Introduction
Taking a vehicle back is the same inspection you ran when it went out, run a second time. RentVisie decides which leg you are on from the booking's status: a booking sitting at Picked up gets the return leg. The screens are identical, so the walkthrough on Run the pickup inspection applies here too.
What is different is what happens the moment you finalise. The return leg does three things the pickup leg does not — it can mark the vehicle dirty, it moves the vehicle's recorded location, and it throws away provisional damage. None of them asks you first.
This page covers those, plus late returns and filing proof that you refuelled a vehicle.
How to use
Configuration
Before you start: running a return inspection needs any counter role — Employee, Employee (minimal) or Company admin. The bulk actions on the overdue list are narrower: Extend all overdues needs Employee or Company admin, and both cleanup buttons need Company admin.
One setting changes what a return does to the vehicle. Open Settings from the main menu, then Operational settings, and find Vehicles return dirty. It starts off.
Turn it on and every vehicle is marked unclean the moment its return inspection is finalised — no question, no exception for a car that came back spotless. That is the point: it puts every returned vehicle into the cleaning queue by default, and staff mark the clean ones back afterwards. Leave it off if you would rather record cleanliness case by case.
Nothing else needs configuring. Where the vehicle ends up is taken from the booking's own drop-off location, so the thing to keep accurate is the booking, not a setting.
Using the return inspection
- Open the booking. Its status should be Picked up.
- Click the Inspection tab, then the Inspection tile.
- Work through the steps — checklist, damage, odometer, fuel — exactly as at pickup.
- Finalise, with or without the receipt email.
Two steps behave differently on the way back, and both are covered in full on their own pages:
- Damage you add now is stamped as drop-off damage, which is the damage a customer can be charged for. See Record damage during an inspection.
- The odometer will refuse a reading lower than the one taken at pickup. See Record mileage and fuel readings.
The moment you finalise, the booking becomes Dropped off and the total is recalculated. Then:
| What happens | When |
|---|---|
| The vehicle is marked unclean | Only if Vehicles return dirty is on |
| The vehicle's location becomes the booking's drop-off location | Always |
| Provisional damage on the booking is deleted | Always |
| Signatures on the booking are deleted | Always |
| The drop-off receipt is emailed | Unless you chose Finalise (no email) |
Filing proof that you refuelled
If you put fuel in the vehicle and want the receipt on file, attach it to the booking: open the booking, click the Other tab, and add a document. Give it a Name, choose Proof of refuelling as its type, and click Save.
This is a record, not a charge — the charge itself is a separate entry on the Fuel tab.
Vehicles that are late back
Open the operational manager overview and click Overdue for the list of bookings past their drop-off time. You can open or copy a booking and export the list. Two bulk buttons are Company admin only, and both cancel bookings and revoke key-box access:
- Clean selected asks "Are you sure? This will cancel all selected bookings."
- Clean all asks "Are you sure? This will clean all overdue bookings (not picked up) with a drop off date in the past."
Both act on bookings that were never collected, not on vehicles still out, so a car a customer is genuinely still driving is untouched.
For long rentals the lease bookings list has Extend all overdues, which pushes every overdue lease's drop-off date 30 days out in one click.
Extend all overdues does not ask for confirmation. One click and every overdue lease in your company moves, with nothing to undo it. There is no way to pick which ones. If you want to extend a single booking, change its dates on the booking itself instead.
A worked example
A Golf on booking B-10432 was due back at 17:00 yesterday, so it shows on the Overdue list. The customer arrives at 09:20 the next morning.
You open the booking, click Inspection, and work through: the checklist, one new dent on the offside door, an odometer reading of 42 810, and a fuel level of 25. You refuelled it for €71.82, so you attach the till receipt on the Other tab as Proof of refuelling.
You press Finalise Inspection. The booking becomes Dropped off and the total picks up the mileage and the dent. The Golf's location changes to your Rotterdam branch, because that is the drop-off location on the booking. And because your company has Vehicles return dirty on, it is marked unclean.
Key details
A return can move a vehicle to the wrong place. The location comes from the booking's drop-off location, not from where you are standing. If a customer brings a car back to a different branch, change that on the booking before you finalise.
Every return is marked dirty, or none is. The setting is company-wide and unconditional — a car that came back immaculate is marked unclean just the same.
Provisional damage does not survive a return. Damage given the Temporary category is deleted when you finalise. Anything you want kept needs a real category.
Signatures do not survive it either. Finalising clears every signature on the booking, so collect signatures afterwards, not before. See Send the rental agreement for signing.
A booking can be checked out with nobody touching it. If a customer is sent a self-service link and does not complete it, RentVisie checks the booking out an hour later by itself: last known odometer reading, tank recorded as 100% full, pickup notes stamped Auto accepted pickup, receipt emailed. Those figures are invented, so check the notes for that phrase before trusting a return that looks odd. It only happens at all if your company has self-service switched on.
What to do next: check the total picked up the mileage, fuel and damage charges, then invoice.
Q&A
The Inspection tile is not on the booking. It only appears while the booking is Confirmed or Picked up. If the booking already says Dropped off, the return has been done.
The vehicle is showing at the wrong branch after the return. The drop-off location on the booking was still the original one when you finalised. Correct the vehicle's location on the vehicle record — changing the booking afterwards will not move it back.
A car came back clean but is marked dirty. Your company has Vehicles return dirty switched on, which marks every return unclean without exception. Mark it clean on the vehicle record.
Can I stop just one vehicle being marked dirty? No. The setting is all or nothing for the whole company.
Damage I recorded has disappeared after the return. It was categorised as Temporary, which means "delete this when the vehicle comes back". Re-record it with a real category.
Will "Clean all" cancel the rental of a customer who is still driving? No. Both cleanup buttons act on bookings that were never picked up. A booking at Picked up is left alone. They do cancel outright, though, so use them only on genuinely dead bookings.
I pressed "Extend all overdues" by mistake. How do I undo it? You cannot, and there was no confirmation to catch you. Every overdue lease moved 30 days out. Correct the dates on each affected booking by hand.
Where do I attach the fuel receipt? The booking's Other tab, as a document of type Proof of refuelling. It records the receipt only — add the charge itself on the Fuel tab.
The customer returned early. Does that change the price? Finalising recalculates the total, but the booking's dates are what drive the rate. If they brought it back days early and you want the price to reflect that, change the drop-off date on the booking before you finalise.
A booking says "Auto accepted pickup" and the readings look invented. They are. Nobody inspected that vehicle — it was checked out automatically an hour after a self-service link went unanswered, with the last known mileage and a full tank assumed. Take real readings before you trust anything on the return.