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Shuttle Bus Business Overview

Shuttle buses run between

  1. Destinations (eg airport / seaport)

  2. Addresses

    1. The price of the fare depends on the area of the Address

    2. The address may be selected from a list (for example a list of hotels)

Broadly there are two types of shuttle runs

  1. Ad-Hoc - built as bookings are received - common with:

    1. Areas with sporadic bookings

    2. Private addresses

  2. Route - scheduled runs

    1. Some stops are made even if no booking exists

    2. Strict schedule adherence

    3. Bookings can auto-attach easily

Definitions

  1. States of Operation - a shuttle run will normally only travel in a single state

  2. Destinations Serviced - eg airport with address and terminals

    1. Hubs are a grouping of destinations

  3. Areas serviced for the destinations

    1. ie Areas that do have a travel time to the destination chosen are not serviced

  4. Services offered

    1. normally a default service and an alternate service eg( Shuttle or Private Vehicle)

  5. Customer Online booking and Payment

  6. Planning Bus Runs

  7. Drivers Portal marking onboard / missed

  8. Delegations

    1. to others (A need to Pay others)

    2. from others (A need to Collect payment from others)

Customer online Booking and Payment

  1. Customers are individuals making bookings using an online website after authentication

    1. Referring organisations may provide a LOGO image to display to referred customers

  2. The booking screen may be a single page - or setup as a stepped wizard

  3. The customer may make a return booking and pay for it all at the same time

  4. The payment is online and the booking if not paid is not retained by the system

Online Booking Portal

URL extensions

&cardNo=xxxxxx

  • Finds the image from that Company or it’s parent card

  • Finds if the Company has an “Installation Option” to be captured by travellers (eg Student No.)

    • If it does then the anonymous booking is not allowed.

&bookingEntity=xxxxxx

  • Sets the Booking Entity on the booking

    • Booking entity inherits rules from the debtor (eg to hide or limit options)

    • Booking entity can trigger a promotion

The fields can be arranged in any order or as a simpler stepped wizard easily

Phone number is setup on the host company > Contact Types > Key = CUSTOMERHOTLINE

The customer will then receive a booking confirmation email with an attached invoice

If the customer logs in again and has an existing booking they will see it at the top of the screen - see the green line

The booking will then be ready for adding to a Bus Run

Booking confirmation email template

  • Email Template for the booking confirmation

    • Usage context = Booking

    • System Usage = Order/Booking Payment Receipt

    • Recipients Role = Customer

Booking Time calculations

Bookings use the following logic to calculate times

  1. The destination must be on the booking

  2. The address must be on the booking with a suburb/postcode

  3. The date must be entered

  4. A time is required

    1. Flight or ship time

Email Templates to use merge fields [PickupTimeSafe] and [DropoffTimeSafe] for shuttle bookings

Booking changes

The customer has not been allowed to make changes to their bookings - they will need to make a phone call.

If a booking has already been paid for it cannot be changed

  1. it can be cancelled and a replacement booking entered

Bus Runs that are a number of Routes

Bus runs have Legs and each Leg can be a route

Bookings will attach to routes based on time

Bus runs that are Ad-hoc

Bus Runs have Legs and each leg is TO or FROM a destination (or group of destinations where they are linked using a TAG).

Ad-hoc runs do not pickup and drop off at the same time.

Ad-hoc bus runs are common where there is not sufficient volume to have regular cycles. This is very common in the Shuttle Bus industry.

Planning Ad-Hoc Bus Runs

Ad-Hoc runs do not follow a schedule and bookings are commonly manually planned.

The Bus Shift is made up of Runs - TO or FROM destinations.

