All about cost items, price lists, deposits and discounts

Pricing

Price lists

In BEX PMS, price lists are the foundation of your administration. They act as the brain behind your rates and availability, determining exactly what a guest pays for a stay.

Getting started with price lists

Setting up your base rates is a crucial step in making your BEX PMS administration operational. This is a guide on how to create your first price list(s) and which tools to use when doing so.

Setting up base rates

Save effort by managing as many types as possible on a single master price list, using factors and offsets to differentiate prices. Updating the master price list will then update the prices for all connected types.

Scaling prices with factors

Pricing rules are flexible tools to finetune your nightly base rates, depending on the season. Pricing rules can be used to only show prices for stays longer than a minimum number of nights, or to discount the base rate for longer stays.

Dynamic pricing with pricing rules

How to update or index (master) price lists, and how the various pricing settings are used to calculate the final rental amount for the guest.

Price management and calculation

Getting prices ready for the next year

Quickly adjust prices per period

Price rules allow you to reduce or activate the standard rental price. Price rules only apply to night-time prices.

Set pricing rules per price list

Besides nightly prices, you can work with Length of Stay prices. These are prices for a fixed period. This way, you can easily enter week, weekend, midweek or prices for a fixed number of nights.

Length of Stay - fixed price for fixed duration of stay

Charge, claim, and refund security deposits

Security deposits

Are you currently working with dedicated costs to charge deposits to your guests and do you want to start using the security deposit policies feature? Read how to do that here.

Switching to security deposit policies

Deposits are used to cover any damage guests accidentally or willfully cause during their stay. Read here how to create a security deposit policy.

Creating security deposit policies

If there is no damage report, your guest will be refunded the full deposit amount. 

Security deposit release and refund

A list of all possible security deposit statuses and their meaning.


Statuses of security deposits

How does the guest pay the deposit?

If damage has been caused by the guest, you can create a damage report. You can add one or more damage reports per security deposit item. Once added, damage can be claimed and settled with the guest.

Making and claiming damage reports for deposits

Automatic refund of deposits

Security deposits in accounting

Cost items for anything that is not included in the rent price

Costs

Create cost items

In addition to calculating a cost based on per pet, or per person per day, it is also possible to add conditions that exclude the first couple of persons, or set a maximum.

Options for cost item calculation based on occupancy

When creating cost items, some calculation methods allow you to set a minimum threshold or maximum amount.

Minimum and maximum prices for costs

In the settings of a cost item, you can determine whether the pricing should vary slightly depending on the booked type or channel of the reservation.

Varying cost item prices for channels or types

Costs for items that are limited in number can be set up for stock control, so these costs can no longer be added to a reservation once stock has run out. You'll also receive a reception message when inventory runs out.

Inventory management in cost items

Use this setting if you do not want to process the payment of this cost through BEX PMS. In the booking process and on the invoice, the cost is shown as being payable on arrival. 

Cost setting 'Do not invoice'

Setting up a cost item for a late checkout ensures that whenever a guest books a late check-out, the associated fee is charged.

Costs for late checkout

When entering the guest group for a reservation, the number of pets that will be coming along is also entered. You can charge a pet fee for these pets by setting up a pet cost item.

Cost item for pets

In France, the tourist tax to be paid is calculated as a fixed amount per person per night, where the amount depends on the classification of the rented accommodation.

Cost item for French tourist tax without classification

How to set up cost items that apply when a guest books a specific object or a specific amenity.

Preference costs & linking costs to amenities

When editing a cost, you can change all settings that were also available to you when setting up this cost for the first time. There are conditions to be able to delete a cost item.

Managing costs

Open the cost item to view bar graphs stating the invoiced amounts per month, and if it is a stock item, also the stock levels per day.

Revenue and stock statistics per cost item

Discounts

Creating a discount campaign

There are two general discount types that can be created. One uses a fixed discount amount, the other discounts a percentage of the rent. Using various parameters you determine when, where, and on which reservations this discount can be applied.

Creating a discount

When creating a discount, you can link coupon codes to it. You can add multiple coupon codes to a single discount. Guests use these codes to apply the discount when booking.

Discounts with coupon codes

When creating a discount, you must select two period groups to indicate when the discount can be booked and for which stay dates it is valid.

Periods in discounts

In the settings of a discount, you can limit its applicability to certain guest groups. That means the discount will only be available for bookings whose guest groups meet the requirements you have set.

Guest group limitations for discounts

Setting up discount cards

Discount calculation for reservations

Packages

You can create packages and offer them via your website, in the Search and Book. Think of an Easter package, or a Valentines package. Packages are a great way to increase bookings or upsell stays for certain periods.

Getting started with packages

Packages are created in the Setup module, in the 'Packages' menu. Here you can also edit and archive them.

Creating and editing packages

When creating a package, you can choose from 3 types, each with their own features.

Types of packages

You can determine when a package should be visible and available online. A package can also be restricted to backoffice only.

Availability of a package

When creating a package, relevant cost items must be added under the 'composition' heading.

Costs in packages

The package types 'Fixed period' and 'Fixed total price' use an all-in price. This therefore also includes the mandatory cost items. For these packages, an 'Addition' checkbox appears behind each cost item, with which you can still charge certain cost items on top of the specified total price. In the invoice for the guest, these are in a separate line to the set total price of the package.

