Trips bring all the pieces of Groupdesk together. Trips allow you to add Contacts and Organizers, add Inventory specific to the trip itinerary, and send emails to Bookings and Contacts. This is also where the payment schedule (including balance date) is determined for each individual group.
Click [+] (top right corner)
Required to enter Name / Status* / Brand
Once status is determined you will also have to enter additional fields that are mandatory depending on the status of the trip.
Name: What you want your trip to be called (Ex. GENERIC-TRIP-2020-YEG-TO-HAWAII)
Status: the status of the trip (active, presale, limited, waitlist etc.)
Brand: The brand catalog that the trip is sold under
Year: The year in which the trip will occur
Program Period: When the trip occurs (March Break, New Years Eve, Spring Break, Custom etc.)
Type: the type of trip (Grad Trip, Spring Break, Festivals & events, custom etc.)
Launch Date: the date of the trip sales launch (first day to sell the trip)
Deposit Deadline: the day that deposits are due for the trip
Travel Week: which week your group travels (Ex. Your company runs 3 weeks of spring break and this trip travels on the second week. It would be travel week 2.)
Departure Date: the date the trip departs
Require Payment In Full – Enabled requires bookings to pay in full at the time of deposit. Will also hide some Payment Schedule info below if enabled.
Payment Period Count: How often you want payment period unit to occur (ex. 1 = once every month, 2 = once every 2 months)
Payment Period Unit: How often you want your periodic payments to occur (Yearly, monthly, weekly, daily)
Deposit Amount: numeric value of the initial deposit that will be required when first booking the trip
Periodic Amount: Numeric value of the periodic payments (ex $100)
Balance Date: The date that final outstanding balances are due (recommended to be 60-90 days prior to travel, but depends on individual business practices).
Currency: currency of the trip (this information pulls from the Brand Record selected for the Trip)
List Price = The lowest selling price per traveller on the trip
Total Available Traveler Spots = Maximum number of bookings/spots available to sell on this trip
Passport Required – if passports are required for this trip
Allow Passport Changes – select if you want passengers to be able to manually update their passport details on their profiles (This only shows if Passport Required is selected)
Automatic Status Changes – allow Groupdesk to automatically update booking statuses based on their payments and schedules (recommended)
Allow Rooming Changes – If selected, passengers will be able to submit their rooming requests through My Profile.
Enable Offline Pay – Enables travellers to pay with cash or cheque
Card Required – Travellers are required to enter a valid credit card to make a booking, even if no payment is necessary
Account: The account associated to the trip (Ex. Local High School, Fraternity/Sorority, Church Group)
Gateway: travel gateway where trip departs (Airport, Ferry Station, Bus Depot etc)
Destination: final travel destination, where the trip will take place
Hotel: The hotel where the trip will take place
Campaign: which sales campaign the trip is a part of
Use Trip Status to control Bookings. Bookings cannot sign up on a trip in Opportunity / Ready to Convert / Closed / Cancelled status.
Are you looking for ‘How to Build a Trip?’ Click Here!
FIELD
MANDATORY ON THIS STATUS
Name
Always Mandatory
Status
Brand
Year
Active, Limited, Presale, Stopsale, Waitlist
Program Period
Type
Launch Date
Ready to Convert
Deposit Deadline
Active, Limited, Presale, Ready to Convert, Stopsale, Waitlist
Travel Week
Departure Date
Payment Period Count
Payment Period Unit
Deposit Amount
Periodic Amount
Balance Date
Currency
Determined by Brand, Active, Limited, Presale, Stopsale, Waitlist
List Price
Total Available Traveler Spots
Account
Active, Limited, Opportunity, Presale, Ready to Convert, Stopsale, Waitlist
Gateway
Destination
Hotel
Campaign
** Cancelled, Closed, and Completed do not require any information other than the mandatory Name, Status, and Brand.
Travel week helps define the time of travel if there is a long program period with many trips. Assigning a travel week is helpful to operations/on-site teams and/or if you need to sort search results by week.
ie: Your week-long summer camp runs for 7 weeks. Trips with start dates in the third week would have “Travel Week: 3”.