  1. Bookings can only be appended to legs that support the booking direction and destination

  2. Bus Shifts are offered with a right click on the booking

    1. The logic for finding viable Runs within a Bus Shift
      a) the Run is a matching booking type (inbound vs outbound) from the destination
      b) the Run has bookings attached
      c) the bookings pick up time <= the Run latest drop off time
      d) the bookings drop off time >= the Run earliest pick up
      e) the booking pick up time falls within the earliest pick up to latest drop off duration OR the booking drop off time falls within the earliest pick up to latest drop off duration

    2. if a Run is deemed viable but either the pick up OR drop off time is outside the earliest pick up to latest drop off duration, then highlight this fact to the user but still allow for the booking to be added to the Run

    3. do not allow a booking of incompatible booking type to be added to a Run

A view of the day and bookings shows

  1. Planned Bus runs (a combination of a driver and a vehicle with a from and to time on a date)

  2. Bus Run Legs

    1. Ad-Hoc runs = a group of bookings in a direction to or from a destination

      1. Eg a group of bookings to the airport will be a leg

      2. At the end of the leg the driver will indicate starting the next leg

      3. The following bookings from the airport will be the next leg

    2. Route runs = a route from start to finish

      1. Eg a route may start at a destination (eg the airport) full of people - expecting to later end at a destination (eg the airport) full of people.

      2. Travel around a series of stops

      3. Drop off and pickup during the route

  3. Allocated bookings (bookings already assigned to a Run Leg)

  4. UnAllocated bookings (bookings that need to be assigned to a run

    1. Bookings can be assigned or moved runs anytime

The Drivers Day

The driver uses the drivers portal to:

  1. View their runs today and in the future

  2. Confirm they have done a vehicle check

  3. Start their run

  4. Be shown the next address to go to

  5. Mark passengers on-board / missed / or end of leg

  6. Back to 4 until day is finished

Payment of Referrals

What is a referrer ? A referrer is a company that

  1. Provides a booking to you

  2. Does not pay for that booking

  3. May expect to get some payment for providing the booking (ie Creditor)

A Referrer is captured on the booking - the referrer is to be paid the % entered on the Supplier Card

  1. Changes to the % requires Secure Features

  2. Changes to the rating require Secure Features

End to End flow of a shuttle booking

The system include full financials (GL/AP/AR etc)

Pricing logic

Each customer may use a different pricing logic - below is an example

The price matrix is per seat with a price per seat above the matrix being optional

Where a price cannot be calculated

Where a price cannot be calculated > “manual pricing” will tick on.

  1. The customer portal will save the booking and not allow online payment
    a) changes the "Pay Now" button to read "Create Booking"
    b) saves the booking but do not prompt for payment
    c) show the "Thank You" dialogue with customised text to indicate that the customer will be contacted regarding pricing

The customer will need to be contacted and a price entered manually by the back office

Create and Modify Delegate Invoices

Any organisation can have be an inbound or outbound delegations on a booking.

An inbound delegate is a company that:

  1. Pays you (ie a Debtor)

  2. Either

    1. Has a booking from a customer they cannot service - so are passing it on

    2. Are an organisation that pays for people to travel. An example is a company that allows it’s users to make bookings that they later pay for.

  3. inbound delegates can be added to the booking manually or based on a parameter being passed into the portal

  4. Some pay full price, some pay a reduced amount.

    1. The % reduction to be paid by a delegate is held in the Debtor > Commission % field. If they pay full price this should be zero.

      1. Updating this requires Secure Features and Secure Features

An outbound delegate is a company that :

  1. carries a booking for you that you cannot carry

  2. Gets paid by you (ie are a creditor)

  3. May be paid less than the booking amount. The % reduction to be paid to a delegate is held on the Creditor > Commission % field.

    1. Updating this requires Secure Features

Use the Edit - Delete option to delete a Delegate Invoice

Enter the To Date for Inbound Delegate Invoices - List Bookings and Create Invoice

Open the Journal Created

Change the Journal Date and Due Date (back to end of month)

Print the Delegate Invoice

Student Bookings for University

Student Login

Create Booking

Create Booking No Payment (University is charged)

Inbound Delegate Invoicing

List bookings and Create Invoice

Print Invoice

Cruise Bookings

Create Booking

From Airport to Cruise

From Cruise to Airport

From/To White Bay

From/To Overseas Passenger Terminal

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For information about SaaSplications go to http://saasplications.com.au