Booking duration

In the “Booking settings”, we can set up the basic bookable product settings, booking terms and location.

Step 1 – Booking settings

Booking duration: here you can choose how the booking duration will be calculated, and choose between:

• customer can choose units of x days/months/hours/minutes: this allows the customer to extend the booking as much as he/she wishes. For example, you rent hotel rooms per day and customers can choose how many days they want to stay. (example below, 3 days).
• fixed units of x days/months/hours/minutes: this allows the customer to only choose the start date, the duration will be automatically calculated. This can be useful for example, if you sell a 4-hour boat tour, a 1-hour consulting etc., products whose duration is fixed and cannot be decided by the customer. (Example below, units of 3 days, 6 days, 9 days etc.). 

The duration of a booking is expressed in “units”, the admin can set units of minutes, hours, days, or months.

Default start date in booking form: here you can decide which ‘start date’ to show on the booking form calendar, among the following:

• None
• Current day
• Current day +1
• First available day
• Custom date

Full day booking: Decide if the booking duration will last until the end of the day, you can read more about it here.

Allowed start days: select days on which the booking can start. For example, if you want a room for 3 days starting only on Friday. Only Fridays will show as selectable in the calendar.

Step 2 – Booking terms

Max bookings per unit: maximum number of bookings that can be accepted for the same day/month/hour/minutes (this depends on the booking duration unit). For example, if you rent bikes and have 3 bikes of the same type, you can add 3 in this field.

Min/max booking duration: minimum and maximum duration that can be selected by customers expressed in months, days, hours, or minutes depending on how previously set in Booking settings. Please, note, that this option is only available if, in the Booking duration option, you select Customer can book in units of.

Min/max advanced reservation: for example, if you set the minimum advanced reservation to 1 day and the maximum to 1 year, the first available date for booking will be tomorrow and the last available one will be in one year’s time.

Check-in/check-out time: enter here the time for check-in and check-out that will be displayed on the product page (only for informative purposes).

Buffer time: decide the time between one booking and the next. (For example, if you give in 1, the buffer time between two reservations will be 1 day. You will not be able to make a reservation for that day/that time period).

Require confirmation: enable if the admin has to confirm a booking before accepting it. For more details about how to take advantage of this option, please, check this page.

Allow cancellation: enable if the customer can cancel the booking. If enabled, another option will appear below to set the cancellation terms (e.g. 7 days before the booking start date). For more details about how to cancel a booking, please, refer to this page.

Step 3 – Google Maps

Here you can set the location of your bookable product, and/or use the [booking_map] shortcode, to show the map on the product page.

Only if you have set “Customer can book units of – 1 day” as booking unit the “Enable calendar range picker” option will be visible.

Once you enable the “Enable calendar range picker” option, an interactive calendar will appear to let your users select the booking date.

In the example above, the minimum duration is set to 3 days. The duration is automatically calculated, meaning that when you select the ‘check-in date’, the system automatically blocks the 3 next days.

From YITH > Booking > Settings > “Customizations” you can manage the way you want to show the date picker and calendar in the booking form.

Go to this page here to read about the options.

If you’ve selected the option “Customer can book units of” you can decide to let your users select the duration of their booking. By setting the minimum and maximum values from the ‘Booking Terms’. This way you can prevent users from making a booking for a longer or shorter duration than allowed.

If you don’t want to set any limits to the booking duration, you can enter “zero” in the ‘Maximum booking duration’ field.

In our example, we have set ‘Customer can book units of‘ to 3 days, and a ‘Maximum booking duration‘ to 0 (unlimited).

This way, the customer will see the 3 days in the booking form by default and will be able to multiply this number by 3, each time he uses the arrows.

It is not possible to book this product for 8 days for example, as this is not a multiplication of 3. 

By enabling the “check min/max duration” option in YITH > Booking > Settings > Form Settings, the calendar in frontend will show the dates which are no longer available, including the minimum/maximum duration.

Example with the option enabled

Customer A has booked the Amsterdam Apartment for 6 days from 3 January to 9 January. The minimum duration to book this apartment is 3 days. 

As you can see in the example above, it is not possible for Customer B to book the apartment from 1 to 9 January, considering the minimum of 3 days and the booked period.

If you disable the option “Check min/max duration”, the customer will see the calendar with the dates available/unavailable, however, it does not take into consideration the minimum and maximum duration of the room. Therefore the days prior to the reservation will appear clickable in the calendar, even if the booking is not available on those dates.

Example with the option disabled

The same scenario with customers A and B, customer A has placed a booking from 3 January to 9 January.

As you can see in the example above, it is not possible for Customer B to book the apartment from 3 to 9 January. But it is possible to select 1 January in this case, as it did not consider the minimum of 3 days and the booked period.

If the customer wants to book the room from 1 to 9 January, they will see a message notifying them that it is not possible to book this room in the period they wish.

Example of date not-bookable

Also, the title of the booking form changes from a price view, to “Not-bookable”.

We suggest keeping the ‘Check min/max duration‘ option enabled at all times.