You can change your Trip Status depending on
Opportunity = traveler cannot yet book, trip not visible on the Trip Page
Ready to Convert = ready to change ‘generic’ or ‘placeholder’ inventory to real inventory
Presale = travelers can pay deposit
Active = open for all to book
Limited = only a few spots left
Closed = travelers can no longer book, but still visible on Trip Page
Waitlist = travelers can book and be added to the waitlist if more space opens up
Completed = this trip is in the past
Stopsale = travelers can see the trip but cannot book (sold out)
Cancelled = this trip is no longer happening
Updating a Trip status to Cancelled will stop all future payments on existing bookings
Part 1:
Create a contact
Part 2:
Open the Trip Record
With the Contacts module open, click Add in the module header
Search for the contact you’ve already created
Can search by name or email
Add Lead from the Association drop-down
Click Add
You can also add the Organizer association when editing a contact already associated to the trip.
Add Organizer from the Association drop-down
Make sure your contact is set to Type Trip Planner.
With the Trip Planners module open, click Add in the module header
Search for your contact by name
The Trip Planner’s Contact Record user photo will display on the Trip Page.
Are you looking for How to Build an Inventory? Click here.
Scroll down and open the Inventory module
Click Add in the Inventory module header, with the module open
Search for the inventory you already created by name
If your browser window is very small, the Add button may be within a … button.
Now your inventory has been added onto a Trip! You will see details from your inventory populate into the Segments module. You will see pricing populate in to the Pricing module and the Pricing Matrix for the trip. Optional inventory pricing will populate in the Optional section under the Pricing Matrix within the Pricing module.
Follow steps 1-4 from above and then click the Inventory + button in the right bottom corner
This will open up another inventory search bar where you can select another inventory to add
Click the Inventory + button for each additional Inventory you wish to add
If you are adding an Inventory to your trip that does not have the Mandatory status you want for this particular trip, you can override it on a trip-by-trip basis.
To do this:
Select the inventory that you want to update
Click Override Mandatory
Choose Optional or Mandatory
Click Update
You can add an inventory to multiple trips at once by:
Using Search to find the Trip Records you are hoping to update
On the search results page, select the Trip Records you want to update
Click Edit Relationships in the top right above the search results
In the Edit Relationship(s) Modal Window, select Add
Choose the relationship type Inventory and search for the inventory you wish to add
Click Append
Click Add Relationships
Make sure to click Append as Overwrite will remove all other inventories from the selected trips.
Inventories can be added and removed from bookings from the Trip Record level. Please see the steps below for more details.
On the Trip Record, Open the Inventory and Bookings Modules.
In the Inventory Module, select the inventory you wish to add to the Booking
In the Bookings Module, select the Booking you want the Inventory to be added to
On the header for the Inventory Module, Select the + button on the top right corner
+
This will add the Inventory to the selected Booking(s)
In the Inventory Module, select the inventory you wish to remove from the Booking
In the Bookings Module, select the Booking(s) you want to remove the Inventory from
On the header for the Inventory Module, Select the – button on the top right corner
This will remove the Inventory from the selected Booking(s)
Once you have pricing on Trips, you can add Discounts or Fees to customize the price for specific trips and bookings. If you would like to add an EBB (Early booking bonus/discount) (which will apply to all bookings when they sign up), click Edit and fill in the information for a Discount.
Open Trip record
Scroll to the Pricing module
Click Edit
Add the following fields:
Category – Discount or Fee
Description – Description of category
Type – Amount or Percentage
Amount – Amount of Discount or Fee
Expiration Date – choose a date for Groupdesk to automatically remove the Discount or Fee from the Trip at midnight of the expiration date.
If you would like to add multiple discounts / fees to one trip, just add another Line Item + and fill in the appropriate information.
Once you have added the discount or fee to the trip record, it will display at the top of the Pricing module, under the Discount and Fees heading.
Always add the value as a positive number (not a negative). The type of ‘discount’ or a ‘fee’ is what determines if it adds or subtracts from the booking.
