Relative rate for combined/mutual blocking property (and few other questions)

Hi,

I am in the process of setting up the following configuration for rent:

• A: 4 bedroom house
• B: 1 bedroom apt
• AB: whole house

I intend to use the mutual blocking feature to ensure that when the whole house AB is blocked, individual units A and B are also blocked off. And vice-versa, when either A or B unit is blocked, it also blocks off the whole house AB.

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/combined-properties-blockoff-lockoff

First question: Consider the following scenario - a guest books unit A, which in turns blocks-off whole house AB. However, since whole house AB is also linked to unit B, in turn it would block-off unit B as well (but this is not desired). I am assuming that it won't do this (i.e block off unit B as well), otherwise such a system would never work. So just wanted to confirm that it does the right thing.

Second question: During holidays such as Christmas or Thanksgiving weekends, I would like to ensure that only the whole house AB is available for rent. I do not want to offer the guest an ability to book individual units like A only or B only. How can I achieve this?

Third question: As you can see, unit A is 4 bedroom and whole house AB would be 5 bedroom house. I would like to set the pricing such that renting the whole house AB would be approx 10% cheaper than renting both the individual units A and B. To do so, I would like to setup the price for the whole house AB to amount $X and it should trickle down its rate to individual units at some proportional value. For ex:

• rate of unit A = (AB price x 4/5) x 1.10
• rate of unit B = (AB price x 1/5) x 1.10

Basically, the rental rate of unit A is 4/5 of the whole house rent + 10%. Similarly for unit B. Is there a way to setup the pricing of mutual units dependent on another unit like the whole house rent? Such a configuration will really help me setup the price for different seasonal rates, spot rates, etc in one place only without having to configure it in multiple places. Also, I may want to change the relative percent value based on season or spot rate. For ex, the rates of individual units 

Fourth question: Similar to above request for mutual/relative pricing, I would also like to setup/configure min stay requirements for whole house AB and it should be propagated down to unit A and unit B settings. 

Fifth question: My first preference will always be to rent the whole house to guests. If it doesn't get rented out, as the date approaches, I would like to rent out the unit A and unit B as individual units. I guess I can achieve this by setting time limit on how far individual units can be booked. For ex, if I set the advance booking limit for units A and B to two months, it should imply that users should be able to book only the whole house AB two+ months in advance. Any other or better way to achieve this?

Hi Hamang,

Those are some Excellent questions, lets go down the list.

First question: You are correct, this is typically how this works.

Second question: When generating a block within OwnerRez one of the options present is "Don't block other properties", this would allow you to create a block at Properties A and B separately, whilst still allowing guests to book at Property AB.

Third question: OwnerRez has many capabilities within Discounts/surcharges as to the flexibility of how you can manage your rates, but I don't believe the complexity of what you're looking for here is doable at this time. I'd recommend taking a look at what PriceLabs can offer in terms of functionality as I believe they have a parent/child function that may do just what you're looking for.

Fourth question: This just isn't doable within OwnerRez at this time, though I'd recommend writing it up as a feature request so other clients can vote on your idea and see it put in action.

https://www.ownerrez.com/forums/requests 

Fifth question: Actually, I think you nailed this! This is how we'd typically recommend doing it.

~Caleb

Thanks for your responses. Few followup questions or comemnts:

Second question: Can you achieve the desired functionality by season. For ex, if I were to create a season for Christmas/New Year, I would like to ensure that only the entire house AB can be booked and the individual units cannot be booked for that season.

Third question/Fourth question: If I am putting in a feature request, I would like to have it done for both, as they are very similar. One is a request to have the rate copied down (proportionately) to child units and the other is to copy down the min stay requirements down to child units.

I am not yet ready to try out PriceLabs because I am not sure how well it would work. Plus paying approx $45 per month for 3 units to PriceLabs would be an overkill to just get the convenience of such a feature to inherit the price mappings.

On a related note, do you have open APIs available in OwnerRez for me to develop and implement such a functionality myself?

Thanks,

Hemang.

Hi Hemang,

Second question:

You could apply seasons to the date range you're looking for but the actual blocking would still typically need to be handled as described prior,

"When generating a block within OwnerRez one of the options present is "Don't block other properties", this would allow you to create a block at Properties A and B separately, whilst still allowing guests to book at Property AB."

Third Question/Fourth Question:

Certainly, you can put in as many feature requests as you'd like!

Related note question:

OwnerRez offers two open API methods that can be used, depending on what exactly you're looking to do.

First is our open OAuth-based API that you can read about here:

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/api-overview

That has traditional GET, POST end points for communicating with an OwnerRez account on demand and in real time. However, that is pretty limited as we only expose certain things and are working to expand it. For instance, you cannot book a property that way (ie. send live bookings through that). Each individual OwnerRez account owner also has to specifically authorize connection with your service using OAuth in their account.

We then also have a Channel Manager side that allows you to become a first-class integrated "channel" (like Vrbo, Booking.com, Airbnb, etc) and promotes you equally with those guys.

You can read about this API here:

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/api-channel-integration-overview

 To do this, you'd have to follow a feeds-based structure, which is compromised of:
- pulling XML feeds on a regular basis throughout the day (listing content, (photos, etc) and rates, rules and availability) to keep your side up to date
- doing a "fast availability" check against our live quote and rates API when your website visitors are trying to book or get a quote (this ensures there is no lag time between changes)
- pushing bookings across with credit card info via our OLB (online booking) end point which accepts live card data and then creates bookings on our side. This requires documented PCI compliance for credit card information handling. Alternatively, you can use our quote redirect process to send the guest to OwnerRez with a quote to book, which allows them to enter their credit card information into OwnerRez which is already PCI certified.
- checking our BUS service (booking update service) to see if a booking was cancelled or get status information from our side after the fact

For monetization using the Channel Manager API, you have a couple choices:

1) Bill the guest's credit card for a service fee prior to sending the booking over to us (which is what Vrbo does)
2) Don't bill any fees inline, but keep track of bookings that are sent across and then bill the owner/PM for the number of bookings they have per month (like Booking.com or HomeToGo does)
3) Annual subscription fee, where the number of bookings and their charges is irrelevant.

Here's more information about how to use our HAXML Sandbox for testing the Channel Manager API:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/eau29e6kzxgb7iv/HAXML%20Sandbox%20Instructions.pdf?dl=0

If you have more questions about these, due to the complexity I'd recommend emailing in to our helpdesk at Help@OwnerReservations.com

~Caleb