Weekly/Monthly Rates Through the APIs
Overview
RCM allows you to use any Weekly/Monthly rates set up in your system as Alterative Rates through both the Web and Agent APIs. This means these Alterative Rates will be available for selection by your customers or Agents when they make longer bookings. The booking they create will have the selected rate type saved against them, and will behave the same as Weekly/Monthly Bookings entered inside RCM.
This article explains how to setup and manage this feature in RCM. However, these Alternative Rates will not appear in your API until you have configured your website to do so. For information on how to do this, please contact support@rentalcarmanager.com.
Setting Up Weekly/Monthly Rates
The Alternative Rates that are available through the API are the same Weekly/Monthly rates that can be used when creating a booking inside RCM.
To set these rates up, you will first need to specify a rate structure: how many days are in a week and how many days are in a month. This will be used to calculate the number of days to charge for daily extra fees and insurance options. For information on how to set this up, please see the Weekly / Monthly Rate Structure article.
Please note: When a booking request is made through the API, the Weekly alternative rates will only be available if the booking length is greater than the Weekly Rate Structure (e.g. 7 days). The same thing applies to Monthly alternative rates.
You will then need to set up the Weekly/Monthly Rates for each Vehicle Category at each Location. For more information, please see the Weekly/Monthly Rate article. The Alterative Rates will only appear as an option in the API if they are set up against the Vehicle Category for the Pickup Location of the booking request.
Setting Up in Web API
Once you have Weekly/Monthly rates set up, you can use the following system parameter to make them available for through the Web API.
System Setup >> System Parameters >> Online Booking Parameters
When this is set to Yes, Alternative Rates will be output by the API as an extra dataset on Step 2. Note that displaying these rates involves a development task on your website. Separate developer instructions are available here: Weekly and Monthly Rates API Process
Setting Up in Agent API
For each agent, you can choose whether or not they are able to use Weekly/Monthly rates. When you update an Agency Record (System Setup >> Agencies), you will see the following flag.
- When it is set to No, the Agent will only be able to access standard daily rates through the API
- When it is set to Yes, the Agent will have the Alternative Rates appear as an option under the standard daily rates, and the agent can choose to proceed with a booking based on these weekly or monthly rates. Note that being able to do so involves a development task for the agency booking site.
How to Check Rates
On both the Agent Category Availability Check and Category Availability Check reports, there is a rate type filter that allows you to search by Daily, Weekly or Monthly rates.
These pages allow you to simulate a booking request made through the API to see vehicle category availability, what discount may apply, and what insurance and extra fee option will be available. It also shows you the daily rate and total rate that will be charged for the selected Rate Type.
When searching these reports for Monthly and Weekly Rates, please note the following:
- Alternative Rate Bookings will use the Web/Agent Category Availability Records set up in your system, the same as standard daily rate bookings.
- Minimum driver age, relocation records and minimum hire period records will still apply to Alterative Rate bookings.
- Web and Agent discounts will only apply to Alternative rate bookings if they are a percentage discount. Discounts with a fixed daily rate will not apply.
- Utilisation Rates and Free Day Specials do not apply to Alternative Rate bookings.
- Rate type has no effect on the Insurance, Extra Fee and Kms option available for the booking.
Example
Alternative Rate Bookings made through the API will behave the same way as any other booking. See the below example of a quotation made using Weekly Rates.
Important Articles
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