Calendar

The Calendar can be maintained in the Calendar window in the "Rental Rates & Pricing" parameters on the Operations tab of the Configure System Settings.
An operator must be assigned a Security Role that allows permission to the Operations - Calendar in order to access this table.

Prior to setting up a new calendar in the software, for rate structure and billing calculations, decide on the hours in a day, and how many days are billable in your week.

Define the Number of Hours in a Day:

It is recommended that the number of hours in a day always be set to 24, to simplify rate calculations.
Other configurations are possible, but 24 hours per day has proven to work consistently.
If your firm prefers another configuration, check with Texada Support before implementing it to confirm that this setup will yield the desired results.

Note: If a Daily Rate Expiry Time is utilized as set in the Divisional Rate Parameters, the hours on the "out" day of the contract may appear to be shorten in the calculation for short term contracts instead of reflecting the 24 hour day.

Define the Number of Days in a Week:

Setting the number of billable days per week has several alternatives, due to the differences in charging for rentals over the weekend.
To determine the correct number of days in a week, ask this question:

If equipment went out Thursday at 8 am and was returned Monday at 8 am, how many days should be charged?

                Thursday 8 AM to Monday 8 AM = 4 days    Use  7 Days per Week
                Thursday 8 AM to Monday 8 AM = 3 days    Use  6 Days per Week
                Thursday 8 AM to Monday 8 AM = 2 days    Use  5 Days per Week
        

• Seven Days per Week:
  Select seven days a week if your firm is open seven days.

  To not charge selected customers (such as contractors) for Saturday and/or Sunday, set the No Charge Weekend flag in the Billing Information of the "Additional Information" screen in Customer Information to the desired setting.

  Seven days per week is recommended, even if your firm is only open five or six days, as intuitively people think of a week as having seven days.
  To compensate for the days in the week that your firm doesn't bill, use the No Charge Weekend feature in the Customer Information file. Any weekend rentals (i.e., Out Saturday, in Monday morning) can still be handled using the special rate WEEKEND RATE.

• Six Days per Week
  Six days can be used, if your firm is open six days. If your firm charges for Sunday as part of your Weekend rate, accomplish this by using a special rate called WEEKEND RATE.

  To prevent charging selected customers (such as contractors) for Saturday, set the No Charge Weekend flag in the Billing Information of the "Additional Information" screen in Customer Information to the desired setting.

• Five Days per Week
  Select five days if your firm is open five days. If your firm charges for Saturday and/or Sunday as part of your Weekend rate, this can be accomplished using a special rate called WEEKEND RATE.

  If your firm typically charges only 5 days a week for most items, but charges every day for certain items such as scaffolding or barricades and flashers, setup the software to reflect 5 days a week. A feature in the Product Class later can be used to compensate for the special items which bill 7 days a week, even though the calendar is set to 5 days a week.

Calendar Setup:
Once the number of hours in a day, and the number of days in a week have been determined, proceed with generating the calendar as follows:

CHARGEABLE HOURS:

Enter the number of chargeable hours for each day of the week.

The recommended calendar format has 24 hours per day, and 7 days per week. However, an alternative setup can be used, if required.

Note: Once the Hours in each day are defined and accepted, the hours cannot be changed, as the rate structures are based on these values.
Contact Texada Support if changes are required.

OPENING TIME

Enter the time of the day when your firm opens.
The system will start charging at the Opening Time each day, and will stop charging for that day when the chargeable hours limit has been reached.

Note: If business is being conducted on a 24 hour basis (Rentals/Sales could be processed at any time of the day) the Company Opening Time should be left at Midnight (00:00:00) as a different opening time could impact rate calculations.

SUMMARY

These numbers will be calculated automatically based on the Chargeable Hours.

MINUTES GRACE

• PER DAY, WEEK, and MONTH
  Leave each of these three Minutes Grace fields blank, if your firm does NOT allow any grace period when the customer brings back the equipment late.

  Otherwise, type in the number of minutes grace to be allowed for each of the three rate levels. During Rental Return the minutes grace used depends on the rate selected.
  i.e. Daily Rate allows minutes PER DAY, Weekly Rate allows minutes PER WEEK, and Monthly Rate allows minutes PER MONTH.

