Facility Booking

1 Understand how booking works

Once Booking is on, a resident visits your public Booking Portal and follows four simple steps:

1. Login or Create Account — so each request is tied to a real person.
2. Select a Facility — they pick from the facilities you flagged as bookable.
3. Request Booking — they choose a date and time on the calendar, fill in any required fields, and pay any fee you have set.
4. Review and Send — the request is submitted, you and any other notification recipients are emailed, and the request appears on your Booking Calendar for review.

Everything below is the staff-side setup that makes that four-step flow possible.

2 Turn on site-wide booking (Booking Settings)

Open Left menu › Facility Booking › Booking Settings. Check the Enable Booking toggle and click Save. Until this toggle is on, the public Booking Portal shows "Booking is not enabled" for your site — even if you already have bookable facilities.

While you are on this page, fill in the Title and content blocks. The Title appears at the top of the public booking page, and the content columns become the landing copy visitors read before they pick a facility.

3 Create a bookable facility

Open Left menu › Maps & Locations › Manage Location / Facility to see what already exists, then click Add Location / Facility to create a new one. Give it a name, drop its location on the map, and fill in the usual content (description, photos, amenities).

On the same edit screen, scroll to the booking section and check the per-facility Enable Booking toggle. Only facilities with this toggle on show up as bookable on the public portal. Then set:

• Booking Interval — how the space is reserved (for example Daily, Weekly, or Hourly). For Hourly you must also set an Open Time and Close Time that bound the bookable window each day.
• Booking Price Rules — added as rows on the edit screen to charge fees (resident-only or member-only pricing can be layered on with additional rules).
• Unbookable Date/Times — block specific windows such as maintenance or private events.
• Notification Email Users / Notification SMS Users — the staff who get pinged when a new request comes in for this facility. Notifications are per-facility, so the parks lead and the community-center coordinator each see only their own queue.

Click Save. Repeat for every bookable space.

4 Check the public Booking Portal

Your residents reach the portal at the /booking address on your own website (for example yourtown.gov/booking). Open it in a new tab and walk through the four steps yourself to confirm the right facilities appear, the calendar shows open dates, and any fee is correct. If the portal says booking is not enabled, revisit Step 2; if no facilities appear, revisit Step 3.

5 Watch the Booking Calendar

Open Left menu › Facility Booking › Booking Calendar for a single, at-a-glance view of every booking across every facility. It is color-coded by status (New Request, Confirmed, Pending Payment, Cancelled, Rejected) so you can spot double-bookings before they happen. Click any event on the calendar to open that booking's details.

6 Approve and manage requests

Open Left menu › Facility Booking › Manage Bookings to see the list. The list starts on Active (open requests) and you can switch to Archived to see past or closed ones. Use the filters at the top to narrow by facility, by who requested it, or to show only ones assigned to you or unassigned.

Click a request to open it. On the detail screen you can:

• Change the Status (for example to Confirmed, Cancelled, or Rejected).
• Assign the request to a staff member with Assign User.
• Adjust the requested date if the interval allows it.
• Add Notes and attach files.

Click Save to apply. The person who made the request is notified of status changes. (Booking requests are kept for the record and are not deleted.)

7 Add a booking request yourself

Sometimes a resident books over the phone or in person. From Left menu › Facility Booking › Manage Bookings, click Add Booking Request. Then:

1. Choose the Facility and pick a date on its calendar.
2. Enter the requester's Email, First Name, Last Name, and Phone. If the email matches an existing account, that person is used; a walk-in with no email is still recorded.
3. Set the Status, optionally Assign it to a staff member, and add any Notes.

Click Save. The new request now appears in the list and on the Booking Calendar.