Rentals - Creating a Booking
This article explains how to manually create a booking in Rentals. It walks through every field in the Create Booking form, how to add listings, customers, and payments, and highlights special cases where in-app bookings override normal business or listing rules. You can also learn how to attach an optional customer intake form while creating a Rental booking.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Overview of Creating a Booking
- Key Benefits of Creating a Booking
- How to Create a New Booking?
- Sections of the Create Booking Form
- Customer Details
- Attach a Form to a Rental Booking
- Listings Section
- Internal Notes
- Payment Summary
- Set Booking Status
- Save and Confirm
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Related Articles
Overview of Creating a Booking
The Create Booking flow allows admins to manually create bookings for customers directly from the Appointments or Calendar view. Admin-created bookings provide complete flexibility—enabling bookings outside configured business or listing constraints.
This means you can:
- Create bookings outside business operating hours.
- Set any start and end time, even if the time selector is disabled.
- Create bookings for any duration, regardless of fixed durations defined on listings.
- Bypass minimum and maximum booking durations, minimum scheduling notice, and maximum advance window.
- Still respect pre-buffer and post-buffer time slots when checking availability.
Example: If a listing's default rental time is 9 AM–11 PM and the time selector is disabled, you can still create a booking from 7 AM–1 PM. Similarly, if fixed durations are 4 hours or 1 day, you can still book it for 2 hours or 2 days manually.
This gives admins flexibility for exceptions while maintaining operational safety.
Key Benefits of Creating a Booking
Manually creating rental bookings helps your team accommodate special scheduling requests, manage availability, and capture the information needed to complete a reservation.
- Speed to Schedule: Create directly from Appointments or Calendar to handle requests quickly.
- Flexible: Admins can set custom start/end times even when listings use fixed durations or disabled time selectors.
- Protection Against Conflicts: Buffers and inventory are always enforced to prevent overbooking.
- Accurate Pricing & Deposits: Payment Summary reflects configured pricing rules and any security deposit so totals are clear before saving.
- Multi-Listing Support: Add multiple listings—each with its own times and quantities—in a single booking to streamline complex orders.
- Immediate Team Visibility: Saved bookings appear right away in Appointments and Calendar for operational coordination.
- Optional Intake Forms: Attach an available form during booking creation to collect customer details alongside the reservation.
How to Create a New Booking?
There are two ways to open the New Booking screen. Use the Appointments View to work from the rental booking list, or Calendar View to create a booking from the calendar.
Option 1 — From the Appointments View
- Navigate to Calendars → Appointment List View.
- Select Rentals from the dropdown.
- Click + Create Booking in the top-right corner.
- The New Booking screen will open.
Option 2 — From the Calendar View
- Go to Calendars → Calendar View.
- Select Rentals from the dropdown.
- Click + New in the top-right corner of the calendar.
- The New Booking screen will appear.
Sections of the Create Booking Form
The New Booking form groups customer information, rental items, optional intake responses, notes, and payment details so you can review the reservation before saving it.
The booking form includes the following sections:
- Customer Details
- Booking form (optional)
- Listings
- Internal Note
- Payment Summary
- Set Booking Status
Each section is detailed below.
Tip: If you need to take a listing off the calendar (for example, maintenance or internal use), create a Blocked slot event. Blocked slots reduce availability like a booking, but they are not tied to a customer booking or order. Learn more: Blocked Slots for Rental Listings.
Customer Details
Enter or select the customer making the booking. Correct contact information helps ensure confirmations and reminders reach the intended person and can prefill supported fields in an attached booking form.
Fields:
- Select Contact:Search existing contacts or create a new one.
- If no record exists, click Add New Contact to create one instantly.
- If no record exists, click Add New Contact to create one instantly.
- Phone & Email: Automatically fetched from the selected contact.
Tip: Always confirm contact details to ensure reminders and payment confirmations reach the right person.
Attach a Form to a Rental Booking
When manually creating a Rental booking, you can attach an optional intake form to collect customer information without directing the customer to a separate booking page. The configured form is preselected, and supported contact details—including first name, last name, email, and phone—are filled from the selected contact.