If you want to add/edit a Trip Record discount and/or fee after you have bookings on the trip, you can choose to apply these discounts or fees to only new bookings, or any/all existing bookings.
To add/edit a discount or fee, follow the steps above.
To push the discount and fee to specific bookings:
Open the Trip Record and scroll to the Bookings Module
Using the checkboxes on the left-hand side of the Bookings Module, select the booking you want to edit to add/change to your new bookings and fees
At the top of the Bookings Module, click the Push Discounts and Fees button
We recommend spot checking a booking or two to confirm the discount and/or fee was applied
When applying the discount to existing bookings, the amount gets taken off of the total amount the booking owes, on the balance payment, not on the ‘next’ upcoming payment.
Payment schedules are one of Groupdesk’s most powerful tools. Here are some things to know about choosing the type of payment schedule you want to set up for your trip.
It’s faster and easier to use a Periodic payment schedule. We suggest that all clients use this type of payment schedule.
Important Information:
Deposit date must be after launch date, and balance date must be after deposit date.
The deposit deadline and balance date must both be in the future (from when you create the trip) or your payments will not work correctly.
If you are opening a trip to Pre-Sale, you only need the deposit amount and the final balance date.
The total amount of the payments on a payment schedule must be less than the total trip cost. When the amount of scheduled payments is more than the trip cost, it causes display issues on the booking record’s profile and payment schedule. For information on how to fix this issue please click here.
Both of these payment schedules look similar, but the behavior of the payment schedule per booking will change.
|
Date
PERIODIC
CUSTOM
Total Trip Cost
–
$1300
$200
Payment Date 1
March X
$150
March 01
Payment Date 2
April X
April 01
Payment Date 3
May X
May 15
Payment Date 4
June X
June 15
Payment Date 5
July X
July 15
Payment Date 6
August X
Payment Date 7
September X
Final Balance
Oct 01
$50
$350
X = The Day of the month that your traveler signed up for the trip
If a traveler (Simon) signs up on May 14th
For Periodic: Simon pays their deposit, skips over all previous payments, their “X” date will be the 14th, and they will pay each Periodic Payment on the 14th until their trip is paid off (Periodic payments populate on the booking until the final balance amount is covered) or they reach their Final Balance date when their remaining balance will be charged.
For Custom: Simon pays their deposit, skips over all previous payments, their payment dates remain rigid to this custom payment schedule , so their next payment will be May 15th. They will continue to owe payments for each Payment date until the gap between July 15 and Oct 01. If there are no custom payments set up during a specific time period, our payment scheduler is unable to catch your traveler up on the payments with a Custom payment schedule. During this gap, the traveler will not have any payments until they reach their Final Balance date.
PERIODIC PAYMENT SCHEDULE
CUSTOM PAYMENT SCHEDULE
PROS
Can change dynamically based on when a traveler signs up
More flexible for longer sign up periods
Periodic payments may be the same amount or customized amounts
Short and simple set up time
Can set the exact dates you want every trip to charge your travelers
Every payment can be a different amount
CONS
Longer set up time (process currently requires generating a schedule, removing unwanted payments and then adding custom payments.)
Individual bookings who sign up in the middle of the set payment schedule (ie: halfway through) will not have payments for time periods not explicitly entered in the trip schedule on the trip
The rigid schedule means that a traveler who signs up on X Date (May 14th), might have a Custom payment coming up less than 24 hours after they sign up (May 15th).
