Set up the insurance a customer can choose

Introduction

Most customers are offered a choice of cover when they rent: a cheap basic option with a high excess, and one or two dearer options that bring the excess down. In RentVisie each of those choices is an insurance option. Unlike other add-ons, it carries a Security deposit and an Excess amount. It also carries "what's included" switches, a Conditions text and a Rating for your website.

You manage them on the screen headed Insurances: a New button above a table with one row per option, and a pencil icon and a bin icon at the end of each row. Opening a row brings up the screen headed Insurance option, with a General tab and a Translation tab. On General, the left column holds the name, the money and the fallback price; the right column, under Web settings, holds everything the customer sees online.

You come here when:

• you are setting up the cover you sell for the first time;
• the deposit or excess on one of your options has changed and the desk keeps quoting the old figure;
• your website shows an insurance with the wrong explanation, no conditions, or in the wrong order;
• you want to check which options you offer.

This is not the vehicle's own insurance. The insurer that covers your fleet, and the breakdown firm you ring, are kept on a different screen: see Record who insures a vehicle and who to call when it breaks down. Nothing on this page changes those records, and nothing there changes a booking's deposit.

Terms used on this screen

This page covers the fields that belong only to insurance. The name, price and category work the same for every add-on and are explained in the three kinds of add-on; showing an option online and linking it to a vehicle class are in offering an add-on.

How to use

Configuration

The insurance options screen is itself the configuration. There is nothing to switch on first, but the options only do something once they are linked to a vehicle class — see offering an add-on.

Before you start: the Product design item in the Admin menu, the Insurances screen and its Save button are for a Company admin account only. Other staff can pick an insurance on a booking but cannot open or change the options themselves.

Using the insurance options screen

From the main menu, open Admin, then Product design. On the screen headed Product design, click the Insurance options tile (a shield icon). The Insurances screen opens. Click New to start an option, or click a row (or its pencil icon) to change one. You land on the General tab.

1. Name the option the way the customer should see it, for example All-in cover.

2. Fill in Security deposit — the deposit, in whole euros, to take when this option is chosen. It starts at 0, and 0 means no deposit at all, not "use the normal one" (see Key details).

3. Fill in Excess amount — what the customer still pays per damage with this option. It starts at 0. Type whole euros: the desk's Insurances button on a booking drops any cents.

4. Set the price and the rest of the left column as for any add-on — see the three kinds of add-on.

5. In the right column, under Web settings, type a Rating from 0 to 3. The app will not save any other number.

6. Work down the four coverage switches. Each is a Yes/No choice with its own Tooltip text box directly underneath, so you will see the label Tooltip text four times, each belonging to the switch above it. All four start on No. A tooltip takes up to 300 characters.

   Switch	Tick Yes when the option covers
   Damage and Theft coverage	Damage to the vehicle and theft
   Tyres and Glass coverage	Tyres, windscreen and windows
   Interior coverage	Seats, upholstery and the inside of the car
   Breakdown covered	Breakdown assistance

7. Type the Conditions: the full small print a customer can open online. This box, and the heading What's included in the insurance option? above the switches, only appear once is enabled for web at the top of the column is set to Yes. The box has a toolbar for formatting.

8. If your website runs in more than one language, open the Translation tab. It shows one block per extra language. Click New Translation, then fill in Name, the four tooltips and Conditions in that language. Name is required.

9. Click Save. If something is missing the screen stays open and shows the message under the field: Name is empty, Base price is empty, Security deposit is empty or Excess amount is empty. Cancel throws your changes away.

When it worked, the row appears in the Insurances table. To remove an option, click the bin icon on its row — read the Key details below first.

Key details

Which deposit and excess a booking gets. Skim this once; the first line that applies wins.

The customer settings are explained in Payment and invoicing settings.

A worked example. Your Volkswagen Polo class has a Default deposit of €750. You offer two options: Basic, Security deposit 1000, Excess amount 2500, Rating 1; and All-in, Security deposit 250, Excess amount 0, Rating 3.

Had All-in been saved with Security deposit left at 0, the customer would pay no deposit at all.

One insurance per booking. Ticking two on a booking's Insurances screen gives Multiple options selected, please make sure the dates are correct. and nothing is saved. How the desk adds it is on Change the vehicle or class on a booking.

The switches, tooltips, conditions and rating are for your website. The desk's list shows only the name, SecurityDeposit, ExcessAmount and price. They do not decide what a damage costs either: a customer on an option with Damage and Theft coverage set to Yes is still charged whatever excess the booking carries.

The rating also sets the order online, lowest first: Basic (1) before All-in (3).

Changes reach bookings that are still open. A booking not yet invoiced picks up a new Security deposit or Excess amount the next time its price is worked out, for example when its class or customer changes. Invoices already sent keep their figures.

Deleting an option takes it off every vehicle class. Bookings that already carry it keep the line and its price, but the next time their price is worked out the deposit falls back to the class's Default deposit and the excess to €1,000. Delete an option only once no open booking uses it.

What to do next. Link the option to the vehicle classes that sell it and decide whether it shows online — see offering an add-on.

Q&A

Why does a booking with insurance ask for no deposit at all? The option's Security deposit is 0. That is taken as "no deposit", not as "use the class's deposit". Open the option from Admin, Product design, Insurance options, type the amount, and click Save. Then change something on the booking that works out the price again, or ask a Company admin to correct the deposit on it.

Why does a booking show €1,000 excess when we never set that figure? The booking has no insurance option, so it falls back to the vehicle class's excess, which is €1,000 and cannot be changed on the vehicle-class screen. Add an insurance with the booking's Insurances button to use that option's Excess amount.

I changed the excess, but one customer's bookings still show the old figure. That customer has custom deposit? switched on, usually with custom excess?, and their own figures win over any insurance. Check the customer's settings — see Payment and invoicing settings.

I typed an excess with cents and the booking shows a round figure. Adding the insurance with the booking's Insurances button rounds the excess down to whole euros. Type the excess in whole euros.

Why won't the option save when every field is filled in? Check Rating: it accepts only 0, 1, 2 or 3. Change it and click Save again.

Where is the Conditions box? It appears only when is enabled for web is Yes. Options that are not shown online have no conditions to fill in.

The table says "is glass covered", but I set Tyres and Glass to Yes and it shows No. The two coverage columns in the Insurances table are mislabelled. is tyres covered shows Tyres and Glass coverage, and is glass covered actually shows Interior coverage. Open the option to see the real settings.

Can I add a fifth coverage item, such as "Personal accident"? No. There are exactly four switches. Describe anything else in Conditions.

Why does the website show my conditions in our own language to a foreign customer? The option has no translation for that customer's language. Open the Translation tab, click New Translation under the language, fill it in, and click Save. See translating your texts.

Related pages:

• The three kinds of add-on — the price, category and other fields every add-on shares.
• Offering an add-on — linking an option to a vehicle class and showing it online.
• Change the vehicle or class on a booking — adding the insurance to a booking at the desk.
• Record who insures a vehicle and who to call when it breaks down — your fleet's own insurer, not the cover a customer buys.