How to Use Proper Scheduling in a Rental Business

Rental businesses should have systematic scheduling in place to accomplish the following:

• Avoid-double bookings. If rental items are not scheduled and recorded on the central calendar, the same items will be booked for the same period, causing a conflict between a business and a customer. 

• To track rental periods accurately. Rental businesses need to track the usage of rental items by scheduling times for pickups or deliveries and expected returns. Depending on the business model, rental inventories can be scheduled with hourly, daily, weekly, or customized rental periods.

• To keep your inventories safe and organized. It isn't easy to find the things you need from massive warehouses with many stocks, especially if you are not keeping track of your inventory with systematic schedules. Therefore, good scheduling is required in order to check the available items without having to dig through your warehouse when someone requests an item. 

• To provide quick and automated support to customers. When you properly schedule all your inventories, you and your customers can conveniently check their availability for each date, hour, or customer period. Plus, when you use electronic scheduling software like Reservety offers, your website lets customers book only the available items. And if the things are out of stock, it will automatically prevent the booking unless a customer picks a different time from the system. 

• To remove time gaps between each rental. When you schedule your rentals using an accurate system, you can minimize the time your equipment will sit inactive without earning any profit. For example, someone booked your mountain bike for 4 hours on Saturday, between 1 pm and 4 pm. In that case, you can rent the same bike before 1 pm and after 4 pm if you use an excellent scheduling tactic. Otherwise, you will keep turning down potential bookings for the same day.

• To improve punctuality and eliminate late returns. Good scheduling also allows you to prepare your rental items for deliveries or pickups ahead of time. This method will help you to improve the customer experience because no one wants to wait additional time to get the rental items ready. Another benefit of scheduling your rental products is to catch late returns on time and charge them a late fee based on your policies. 

• To extend the life of your rental inventories. Scheduling does not only refer to scheduling inventories for rentals but also to getting your rental equipment inspected and maintained on time. A simple question. How can we know which rental items are due for maintenance work if we do not keep track of their maintenance history?!

• Schedule Payments. Some rental companies offer payment plans which allow customers to pay in installments. A company needs a scheduling tool to collect timely payments in those cases. 

What is the Best Scheduling Software for the Rental Industry?

There may be several of them, but we do not recommend getting a single tool or software for the sole purpose of scheduling your rental items. Instead, we recommend selecting rental software that has a built-in scheduling system along with other features. That way, you can sync all your schedules with other rental processes, making the rentals more convenient.

This statement may confuse you a bit. Let's do a simple case study with Reservety's all-in-one rental software.

Here is how Reservety helps you to schedule your rental products:

• Synchs all your rental items with a central calendar for enhanced scheduling. It means that when you add your inventories to your website, Reservety's scheduling system starts tracking your inventory usage and availability. Reservety schedules rental items automatically based on the bookings and record them in the central calendar. For example, if item A is booked for three days, the system schedules that booking on the calendar, and no one can book the same item for the period. 

• Schedules are organized by serial numbers. In other words, Reservety lets you label your rental inventories with stock numbers and serials so that the scheduling will be adequately applied to the same item. The logic behind this approach is how we can know which item is scheduled if several are in stock. Labels, or item identifiers, are handy for checking the performance and availability of individual items in your inventory and implementing maintenance schedules accurately.

• Central Calendar View. Have you ever wished all your inventories magically appeared on a single calendar with all the booking details? Well, that is not magic anymore. Reservety adds all the bookings into a central calendar with color coding so rental managers can view the overall rental activities without digging the paper-based records. 

• Applies late fees accurately. Reservety lets you accurately charge late fees based on your late-return policies. For instance, if Mr. Smith booked your 20-person tent for 8 hours on Sunday but brings it back 2 hours late, the system will automatically charge for additional 2 hours, unless you have 2 hour grace period. 

• Notifies you about new bookings. Reservety has a built-in notification system that collaborates with rental schedules. When someone books an item through your website, the system sends an automated email with precise schedules and order details so you can prepare the items for the clients. 

• Notifies customers about approaching deadlines. Reservety's scheduling system is interactive. It leaves all customers and rental managers informed about the schedules. If a client's rental duration expires soon, the system sends the clients an automated message to inform them about the approaching deadline so they can avoid late fees.

•  Organizes inventories by displaying their statuses. The primary purpose of scheduling in the rental industry is to track the availability and status of rental items at any time. For example, if someone calls us and asks to see if they can rent 25 party chairs and five tables for a birthday party, we need to give them a quick response. However, to answer their question, we must have the schedule ready for our inventories. Reservety goes one step further by allowing potential customers to check the item availabilities from a website. If an item is unavailable for the preferred period, it will conveniently display the next available hour and date. This feature increases the likelihood of booking for another period if something is already booked.

• Schedules automated invoices and installment payments. Consider the extent of work involved in collecting installment payments from individual customers. Let's suppose you financed your rental equipment for five payments in installments where a customer pays $100 per month. To collect those payments on time, Reservety first allows you to set up your payment terms with pre-determined dates and send automated invoices to collect those payments on time. 

• Blocking dates. One of the most convenient scheduling features of Reservety is the ability to block specific dates and hours from booking. Let's say your business is closed for holidays or needs maintenance work (e.g., cleaning inventories, organizing, etc.). In that case, you can schedule a block to prevent people from renting your items during that period. 

• Schedules seasonal or holiday prices in advance. This scheduling feature is essential because you may want to raise the prices of your rental equipment in peak seasons to maximize your revenues. For example, Reservety helps you set the seasonal and holiday pricing in advance and automatically implements it on your website, so any booking for that period will be calculated with new pricing. 

Take-home points

In this article, we outline eight important reasons for using systematic scheduling in the rental business: Those are:

1. To avoid double bookings
2. To track rental periods accurately
3. To keep rental inventories safe and organized
4. To provide quick and automated support for customers
5. To remove time gaps between rentals
6. To improve punctuality and minimize late returns
7. To extend the life of rental inventories
8. To receive payments on time

The best scheduling software for the rental industry comes as a part of Reservety's all-in-one booking software. It is the best option because you are not just getting scheduling software with Reservety but a whole package of features that work in collaboration with each other. The scheduling tool is linked to other rental processes to give your customers the best booking experience and for you convenient management capabilities.

Here is why Reservety is the best option for rental scheduling:

1. Synch all the rentals with a central calendar, making it convenient to track the rental activities
2. Schedules and organizes rental items based on stock and serial numbers
3. Provides a convenient calendar view to give a detailed overview of the rental schedules
4. Tracks rental periods, schedules rental deadlines, and automatically charges late fees after a grace period
5. Notifies rental owners about new bookings
6. Schedules notification messages to customers to keep them updated about approaching deadlines
7. Displays inventories with their precise schedules
8. Schedules automated invoices and set due dates for installment payments
9. Implements blocks for specific hours and dates to prevent bookings on off-hours or closures
10. Schedules new rates for holiday seasons or peak seasons.

Note: Currently, Reservety is running a free trial without requiring any credit cards or contracts. You may sign up here and test it without any obligations.