• PER PERIOD
  This Overtime grace Per Period is based on Contract DATE DUE.
  Leave this field blank if your firm does NOT allow any grace period if the customer brings back the equipment late.

  Otherwise, type in the number of minutes grace allowed.
  Overtime Grace applies only when the equipment is returned in Rental Return on the original Date Due but after the Time Due, and the number of minutes late is less than or equal to the grace allowed PER PERIOD, then the extra minutes are not billed.

• PER DAY/WEEK/MONTH and PER PERIOD
  If Both grace periods are used, the Overtime Grace Period is checked first to reduce the total hours, then the rate is selected and the second grace is applied.

Note: Changing a grace period on a future calendar will also affect current grace periods.

DEFAULT BILLING METHOD

Select one of the following:

• Click 28 Days if your firm normally bills every 4 weeks (13 even billing periods a year), as outlined in The 28 Day Billing Cycle.
• Click Monthly if your firm prefers to bill by calendar month (12 times a year), as outlined in The Monthly Billing Cycle.

Note: If your firm uses a combination of 28 day and monthly billing periods, set this Default Billing Method to 28 Days and activate the Respect Customer Cycle Bill Interval option in the Company Billing Parameters so that individual customers can be flagged to bill Monthly in Customer Billing Settings.

Finished?

Click ACCEPT if changes are only being made to the Opening Time or Minutes Grace.
This will prevent the calendar from being re-created.

ACTIONS:
Additional actions provided by buttons on the Calendar screen include:

• Generating the Calendar:
  Click the GENERATE button to generate the calendar days with billing day codes, as follows:

  DEFAULT BILLING DAY CODES

  Check this box if your firm does either regular Monthly or 28 Day billings.
  The correct cycle billing day code for each day will be assigned from this calendar automatically to the contract at document entry in preparation for the Cycle Billing run.

  Uncheck this box if your firm does not do regular Monthly or 28 Day billings.

  
  STARTING DATE

  This date defaults to the first date for which there is no existing calendar.

  It can be over-typed as required.

  Calendar Warning Window:

  This warning only appears if there already is a calendar generated for this starting date.
  Click NO to abort.
  Click YES to proceed. The starting Billing Day Code will then default to match the billing day code already existing in the calendar.

  
  ENDING DATE

  The year end displays. This can be over-typed into the future, as required.

  
  STARTING BILLING DAY CODE

  • Monthly Billing:
    If your firm uses Monthly Billing, this field is skipped as the Starting Billing Day Code will always match the day of the month for the Starting Date.
  • 28 Day Billing:
    If this is a new company and a calendar has never been generated before, type 1 to begin at Cycle Billing Day code 1.
    If a calendar already exists and needs to be extended, (i.e. when generating a calendar for the next Year), the Starting Billing Day Code defaults automatically to the correct sequential Billing Day Code, even allowing for missing days.
    This can be confirmed by viewing the previous year in Review Calendar.

    When generating a calendar to correct or replace an existing calendar, the Billing Day Code defaults to match the billing day code already existing in the calendar.

    Optionally, an M for Monthly can be entered instead of a Billing Day number, to assign the character M to each calendar day in the date range.
    This code is useful if your firm bills to a common date at the end of each month.

• View an Existing Calendar:
  Click the VIEW button if the calendar exists, to review the calendar and change billable hours as outlined in Review Calendar.
  • Changing an Existing Calendar:
    Since the rental rate structure is specifically designed to fit the current calendar, the calendar should not be changed without also changing the following:

    Company Default Rates
    Product Classes - default rates for each product class
    Rental Inventory - rental rates on each item
    Contracts - any open contracts

    Before proceeding, contact Texada Support if these changes are required. Custom programs can be written to convert existing data to suit a new calendar. Texada Support can assist in determining the most suitable rate structure, to replace your existing one.

  • Delete Old Calendars:
    Unless all contracts from an old year have been closed, do NOT delete old calendar records from Review Calendar. The old calendars will be needed for billing the old contracts.

Finished ?

Click the ACCEPT button to generate the calendar or click CANCEL to abort.