Can I edit an individual booking’s schedule for both kinds of payment schedules? Yes
Can I choose the Deposit and Final Balance date for both types of Payments schedules? Yes
Can I mix Periodic and Custom Payments? Yes
Can I set up a payment schedule by percentage rather than dollar amount? No
In the Overview module, click Edit
In the Edit Trip pop up, Add in the details below to the fields
Launch Date – Day you plan on selling the trip
Deposit Deadline – Day all deposits are due (Must be at least 1 day before the Balance Date)
Payment Period Count – How many times is the periodic amount being charged within the payment period unit
Payment Period Unit – Daily, weekly, monthly, yearly
Deposit Amount – Amount the traveler must put down to begin the booking and payment process
Periodic Amount – Amount of each periodic payment
Balance Date – Day all travelers must have completed all payments
Payments occur once every _Payment Period Count_ _Payment Period Unit_
Most of this information can also be reviewed and updated in the Payment Scheduler module. You can update the following fields there: Payment Period Count – How many times is the periodic amount being charged within the payment period unit Payment Period Unit – Daily, weekly, monthly, yearly Deposit Amount – Amount the traveler must put down to begin the booking and payment process Periodic Amount – Amount of each periodic payment Balance Date – Day all travelers must have completed all payments
Most of this information can also be reviewed and updated in the Payment Scheduler module. You can update the following fields there:
On the Trip Record
To review your schedule, scroll down to the Payments Scheduler module and click Edit
In the Update Scheduler pop up, review and update (if necessary) in the schedule details and click Update
Click Generate Schedule
Your new Payment Schedule will appear in Payments module (above the Payment Scheduler module)
Review and edit the payments (if necessary)
Only push your schedule once you are 100% satisfied with your generated schedule as you CANNOT make any changes once it has been pushed.
Make sure that you have reviewed your schedule fully
Once satisfied, press the Push Schedule button
A pop up will appear asking if you are sure (as this process can only be completed once), click OK
The Push Schedule button will become unavailable after it has been selected once
You can only push a trip schedule ONCE.
Periodic Payments cannot be generated within 16 days of the Final Balance Date. You can add a Custom Payment within 16 days.
You will still need to enter the following information, even though you will be creating a custom schedule later on:
When the total amount of the scheduled payments on a payment schedule is more than the total trip cost, it causes display issues on the booking record’s profile and payment schedule. The total of the scheduled payments MUST BE LOWER THAN THE TOTAL TRIP COST. For existing trips with this issue, please click here for info on how to solve this error.
Your Payment Schedule will appear in Payments module (above the Payment Scheduler module)
Remove any Periodic payments that you do not want included in your schedule by clicking remove on the right side of the module
To add Custom payments, click Add (in the top right of the Payments module)
Fill in the appropriate information:
Amount
Currency (determined for you by the brand associated to the Trip)
Scheduled At
Click Create
Repeat for all the payments you wish to add to your schedule
If you want a $3000 Spring Break Trip with bi-monthly payments (every other month) of $200 and a deposit of $150:
Payment Period Count: 2
Payment Period Unit: Month
Deposit Amount: 150
Periodic Amount: 200
If you want a $350 ski trip with weekly payments of $25 and a deposit of $10:
Payment Period Count: 1
Payment Period Unit: Week
Deposit Amount: 10
Periodic Amount: 25
If you want a $1000 camp trip with monthly payments of $200 and a deposit of $100:
Deposit Amount: 100
Automatic Status Updates happen when transactions are made to booking records based on the status of the payments on that booking. See here for the definitions of each status.
NEW JOINER
ACTIVE
OVERDUE
PENDING
DEFAULT
CANCELLED
COMPLETED
WAITLIST
UNCONFIRMED
NO SHOW
Bookings that are Organizers on the trip will not fall to Pending when they have missed more than 1 payment. They will stay in the Overdue status until manually changed
Trip Status directly affects how Automatic Status Updates function on Booking Records. Please see the charts below for how Booking Statuses update in relation to Trip Status. The term missed in the Legends below refers to missed payments and Org refers to Organizers.
Users can add a document to a trip and have it show up on all the bookings on that trip on My Profile. The document must be Document Type – Document, and Document Category – Other or Marketing.
Once the document has been added to the trip record, it will appear on the Travel Documents section of MyProfile under the Documents to Print module. Travelers can click on the document and the document will open in another window.
To reset a booking’s pricing from a Trip Record, please follow these steps:
Open the Trip record has the Booking that you wish to reset pricing for
Select Booking you wish to reset under the Bookings module and the Inventory that contains the pricing under the Inventory Module
Click Reset Pricing on the bookings module
Allow a few minutes for the pricing to take affect then check the Booking record for the updates