Allocating suppliers manually to a booking provides more flexibility on the booking process, allowing the business to decide if a booking will be allocated to the business itself or allocated to a specific supplier.
Example: A transfer can be allocated either to the hotel or in case the hotel does not have any vehicles available at that particular date and time, it can be allocated to any of the associated suppliers.
In order to enable this functionality, proceed to the product's Settings & Policies > Bookings section and on the Booking model field select Manual Supplier Allocation.
Note: After activating this option, the booking flow must be chosen in order to determine what happens to the booking when a supplier declines:
If the supplier rejects the booking, the booking is automatically cancelled.
If the supplier rejects the booking, the booking status remains as Pending and the booking returns to the business either to be confirmed by the Business or to be allocated to another supplier.
How to allocate a supplier to a booking
When the Manual Supplier Allocation feature has been enabled and a booking is made it will be indicated on the Bookings table under the column Booking Allocation as shown below:
Note: In order to see this update, the Booking Allocation column needs to be added to the Bookings table. To do so, click on the Cog icon Configure table columns on the top right-hand side of the table and select the required column to be exposed on the Bookings table.
For the supplier or the business to be allocated, enter the booking page and click on the Allocate transaction button.
The available options will then be displayed, at which point a selection must be made to either allocate a supplier or the business to the booking.
Once a supplier gets allocated to a booking, the specific supplier receives an email notification and the booking will show up in their dashboard. Either through the email or the dashboard, the supplier can accept or reject the booking.
Additionally, the Business receives an email notification that the booking has been allocated to the specific supplier.
Within the Business's Bookings table:
The allocated supplier will appear in the Supplier column.
The Booking Allocation column will be updated to display whether the booking was allocated to the Business or to a Supplier.
The Status of the booking will remain as Pending until confirmation or rejection is received.
Once the supplier or business modifies the status to Confirmed, the customer will receive the equivalent email notification.
Note: As long as the transaction/booking is in Pending status, it can be allocated to another supplier or to the business itself (i.e. the Allocate transaction action remains available).
Important Note:
When a booking is rejected by a supplier, then the indication in the Booking Allocation column changes from Supplier to Confirm or Allocate again, and declined booking appears next to the supplier's name on the Allocate transaction page. These changes indicate that an action is required for the specific booking (i.e to make a new allocation).
Additionally, the booking is removed from the supplier's dashboard and the specific supplier cannot be allocated again to the booking.
