Availability

Availability periods for the properties can be specified using three methods:

Availability in Rentals United is managed using API. This is a standard format to share calendar information in the vacation rental industry.

Manual selection

  1. Select the year, month and the time period.

  2. Date fields under the calendar are automatically populated according to the time periods specified. Select the right Status next to the specified period. Click Save after period is assigned a desired status, so that the changes are visible in the calendar.

    It is possible to specify the following availability statuses:

    • Available - guests can make reservations on this day.

    • Booked - guests cannot make reservations on this day, as the date has been already booked.

    • Blocked - this date is unavailable for reservations due to any reason.

    Availability statuses are coloured according to the legend below the calendar, which is also shown in the screenshot.

  3. The calendar is updated according to the specified statuses.

    As can be seen in the screenshot, the property is available for rent and its status is coloured white:

    • From February 1 (check-in) to February 6 (check-out),

    • From February 8 (check-in) to February 13 (check-out).

    It is not possible to rent the property and its status is coloured grey:

    • From February 6 (check-in) to February 7 (check-out),

    • From February 13 (check-in) to February 14 (check-out).

    As can be seen in the screenshot, the property has been already booked and its status is coloured green from June 3 to June 8.

  4. Go to the Pricing tab on top or click the Save & Next button.

Preparation Time Before Arrival

PTBA stands for Preparation Time Before Arrival. It is a general keyword to describe the minimum time a booking has to be made in advance in order to be accepted by the PM. The dates restricted by PTBA are normally set as not available already in the calendar. Hence, the PTBA data is already applied in availability and sent to the channel within the ARI data.

The PTBA in Rentals United blocks the availability x hours from 23:59 PM of the day of arrival on the property's local timezone. For example if the PTBA is set to 6 hours, bookings will be accepted until 6:00 PM of the day of arrival, after 6:00 PM the calendar will be closed. If the PTBA is set to 24 hours, bookings will be accepted until 23:59 PM before the day of arrival, after that the calendar will be closed.

This functionality may be referred to in other systems as minimum notice, release time, minimum lead time, cut-off days and so on.

PTBA in Rentals United is defined as the minimum number of hours before the arrival (23.59 p.m.) in a given timezone.

PTBA settings

After the definition change

PTBA = 0

The PTBA value indicates that the availability gets blocked 0  hours before the arrival day (midnight) in a given timezone. It means that for properties with PTBA = 0, the availability is not blocked. 

Example: Today is Thursday, 2 PM (local time) and PTBA = 0. Hence, it is possible to book a stay for tonight.

PTBA > 0

The PTBA value indicates that the availability gets blocked more than 0 hours before the arrival.

Example: Today is Thursday, 2 PM (UTC-02) and PTBA = 8. Hence, it is possible to book a stay for tonight until 4 PM (UTC-02), yet no later.

How it works

Not all PMs (Property Managers) can handle the situation when a guest makes a booking, for example, an hour before they show up. The PTBA prevents bookings from being made very late before the guests’ arrival. Hence, by setting proper PTBA, the last-minute bookings may be avoided.

The PTBA settings in Rentals United are based on the value, which indicates the number of hours that must remain till the end of the arrival day (23:59 PM, local time) for a reservation to be accepted. These settings take place in accordance with the local timezone, which is established based on the property location. This means that all PTBA settings are timezone-specific. By default, PTBA = 0, which means that the same-day bookings are possible until the end of the day (23:59, local time).

When PTBA is set, the property availability is blocked for the specified number of hours before the end of the arrival day (23:59, local time). In other words, PTBA is interpreted as the minimum number of hours (till the end of the arrival day) the booking has to be made in order to be still accepted. For instance:

  • If PTBA = 10, property availability is blocked for 10 hours before the end of the arrival day. Bookings are possible until 2 PM on the arrival day.

  • If PTBA = 30, property availability is blocked for 30 hours before the end of the arrival day. Bookings are possible until 6 PM. on the day before the arrival day.

Important: The check-in hours set for the property are disregarded. Only the end of the arrival day is taken into account.
Example 1: The host’s office is open until 6 PM everyday and the host does not want to receive new bookings after the office is closed. The solution is to set PTBA = 6. This means that the latest booking can be made 6 hours before the end of the arrival day (23:59 PM, local time). Hence, the availability of the host’s properties is blocked after 6 PM and this information is passed to the Sales Channels.
Example 2: The host’s standard check-in hour is 4 PM and the host needs to know about a new arrival at least 8 hours before the standard check-in hour, that is 8 PM. The solution is to set PTBA = 16. This means that the latest booking can be made 16 hours before the end of the arrival day (23:59 PM, local time). Hence, the availability of the host’s properties is blocked after 8 AM. and this information is passed to the Sales Channels.
Note: The PTBA settings are optional.

PTBA in Sales Channels

After the PTBA is set, it may take up to 1 hour for the changes to propagate in Sales Channels and fully block the property’s availability. Note that it is currently not possible to modify the PTBA individually for each Sales Channel.

