Administrator's Guide – Settings tab: Advanced booking rules
This page describes the different settings you can apply in the Advanced booking rules section of the Settings tab when you edit a location or resource.
Contents
Booking category selector
Underneath the Time zone section, your booking categories can be selected. For example, Meeting Rooms.
As the Time zone section is above the booking category selector, it’s not affected by the booking category selector.
All settings below the booking category selector are specific to the booking category that you select (for example, Meeting Rooms).
Note: make sure that you’ve selected the right booking category before making any changes to your settings.
Advance bookings
The Advanced booking rules section gives you multiple options to set:
How much in advance groups or teams and standard users can book certain resources.
Who can book resources and who can’t – this is useful if a Location Manager is in charge of bookings for a resource.
When you want to release resources.
How much in advance resources should be booked.
Whether resources can be booked only once a day.
These rules are useful if you want to give one of your team a higher priority to book a certain set of resources over other teams or how much time in advanced your staff can book resources.
Group rules
Group rules allow you to set how much in advance each group can book a set of resources. These rules can be applied to any resources you have in your hierarchy (for example, meeting rooms or desks on a floor) using the Booking category selector.
This is useful if you want to give a group or team a higher priority to book a set of resources in advance. If the group or team doesn’t need them, the group who has the next highest priority will be able to book them in the advanced booking time period that’s been set for them.
The higher the group rule is, the higher the priority they have to book resources in advance. The group rules always decrease in priority until you reach all other users who aren’t in a group with a prioritisation rule. For example:
The Directors group can book resources 10 days in advance.
If there are any resources available after the Directors group has made its bookings, the Facilities management group can book them 3 days in advance.
If there are any resources available after both the Directors and Facilities management group have made their bookings, everyone else (all standard users) can book them 1 day in advance.
For group rules to work, you need to set up at least one group for your organisation. It can be a user, domain, or advanced group.
Once you’ve made your groups, you can set up your group rules using the Advanced booking rules settings. We recommend that you set up these settings in the location above the resources that you want them applied to (for example, a desk bank). The settings will be inherited by all the resources below that location (for example, the desks below the desk bank).
Once you have a group rule set up, you’ll see a Direct prioritisation rules configured icon next to that location or resource.
If you select the icon, it will bring up a summary of the Prioritisation rules that have been applied.
These rules can also be used with the Restrict access to tick box in the Availability tab (for example, Restrict access to Human Resources).
For more information, see our Advanced booking group rules troubleshooting article.
Set up Advanced booking rules settings
To set up the Advanced booking rules settings of a location or resource:
Select Admin in the top bar.
Select Location and Resources under the Location Settings section in the side menu.
Select Edit hierarchy. Your resource hierarchy will appear.
Select the 📝 Edit button next to the location or resource.
The Edit [Location] or Edit [Resource] pop-up will appear.
Select the Settings tab.
Select the correct resource using the booking category selector.
Select the Override global settings or Override [location or resource] tick box under the Advanced booking rules section.
Check if any of the tick boxes are greyed out. If they are, this means that these settings are inherited from a higher level in your resource hierarchy. You may have them switched on at that level for a reason.
The Allow everyone to book in advance without limit tick box will be automatically selected.
If you want apply group rules, follow steps 12 to 16. If you don’t, skip to step 19.
Select the
Add group rule button. The Allow [group] to book in advance without limit and the Then allow everyone else to book up to X days, weeks, or months tick boxes will be automatically selected.
Select the Group drop-down list and select the group you want from the list to have the highest priority.
If you want the group to book a specific period in advance, select the to book up to a specified period in advance tick box. A text box and drop-down list will appear.
Enter the number of days, weeks, or months in to the text box you want.
Select the drop-down list and select either:
days
weeks
months
If you want to add more group rules, repeat steps 12 to 16.
If you want to remove a group rule, select the
Remove group rule button next to that group rule.Select either Allow everyone:
to book in advance without limit tick box (option not available if a group rule has been added).
to book up to a specific period in advance tick box.
to only view bookings and availability tick box.
If you select the Allow everyone to book up to a specific period in advance tick box, a text box and a drop-down list will appear.
Enter the number of days, weeks, or months you want into the text box.
Select the drop-down list and select either:
days
weeks
months
If you select Allow everyone to only view bookings and availability tick box, standard users won’t be able to book these resources, but will be able to see if and when they are available.
If you want to release your resources at a specific time of day, select the Set a time each day when the advance booking window opens tick box. The furthest out booking can only be made after [Time] text box will appear.
Enter the time in the Time text box.
If you want resources to booked a specific period in advance and no later, select the Set a minimum lead time for bookings tick box. The Bookings must be made by at least X hours or days before text box will appear.
Enter the number of days or hours you want bookings to be made in advance.
Select the drop-down list and select either:
hours
days
If you want your resources to be booked only once per day, select the Allow each [resource] to be booked only once per day tick box.
If you want to allow a single booking (and not a repeated booking) to be spread over multiple days, select the Allow multi-day bookings tick box.
Go to the bottom of the pop-up.
Select Save. The pop-up will close.
Select Save Changes.
Notes:
Use the booking category selector to select your resource type before editing these settings.
Settings from a location or resource that’s higher in your hierarchy will be inherited by locations and resources below it. These settings will appear greyed out in the locations or resources lower in the hierarchy. If they are, this means that these settings are inherited from a higher level in your resource hierarchy. You may have them switched on at that level for a reason.
Changing the settings described above may affect other features you have for your organisation.
Restrict access to and Advanced booking rules
If Restrict access to in the Availability tab has been set up for a location or resource, only groups and users that exist within the Restrict access to groups will be considered when using the advanced booking rules. For example:
An advanced group, named Access to Ground Floor resources, has been set up to include the Directors and Facilities Manager user groups.
The Restrict access to setting for the Ground Floor has been set to the Access to Ground Floor resources advanced group. This setting is inherited down the Locations and Resources hierarchy so any resources on the Ground Floor will also have this setting applied. Only users from this advanced group as well as all Location Managers, Location Administrators, and Administrators have access to any Ground Floor resources.
The following advanced booking rules in the Settings tab have been added:
Directors user group can book up to 10 days in advance.
Facilities Manager user group can book up to 5 days in advance.
Human Resources user group can book up to 3 days in advance.
Then allow everyone else in group Access to Ground Floor resources to book up to 1 day in advance.
The advanced booking rules for the Directors and Facilities Manager user groups apply because both groups are in the Access to Ground Floor resources advanced group. It’s the only advanced group that has access to and can book any Ground Floor resources because of the Restrict access to setting.
The advanced booking rule for the Human Resources user group is ignored because that group isn’t in the Access to Ground Floor resources advanced group. Users in the Human Resources user group can’t book any Ground Floor resources because the Restrict access to the Access to Ground Floor resources advanced group setting.
Note: this is also applies if the Restrict access to setting is set to any of your user or domain groups.
Groups and Advanced booking rules
If you set up 2 advanced booking rules and a user’s in both groups for those rules, the user will get the higher priority ruling. For example:
A user is in both the Directors and Facilities Manager groups. Advanced booking rules have been set up:
The Directors group can book up to 10 days in advance.
The Facilities Manager group can book up to 3 days in advance.
The user can book up to 10 days in advance, and not 3, because they are in the Directors group.