please explain the fields in each besides name, Code Category and how they are used
Invoiceable items
Accommodation
Unit Types and Units
Information such as security deposit, max occupancy and commission percentage are set in Unit Type. If you prefer, an individual Invoice Item can be created for each Unit Type that is specific to that Unit Type. However for simplicity, you can also create just one Invoice Item such as Rental, which can be used for all the properties. Both your invoice item and security deposit information that is filled in here will be pulled through for invoicing.
Difference between a unit type and a unit. A unit type cannot be booked. Only units can be. Unit types are where you setup the X, Y, Z of the units within the unit type.
I dont feel that Property, Unity Type and Unit is explained enough. A property is not what you book. A unit type is for this or that. A unit is what you book.
Addons
Here you can add the services that is offered by the property owner, in addition to the rental of the property.
Commission
The company that is invoicing the commission needs to be selected under the Business Unit. In our screenshot this is Cape Villas - Finance. This will then generate an invoice in the Finance company to the owner when commission is invoiced from the booking. A commission account must be setup in the chart of accounts and a commission item needs to be setup as a service item to be used. We have used rental commission (RC) in our example.
Rules: The current rules setup for pet friendly allows you to select whether the property is pet friendly or not. If a property is selected as pet friendly the booking form will be populated with required fields for the pets.
Terms: Booking terms such as deposit rules are set up in Business Unit and the applicable terms to a property can be selected here. This will pull through to the booking form when it is generated which is sent to the client. Augtool will also use this information to determine the deposit amount and balance amount as well as the deposit due date and balance due date.
Form: The Form is the Booking Contents that was linked to this Property and can be viewed here.
As per above. The pre requisites for setting up a property include setting up a form first and you can only link the property to the form from the form itself.
Accommodation Rates
Augtool allows you to setup Rates either for a Date Range or Special Day. If it is a Special Day, this must first be setup in Special Day Group and can then be selected here. For Date range, simply select the date range that the rate will be valid for. When setting up rates per Accommodation the rates should never overlap dates even if different rate types are being used. The system will show a yellow warning for overlapped rates that should be resolved or else the system will not know which rate to use on a booking for the date requested.
Augtool gives you the below options of the different Rate Types i.e
1. Per Night: Here the rate is based on a Per Night basis irrespective of the number of guests however the accommodation conditions would usually state the maximum number of guests allowed on that accommodation.
2. Per Night-Per Guest: This rate applies to each Guest, per night.
3. Per Night (Day of the Week): This rate is applicable to specific days of the week and is also charged on a per night basis.
4. Per Night (Up to Guest): You may have discounted rates for a higher number of guests or different rates, based on the number of guests. This allows you to set rates applicable to a specific number of guests.
All the rate types need to be explained here.
Accommodation Discounts
Property Discounts allows you to set discount percentages based on the number of nights stay. For example, if a guest qualifies for 10% discount on the rates if they stay for more than 5 nights, then on the booking once 5 nights are exceeded the 10% discount will be applied and the rates would change accordingly.
Property Blocks
To block out any period not available for bookings on a specific unit, a property block can be created. This is normally used by owners who want to block out dates.
When is this normally used? This is for owners who want to block out dates or other reasons.
Bookable Extras
Bookable extras are optional services offered to guests that are not supplied by the Accommodation itself but by other suppliers. It requires an invoice item and a supplier organization to be setup so when this is selected on the booking an invoice to the supplier can be generated. Should there be a commission arrangement for selling these services the commission for it can be setup here.
Sales Agent Commission Management
If you want to manage Sales Agent Commission you need to setup Salespersons and link them to a Sales Commission Ruleset. You will also need to link the Salesperson to a Linked User so that the system will default to the linked salesperson when a User creates a booking. If you are a broker you need the same salesperson in both Business Units i.e the Bookings company and the Finance company. This will allow you to do the sales invoice
Sales Agent Commission on Sales Invoice for Commission - Once a salesperson is selected on the booking the commission should always pull through to the sales invoice for commission and should be seen on the line item popup of the sales invoice. If you are not seeing that, then please ensure that the Salesperson and Commission Ruleset is also set up in the Finance /Pty company and not only in Operations.
Sales Agent Commission should have its own section and reference the sales agent section of the guide. Explain that if you are a broker you need the same sales agent in both business units.
External Agencies
Should the broker outsource bookings to an external agency, the External Agency is setup under Sales > Agencies in Augtool. An Organisation first needs to be created for the External Agency which will be linked to the setup in Sales > Agencies. If a separate invoiceable Commission Item is used for the external agency, this must also be created first which will then be linked here.
The external agency is normally setup in the Bookings company. For external agencies that handle the full booking process, Invoice Agency is selected and for external agencies that bring referrals but does not handle the full booking process, Invoice Client is selected. The agreed commission percentage is input here as well as the applicable commission item and tax code.
The user will be able to setup both Commission Types at the same time and this will appear as an option when creating the booking.
Adding New client in Organizations
I would move "adding a new client" to the setup section - moved
The broker can fill in as much information as they need however the minimum information required to be filled in are the Summary tab, Contacts tab, Billings tab and link to the Account in the Business Unit for any other company you may utilize that organisation.
The Contacts tab should be filled in with the details of a main contact person. The Defaults section allows you to set the default email address for Bookings and Statements. This is where statements and booking forms will be auto-emailed to. (What about the Default email for bookings?). Once the client is created you can select the Contact Person on the booking and it will pull through all the information that you saved on the Contacts tab. You also have the option of typing in the contact details directly on the booking.
The Billing tab should include the name and should be set as vat-vendor irrespective of whether the client is a vat vendor or not.