When the PTBA settings eventually take effect, it is not possible to make a reservation within the blocked times. Depending on the Sales Channel type, the PTBA settings restrict reservations differently for guests:

  • In the case of the regular pull sales channels (channels that integrated Rentals United API), if a guest attempts to book a stay within the PTBA-blocked times, the API availability response to the sales channel is initially positive. However, only when performing the final quote request, the reservation response contains the PTBA details. Then, the reservation attempt is eventually rejected with the negative response: Not available.

  • In the case of the push sales channels, the PTBA is already applied to the calendar. Hence, the periods restricted by PTBA are blocked in the calendar.

Setting PTBA in the Rentals United platform

  1. In Rentals United platform, go to the Properties tab on the main menu and select All properties.

  2. Find the property you want to set the PTBA for. Click the Edit / Improve button.

  3. Go to Step 5: Price and availability.

  4. Go to the Preparation Time Before Arrival section.

  5. Edit PTBA.

    • If there is no PTBA set, the PTBA value is set to “0”. Provide the PTBA value in the text field. It is possible to set the PTBA values within the 0-1008 hour range, inclusive. Other values will not be accepted and you will be prompted with an error.

      Important: If you have requested setting PTBA manually for the whole account in the past, the PTBA section will display that value for you.

      However, you can change PTBA for your properties anytime by providing a different value in the PTBA section. This will overwrite the manual settings from the past. In case you want to retrieve the manual settings, highlight the value, hit the Delete button on your keyboard and click away. Then, the PTBA value agreed in the past will be displayed back again. If you type “0”, the PTBA turns off!

      In order to entirely cancel the PTBA settings requested in the past, please contact the Rentals United Support Team.

    • If the PTBA is set, the exact value is displayed, for example 24. In order to disable PTBA, highlight the value and type “0”.

  6. Click the Save & Next button at the bottom of the page.

It is possible to set the PTBA for multiple properties at once.

  1. In Rentals United, go to the My Properties page and click Go to Advanced Settings.

  2. Select properties you want to set the PTBA for. Click the Batch Edit button.

  3. Go to Step 5: Price and availability.

  4. Click the Edit button to enable editing PTBA for selected properties at once.

  5. Edit PTBA.

    • If the property has no PTBA, the PTBA value is set to “0”. Provide the PTBA value in the textfield. It is possible to set the PTBA values within the 0-1008 hour range, inclusive. Other values will not be accepted and you will be prompted with an error.

      Important: If you have requested setting PTBA manually for the whole account in the past, the PTBA section will display that value for you.

      However, you can change PTBA for individual properties anytime by providing a different value in the PTBA section. This will overwrite the manual settings from the past. In case you want to retrieve the manual settings, highlight the value, hit the Delete button on your keyboard and click away. Then, the PTBA value agreed in the past will be displayed back again. If you type “0”, the PTBA turns off!

      In order to entirely cancel the PTBA settings requested in the past, please contact Rentals United using the Support Form.

    • If the property has the PTBA value set, the PTBA value is displayed, for example 24. In order to disable PTBA, highlight the value and type “0”.

  6. Click Save and confirm your choice upon prompt.

  7. The PTBA is set for all the selected properties.

Rentals United API

The API clients/partners can set PTBA in hours via Rentals United API. For more information, please see the API Documentation.

The functionality is backwards compatible. Rentals United supports setting up PTBA in days and in hours. Only one of the two fields can be set. Otherwise, an API error will be returned.

iCal

It is possible to share the availability with Rentals United in the iCal format. The calendar availability is regularly refreshed to ensure correct information is available in Rentals United and sales channels.

Note: iCals do not sync for inactive properties!

The dates in iCal cannot be sole calendar days. This is due to the fact that it is the stays that are booked. By definition, a stay is a period that starts on one day and continues onto another. For example, if a property is unavailable for today, iCal must indicate that it is not available between today and tomorrow. Then, the night between today and tomorrow morning is blocked.

If a property is powered by iCal, all days that are not in iCal will be marked as available in Rentals United.

Availability data import

In case you want to import the availability to Rentals United from an iCal-managed application, have a look at the below steps.

  1. Unfold the Import availability using iCal section.

  2. Click the New iCal Import button.

  3. An Add / Edit iCal Import form is displayed.

    1. Provide a URL to an external iCal in the iCal Link field.

    2. Specify how frequently a synchronization is run between iCal and the external calendar. Select the correct option from the Activity Level dropdown list.

    3. In the Next Import field, select the date when the next import should be performed.

    4. Click the Save button.

Availability data export

In case you manage the availability in a PMS or directly in Rentals United, you may want to export the availability data to an iCal-managed application. Use the link provided in the Export availability using iCal section. Copy and paste it in a dedicated field in any external calendar to keep it synchronized with the Rentals United calendar.