Mandatory costs in packages using a total price

Bundle extras that are available independent of stay

Bundles

You can offer your guests an optional cancellation insurance. This is set up as a bundle, to make it available to your guests during the booking process. Here, we will explain how to set up a bundle as a cancellation insurance:

Cancellation insurance for guests

A bundle is a set of extra's, or cost items, that your guests may book as an addition to their reservation.

Getting started with bundles

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Updates

Developer Portal

Trust Center

Onboarding

What you need to know before starting the onboarding process

Before you start

Welcome to Booking Experts! Here you can find an overview of what happens next and how to start with your BEX PMS.

Starting with Booking Experts

Log in to your Booking Experts account in one of the following ways: with an email address and password with MFA, or via SSO through a Google or Microsoft account.

Log in to BEX PMS or CMS

The user role connected to your account determines how you interact with BEX PMS. You can be an employee working for a single or multi-park organization, an owner who rents out their accommodation, an executor or contractor who performs maintenance or provides services, or even a travel agency booking holidays for your clients. For BEX CMS, there is only one user role.

User roles within BEX PMS and CMS

The light green upper part of the menubar focuses on options regarding the account details, updates of Booking Experts, or reception messages.

Menubar in the BEX PMS

Every employee who uses the Booking Experts system has their own profile within the software. This is setup during onboarding or when a new colleague needs to be introduced to the system.

Adjusting your profile

Tools to help you in the onboarding process

Checklist and Academy

About the safety of your and your guests' data

Privacy and security

Modules

About data transferable from other systems

Importing data

Organization and administration settings

All organizations with multiple administrations have an Organization overview. In this overview, as an organization manager, you have insight into the bundled data of all administrations.

Overview for organizations with multiple administrations

What you need to know about setting up accounts for your employees

Employee settings

Brand and appearance

Central management of terms and conditions

Terms & Conditions

Domains

Setting up objects

Amenities

Individual objects and the types they belong to

Types and objects

Media content

Set up your pricing and business finances

Prices and finances

Important financial settings

Rental prices for various types and periods of time

Add cost items for add-ons and separate fees

Setting up CMS

Switching between BEX PMS and BEX CMS

As a park manager, you can create CMS accounts for employees and manage their rights.

Access rights for CMS users

Tools

Site settings

Website pages

How reservations are made through your website

Search & Book

Brand appearance

Email campaigns

Offering holiday homes for sale on your website 

Sales module

If you are using both ParcVu and BEX CMS with the sales module, you can connect the two to easily generate prospects out of interested website visitors and advertise ParcVu Vans for sale on your website.

Connect to ParcVu

All day-to-day actions necessary at your reception

Daily use of PMS

Dashboard

Getting started with the reservations module and reception messages

Reservations and messages

BEX PMS

Planboard

The Planboard is the main tool for receptionists. From here, current and future reservations can easily be managed.

Managing reservations from the Planboard

You can scroll left and right to move through the dates in your planboard, but with these tips you might find what you are looking for easier and faster.

Calendar navigation in the planboard

Using the PMS planboard, you can easily move a reservation to a different object, or make two reservations switch places.

Move or swap a reservation in the Planboard

Select an available date range directly at the correct object by clicking and dragging, or first create a shortlist of objects using the filters at the top of your planboard.

Making a new reservation via Planboard

A cluster is a combination of multiple objects, which are treated as a single object in the Planboard.

Cluster reservation in the Planboard

The planboard legend explains the significance of colors, and through planboard settings you can determine what the planboard looks like for your account.

Planboard legend and settings

The planboard filters can be used to find certain reservations, or to narrow down the availability for a new reservation.

Available filters for the Planboard

Convenient keyboard shortcuts that may make your work easier.

Hotkeys for Planboard

Settings that apply to your entire organization

Organization settings

During onboarding, you connect or register your domain(s) to ensure that your BEX PMS works correctly. You might also add a new domain when opening a new park, for example.

Domains: settings for technical website management

It is possible to make predefined holidays and bank holidays visible on your website, so guests can click on them or more easily search for availability, for example, during the Christmas period. 

Set holidays as selectable on your website

For each administration separately, financial records can be locked and closed for accounting purposes. In your organization settings, you can prevent them from being reopened across your administrations.

Preventing closed financial records from being reopened

Special periods are used in statistics, price lists, and the Search & Book. Examples of special periods are the often-booked getaways around public holidays, local events or school holidays.

How are special periods used?

Special periods are arrival/departure date ranges that are important to your organization, and that can be applied throughout your administrations.

Creating special periods

A label alerts the user to important matters concerning the various modules and data within the PMS. For example, you could give the label 'loyal guest' to guests who have stayed for the fourth time, or the label 'renovated' to objects that have been refurbished. You can create these labels yourself and give them a desired colour and emoji.

Purpose of labels

Employees

Manage the amenities of your types, objects and administrations

Brands

Manage your booking portal and customer portal

Portal settings

Settings that apply within an administration

Administration settings

Description of the park and its surroundings

Exclude postcodes

Period groups are applied to costs, packages, auto emails and discounts, to determine when these items are valid, active, and/or applicable.