- Open Calendars → Appointment List View, select Rentals, and click + Create Booking to open New Booking. You can also start from Rentals in Calendar View.
- Under Customer details, select the contact for the reservation.
- In the Booking form section, click Attach form.
- Review the preselected form or choose another available form from the Booking form dropdown.
- Review the prefilled customer details and complete the remaining applicable fields on the customer's behalf.
- Click Attach form at the bottom of the form window.
- Confirm that the selected form appears in the Booking form section, then complete the listing, status, and other booking details before saving.
Important: Form attachment is optional and is only available during booking creation. You cannot add a form to an existing booking or edit its submitted form afterward. CAPTCHA, product-selling, and payment elements do not appear inside the embedded form; separate payment or product controls on the main booking screen are unaffected.
Listings Section
Select the listing or listings being booked and specify the quantity, timing, and applicable options. These details determine availability and contribute to the rental total.
Steps to Add a Listing
- Choose the Listing Name from the dropdown.
- Select a Variant (if applicable).
- Enter the Quantity—the number of units being booked.
- Define Start and End Date/Time.
- The time picker appears even if the listing's time selector is disabled.
- You can choose custom times and durations beyond fixed durations or rental hours.
- When updating or adding new listings to the booking, inventory must be available for the selected duration.
- The Duration auto-calculates based on your selection but can be manually adjusted.
- The time picker appears even if the listing's time selector is disabled.
- The Listing Total updates automatically with pricing rules and discounts.
- The Security Deposit updates automatically if applicable.
Important: Manual bookings ignore minimum/maximum durations, scheduling notice, and booking windows, but respect buffer times so existing reservations aren't overlapped.
Adding Multiple Listings
Multiple listings can be combined in one rental booking while retaining separate schedules and quantities for each item.
- Click + Add Listing again to include multiple items in a single booking.
- Each listing can have unique start/end times and quantities.
- The combined total updates in the final Payment Summary.
Internal Notes
Use the Internal Notes section to record operational details that help your team handle the reservation.
- Add Internal Note: Add instructions, customer requests, or internal reminders.
Payment Summary
The Payment Summary consolidates listing charges and any applicable security deposits so you can review what is owed before saving the booking. For related setup, see Configuring Pricing & Discounts.
Displayed Fields:
- Rental Subtotal: The combined value of all listings.
- Security Deposit: Total security deposit applicable for the booking. Depending on the deposit mode, this may be collected upfront or charged later for damages or violations of terms when a card is on file.
- Total Amount: Final amount to be collected, including any security deposits and other applicable charges when due upfront.
- Due Today: Remaining amount to be collected.
Note: When the security deposit is set to Card on File, the Total Amount in the Payment Summary excludes that deposit. It can be collected later and is not due until explicitly charged.
Set Booking Status
Choose the initial booking status to indicate whether the rental is tentative or confirmed before saving it.
- Unconfirmed: The booking is recorded but not yet confirmed; useful for tentative rentals.
- Booked: The booking is confirmed immediately.
This flexibility helps admins manage provisional holds or manually confirmed bookings.
Save and Confirm
Review the customer, attached form (if used), listings, and booking status before submitting the reservation. Saving the booking makes it available in the Appointments List View.
- Review customer and listing details, and confirm that any completed form appears in the Booking form section.
- Click Create booking to finish the booking.
- The booking appears in the Appointments List View.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Can I create a booking without taking payment right now?
Yes. Save without payment, then open Edit Booking later to collect the full balance or deposit.
Q: Why isn't the deposit appearing in Payment Summary?
Check Global Settings to ensure deposits are enabled and that the variant's deposit isn't set to $0.
Q: What happens if my time overlaps a buffer or inventory isn't available?
You'll see an error or disabled save. Adjust times to respect buffers or reduce the booking to available inventory.
Q: How are multi-listing bookings priced and shown?
Each listing becomes a separate row with its own pricing and payment state; the booking may show Partially Paid until all rows are paid.
Q: Is an intake form required for a manually created Rental booking?
No. Form attachment is optional, and you can create a booking without one.
Q: Can I add or change the attached form after creating a Rental booking?
No. Attach and complete the form during booking creation. You cannot add a form to an existing booking or edit its submitted form afterward.