Production Update 24 January 2012

The following updates to iBex Accommodation PMS (property management system) are to be uploaded Tuesday, 24 January 2012.

The enhancements apply to V3 screens only, however in most cases these screens are also accessed by V4 users. Where V4 screens have replaced V3 screens you may need to switch back to the applicable V3 screen until the functionality has been added fully into V4 (we anticipate within a couple of weeks).

Extras Commission
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3,V4)

The ‘Manage External Supplier’ screen has now been updated to enable a default commission to be recorded. The ‘Manage Extras’ screen has also been updated so that you can override the default commission for any extras that are linked to an external supplier.

 

 Any extras added to a booking that are linked to an external supplier will have the commission the supplier pays you recorded in the booking. You can override the default commission set for the extra if required. This is to allow for reconciliation with external suppliers (eg. activity operators) that you sell for.

The reconciliation report will follow shortly.

Commissions entered for externally provided extras will apply only for bookings entered from implementation date of this development.

Extras Title
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

When adding an extra to a booking you can now edit the title. This allows you to have a generic extra (eg. Miscellaneous) and change the title for each instance. For example, you might have supplied a bunch of flowers for a guest. You are unlikely to have this extra pre-defined so would have had to create a ‘Misc Sale’ item within an invoice.

By being able to change the extra title it can be added to a booking and displayed on the booking receipt whereas ‘Misc Sale’ items do not. This is a distinct advantage for those of you who use booking receipts instead of invoices. It also means you can have different extra codes for different categories of miscellaneous items. You can also amend the title of your specifically defined extras.

The example below shows where the title can be edited for an extra when accessing a booking through admin screens.

UnCancel Function

Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

Bookings that have been cancelled can now be reinstated using the new UnCancel button. This will reinstate the booking with the same booking reference number and details, however a change of unit may apply if the same unit is no longer available.

Units will be booked based on the same rules as bookings being received. Where bookings have spilt dates you will need to manually assign units until enhanced functionality has been developed for these circumstances.

Payment Report
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3,V4)

The payment report was altered recently to show payments, credits and debits. While this is of value, it is confusing for those who want to see physical payments as single line entries. This report will now default to this format however you will have the option to have the display include debits and credits.

Status Log
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

Because a booking can change status (and with future plans to add further statuses) a ‘Status Log’ button has been added to the booking edit screen to display status changes made to a booking. The example below shows a booking that has been created, cancelled and then re-instated.

This will apply only for booking status changes made from implementation date of this development.

 

Sales Audit (New)
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

The invoice button in the ‘Edit Booking’ screen takes you to the list of sales items that can be invoiced. When you amend a booking transaction the original item is credited and a new debit item is created so that changes can be tracked. In most cases, the original items didn’t need to be invoiced so only changed items are displayed in the default view.

However, all transactions can be viewed when the ‘All Transactions’ option is selected. This view enables suitably authorised admin users to delete unwanted transactions – which is OK providing the sales total still balances with the booking total (ie. matched debits and credits are deleted). If this is not done correctly an audit warning message will display (see example below).

Should you receive such a warning, do not process any invoices until the error is resolved (by clicking the ‘Reset’ button). The ‘Reset’ button will clear all transaction history and provide invoice items for selection only as currently booked.

Associated with this new function is a new ‘Sales Audit’ report which will show any bookings that have a sales audit error. The report is available from the report menu (V3 only at this stage).

Qualifying Zero Booking Balances
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

A number of users have experienced confusion due to a booking balance being zero once invoiced, even if the invoice/s is not yet paid. This is because the debt is transferred from the booking to debtors and managed there – ie. the invoice/s has ‘paid’ the booking. Because an invoice can include multiple bookings it is not possible to show an invoice due balance within a booking.

However, the ‘Retrieve Booking’ screen has been enhanced to show a ‘Y’ if a booking has been invoiced and will be coloyred red if any invoices associated with this booking are not fully paid. This should aid in identifying which customers still owe you.

Remember that the ‘Invoice/Debtors’ report should be your primary source to determine unpaid invoices and their age.

Companies vs Customers
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

When manually making booking, if you enter a registered user that is a company (not an agent) then then the ‘Find Customer’ selector will be limited to customers associated with that company. Conversely, if when making a booking you first select a customer and that customer is associated with a company registered user then that company will automatically be associated with the booking.

Note that if a company registered user is subsequently added to, or changed within a booking then the suggested rate may change.

Account Balances
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

Booking, invoice and customer balances have caused some confusion as to whether the the balance is debit or credit due to inconsistent presentation. For example, a negative symbol indicated a credit balance whereas red colouring indicated a debit balance.

All balances will now be suffixed with a ‘CR’ if in credit and a ‘DR’ if in debit.

Customer / Company Account Balances
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

In the ‘Booking Edit’ screen, if the booking has a company or agent registered user and a customer registered user assigned to the booking, then both balances will display per the example below.

 

To see how the balance is made up, simply click on the balance figure and you will be presented with a screen showing invoice and payment transactions per the example below.

Tracking Company/Agent Payments

Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

Any payment made by a customer would have the payment recorded through their customer account as a credit and debit (the debit matching a contra credit to a booking or an invoice). This allowed tracking of payments and allowed advance payments to be recorded to the customer’s account which could then be applied to a future booking/s.

This functionality has now also been added for Company and Agent registered users. When making a payment within a booking you will have a choice of whom the payment was made by (see example below).

 

Payment Log
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

If you select a payment to edit, you can now view change history of that payment by clicking ‘View Log’ in the ‘Edit Customer Payment’ screen. The log will show user comments and system comments (such as when you cancel an invoice and associated payment/s is transferred back to the customer account).

Cancelling Bookings and Invoices
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

Previously you were required to delete payments made on an invoice before you could cancel it. If the payment was valid it then required re-entry which was time consuming and could make it harder to manage the ‘Payment Reconciliation’ report.

You can now cancel an invoice, even if payments have been made to it. If a customer, company or agent is associated with the invoice then the payment’s will be transferred to their account.

If a casual invoice is cancelled, payment/s will be unassigned and will be viewable in the ‘Payments Received’ report.

Agent Commission on Extras
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3, V4)

In the invoice screen, when you click to add agent’s commission all transactions were automatically selected. In most cases, as extras are not commission-able you had to deselect them before proceeding.

Now extras will only be pre-selected for commission if they are set as being commision-able, however you can still select manually if required.

Find Company/Agent
Applies to plans: iBex PMS (V3)

We are replacing the term registered user with Company and Agent which is much more meaningful. From the registered user screen the only way to retrieve details for an agent or company was via a single select field. As some users have very large numbers of agents/companies the select field has become inefficient.

A new screen, ‘Find Company/Agent’, has been developed which is available for selection from the ‘Users & Clients’ menu group. This screen provides an alphabetically sorted list of company and agent registered users and provides enhanced search options.

To access/edit the details of a company or agent, just click on their ID (refer example below).

 

You can test these functions by logging into our test environment known as "QA" from the panel in the knowledgebase.