Auto Settle Folios Periodically in Reservations, Groups, and House Accounts

Stay allows users to settle folios periodically in reservations, groups, and house accounts. This enhancement facilitates timely clearing of the outstanding charges in the account folios. Previously, users had to make manual payments to settle the folios.

Feature Setting

The following feature setting must be enabled to allow users to create an auto settlement rule that can be associated with reservations/groups/house accounts:

Name: Auto Settlement Rule
Value: Must be enabled
Comments: License is not required

Permission

The following permission must be assigned to allow users to create/modify the settlement rule:

Stay_AutoSettlement

This permission is provided to the following roles by default:

System Administrator
Stay Hotel Manager
Department Manager
Profile Management
Stay Accounting
Accounts Receivable Manager

The following permissions must be assigned to allow users to associate a settlement rule with reservations/groups/house accounts:

Stay_AutoSettlementReservation
Stay_AutoSettlementGroup
Stay_AutoSettlementHouseAccount

These permissions are provided to the following roles by default:

System Administrator
Stay Hotel Manager
Department Manager
Profile Management
Guest Service Agent
Stay Front Desk
Stay Hotel Supervisor
GSA Supervisor
Stay Accounting
Accounts Receivable Manager
Stay Night Audit

Selecting a Payment Method for a House Account

Before settling outstanding charges for folios of house accounts, users must first select a payment method for house accounts from the Payment Methods section of the house account. Users can add, remove, or modify the payment methods selected for a house account like reservations and groups. Users can add a new payment method to a house account by clicking the add icon (+) in the Payment Methods section. The Payment Method pop-up screen appears that displays the list of available payment methods configured at the property. Users can select the preferred payment method and click Save. The payment method gets added to the house account.

Users can select a default payment method for the account by enabling the Make this the default payment method option for the preferred payment method. Users can also select a default payment method for each folio in the house account. The payment for the folio is processed based on the payment method selected. For a new house account, Cash is set as the default payment method.

The Reference field in the record created for the payments collected with the auto settlement rule in the account folios, displays the default verbiage, Interim Settlement along with the date, time, and username of the user. This value is displayed only when the auto settlement rule is processed successfully for credit card and direct bill payments.

The Reference field will not be displayed when the folio is emailed or printed.

Creating an Auto Settlement Rule

When the Auto Settlement Rule feature setting is enabled, users can create the settlement rule to be associated with reservations/groups/house accounts from the Auto Settlement Rule tab in the Guest Accounting screen. Users can select the payment collection date and the payment method type for which the payments must be collected automatically. Only users with the Stay_AutoSettlement permission can create/modify the settlement rule.

Associating a Settlement Rule with a Reservation/Group/House Account

Users with the Stay_AutoSettlementReservation, Stay_AutoSettlementGroup, and Stay_AutoSettlementHouseAccount permissions can associate a settlement rule with a reservation/group/house account from the Settlement Rule drop-down list in the Folios section of the account. This drop-down list displays all the settlement rules that fall within the date range of the reservation. The rules in the drop-down list are displayed in their order of occurrence (daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly).

Users can only select the rule for which the Payment Type matches the Payment Method associated with the folio. For example, users cannot associate a rule with the Payment Type as Direct Bill for a folio whose Payment Method is set as Credit Card. The following messages are displayed when the Payment Type of the rule does not match the Payment Method associated with the folio:

No valid credit card is currently available for the folio. To proceed, please add a valid credit card.
No A/R Account is currently available for the folio. To proceed, please add an A/R Account.

Once the settlement rule is selected, users cannot modify the Payment Method associated with the folio. To modify the Payment Method, users must select the Settlement Rule option as None and then modify the payment method.

The settlement rule associated with the account is displayed in the Settlement Rule tab in the Auto Settlement Rule section of the account. Users can choose to hide the display of the details of an auto settlement rule in the Auto Settlement Rule section.

To hide the details of the settlement rule associated with the reservation, users must click the eye icon. By default, the settlement rule associated with the account is displayed in the Settlement Rule tab and the status of the payments collected is displayed in the History tab if there is at least one settlement rule associated with the reservation. However, when users refresh the screen when the tabs are hidden, the tabs are continued to be displayed if an auto settlement rule is associated with the reservation.

Users must click the eye icon to view the Settlement Rule and History tabs if there is no auto settlement rule associated with the reservation. However, when users refresh the screen when the tabs are displayed, the tabs remain hidden if there is no auto settlement rule associated with the reservation.

The status of the payments collected is displayed in the History tab. The Reference column in this tab displays the value, Interim Settlement, for the successful collection of payments. This column is left blank when the auto settlement is not processed successfully.

When the payment collection fails, users can select the required transactions and click the Retry option to process the payments again. Users can also perform a Retry when the settlement rule associated with the folio is modified.

The following message is displayed when the settlement rule does not apply to a reservation when the reservation’s duration is modified: The system has automatically removed the settlement rule because it does not apply to the modified date range. Please review and link the appropriate rule instead.

The Expected Auto Settlement Rule for <current property date> section in the Date Roll tab of the Night Audit screen displays the count of the auto settlements scheduled for the day.

The Auto Settlement section in the Auto Date Roll Error Log tab of the Night Audit screen displays the error logs for the auto settlement failures that occur in reservations, groups, and house accounts.