I set up a short manual to set up a repayment, used to refund/repay the amount to its customers.
1. Introduction
The Repayments module is used to refund/repay the amount to its customers. Payments that were taken as deposits or excess payments that were made in the reservations. The reservations can be filtered by various criteria’s in this module. The re-payments can be refunded to Customers, Paying customers and Agents.
Repayment module
The “Repayment module” can be found in Maxxton Software under the “Content Manager” and then ‘’Add-ons’’.
This module is specially designed to refund payments to the “Customers”, “Paying customers” and “Agents”. The refund can be in the form of deposits or excess payments performed in the reservations.
2 Baseline configuration
We first need to create a new add-on.
See the screenshot below. On the next step, you can choose eventually translations and a few other settings. After that click finish.
In the next step, MXTS will give an overview of settings that need to be configured
Representations, linked accommodation types, and Rentability rules:
In these three settings, you can decide whether you want 1 type deposit to be obligated for all the DC’s, accommodations and rentabilities or set up a setting on an individual level. Under ‘’Representations’’, you can also click on ‘’Rentability’’ where you be able to set up the period this add-on will be choosable or not. When there’s no data filled in, the add-on will always be choosable. When there’s nothing set up on an individual level it applies for every DC, accommodation, and rentability.
Rate
In this setting, we will set up the kind of rate. There are three possible options as mentioned below.
It is possible to set up an absolute price/percentage or to set up a rate per subject/accommodation. When there is chosen for ‘’valid from specific period’’ it’s possible to set up a period for which this rate is valid.
In the third step, you were able to select accommodations/add-ons and offers for which this rate should be applicable.
3. advanced settings
Under the advanced settings, there are several options who can be changed using the toggle switches. Underneath this setting, you were able to add the add-on (in this case a deposit) from the internal to the main bill.
It is possible to link the add-on/deposit to a ledger like the screenshot below.
It seems wise to set up a separate ledger (deposit/borg) for deposits because it is a temporary booking.
Place the deposit on a separate space on the bill.
If there is no further config added, the deposit will show below all the other resources. Most of the times it prefer to have the checkbox "warrant extra" selected. That checkbox makes sure the deposit is placed between the subtotal and total. As when everything will be left as it should be, the guest would receive the deposit back so it would be good to not have them between the costs on the bill. The checkbox isn’t yet in MXTS available so this config needs to be done in Newyse (Resources --> Extra’s). Select the add-on (deposit/borg) and switch on select the checkbox "warrant extra".
With these settings set as above the bill will visible as follow:
4. Repayment:
Furthermore, in the configuration, it's possible to set that deposits will be contra booked during the night, manually or automatically at checkout. When we choose ‘’during at night’’, that means, if the warrant extra checkbox is selected, that you don't have to manually add another resource to contra book the warrant (and can't forget that), but that the system is doing that for you in the night. The next day a negative amount will be available in the reservation, which can be paid back to the guests by generating a repayment file via the repayment module.
The checkbox isn’t yet in MXTS available so this config needs to be done in Newyse (Setup → Resorts). Then you can decide on which level you want to create this configuration (highest or individual level). In this case, we set up on an individual level and select ‘’automatically at checkout’’.
Under the tab ''accounts'' you need to config the different payment files. For the payment file 'PAIN' we add an IBAN number, country, accountholder name, and the BIC number. After that, we select the checkbox ''for Repayment module'', otherwise you can't create a payment file.
In case we check out it will look like this in the bill:
So the deposit is presented as a negative amount (should be repaid to the customer). It can be paid by cash at the reception. The other option (at night) will get the reservation into the script which runs on a nightly basis at the back end and it creates automatically the contra entry of the “Deposit” -50.00 as mentioned in the below screenshot.
Processing Repayments
First we need to find the reservations for repayments.
There is a refined search criterion for searching the reservation under the “Repayments module”.You can search on:
- Departure date
- Reservation category
- Matching Resort
- Distribution channel
- Country
- Reservation status
We like to clarify the search criterion Matching because there are 3 options in the drop-down menu:
a) Show matching: When this option is selected all the “Deposit” due amounts are visible.
b) Show not-matching: When this option is selected all the refund due amounts except for “Deposit” are visible.
c) Show all: When this option is selected all the reservations including “Deposit” and other refund amounts are visible. The options for “Matching” are mentioned in the below screenshot.
For this example, we have just one reservation that needs to be repaid.
Generate payment file repayment
Generate the Paymentfile from the “Generate file” button on the “Repayments module” page. The different formats of the payment file are:
- Pain File.
- ClieOp03 File.
- PAYMUL File.
- MT101 File.
- BSIFile
Before you can create a payment file, be aware that you first need to change the repayment status (1) into ''pay due'' for all the reservations you want to repay. After that, you can successfully create a payment file (2), see the screenshot below. After that, you can download the file from the server to your own device (3).
5. Change Repayment amount in case damage has been found to the accommodation.
Example:
During cleaning one of the employees has found that one of the doors has been damaged. The travel party has already checked out. Total repair cost: EUR 40,–.
First, we need to change the repayment status ''on hold''. There will be no repayment when that status is selected.
Secondly, we go back to the Frontoffice Manager and search for the specific reservation. We add an add-on to charge the travel party for the extra costs. If there is not yet an add-on created, you first need to do this in Content Manager. It is wise to create an add-on with the possibility to adjust the price depending on the level of damage. The total amount will be recalculated. If the total amount is still negative (so customer received still money) you can change the payment status in Newyse back into ''pay due'' and follow the steps as mentioned above. If the amount is positive (so the customer needs to pay) it is wise to keep the status ''on hold'' and cut this (hopefully) incidental case out of this workaround. When there is an agreement with the customer and the amount is 0 the reservation will disappear from the Repayment module.