Travel insurance can be set up as an automatic charge to the reservation. It is based on a percentage of the total amount of the reservation being booked. It may also compute against the amount of the security deposit if desired. At the time the reservation is booked, the guest is given an opportunity to accept or decline the travel insurance. You may write a message to be displayed or that prompts your reservationist to communicate your policy regarding travel insurance to the guest if he decides to cancel. The message may say, "Although the guest is not in the cancellation period, and they will be able to accept this insurance at another time, tell them the cost can't be guaranteed to stay at the current rate. Be sure they realize that it's always in their best interest to get this insurance now."
You may define a cancellation period in RMS, or how long before a reservation’s arrival you have to cancel your insurance and still get a refund. You may choose to set two different cancellation periods depending on the length of stay. For example, a reservation staying two weeks or less may require notification at least 14 days prior to arrival. Any reservation staying longer than two weeks would require at least a month’s notice in order to get a refund on travel insurance. The number of days in the cancellation period is set up in the Control file.
You also need to decide what the insurance charge will be depending on the length of stay. A reservation booked for one or two weeks length of stay may be a lower rate of insurance than a reservation booked for three weeks length of stay. RMS requires you to define these daybreaks on the Travel Insurance Information Screen in the Control File. Then each daybreak period, or length of stay, is assigned a travel insurance rate. If you use only one rate no matter how long the guest stays you would choose the "Maximum" option for the day break, indicating there is no change in rate in relation to the length of stay.
There are some prerequisites to setting up your travel insurance:
•It is important to have your Season file set up properly before you create your travel insurance rate. Set up your seasons in the Season File. The All YEAR season may be used.
•Next create your rates in the Rate Definition File. The rate type to choose is "Other charge". When entering amounts the travel insurance rates are percentages of the total cost of the reservation. You will need to enter a rate to charge against the reservation and a rate percentage to pay the insurance company.
For example: Travel Rate #1 is the percent charged the reservation. If it is .10 (or 10%), and the amount of the reservation is $1000.00, the insurance gross premium is $100.00. Travel Rate #2 is the percentage to pay the insurance company. If it is .70, the insurance company would get $70.00 and the management company’s commission would be $30.00.
•Set up a travel insurance charge record in the Charges File. Make this charge amount
0.0. You need to remember the Charge record key for travel
insurance. (This is the number you gave it when you created the Charge
record.) This Charge record key is stored in the Control File
with your other Travel Insurance settings.
Once you have created your Travel insurance rates and a charge record and decided what your daybreaks (or rate change cutoffs) will be, then you can go to Travel Insurance Information in the Control File and finish setting up Travel insurance.
If Travel insurance is not used, choose the "not used" option for all the travel insurance settings on the Travel Insurance Information Screen.
A Travel insurance report may be run for in house use or to submit to the Travel Insurance Company. The guest name and address, arrival and departure, reservation number, insured amount, gross premium, net premium (the amount to pay the insurance company) and the commission (the management company take) will print or display to the screen. An automated report especially formatted for Travel Guard may be created in the form of a file for you to send to them via e-mail. .