Rates Management

New Ideas to control Rates Management

Control rates, cut discounts and maximize revenue potential

Whether you want to prevent over-discounting, or maximize your rates through rate optimization or on-demand pricing, the rentalresult application allows you to put system controls, customer and location based rate agreements and manage your charging options in multiple different ways. The system has been designed to be ultra-flexible when it comes to both rate management and billing possibilities allowing you to manage almost any rate situation.

rentalresult offers a number of key features to control your rates and discounts

controlling rate sheets

the rentalresult application allows you to manage rates sheets at multiple levels, starting from the corporate rates sheet (or sheets if you want to separate retail from trade for example), then allowing variation at regional, location, customer, customer site and product level. A product doesn’t have to be on every rate sheet, so if you want a customer to have a special rate on 3 products, but revert to the standard rates for everything else, that can be accomplished in seconds. Rates can include values for everything from hours to months, quarters or event based billing and you can include excess hours charges, usage charges (eg for diamond blades) and maintenance premiums if you wish. Discount lists can be maintained in just the same way as rates sheets giving you complete control.

minimum and maximum rates

Every rates sheet can include minimum and maximum rates if you wish, whether that is a specific minimum value, or a maximum discount beyond which your sales people cannot negotiate, or whether you simply want to limit the maximum value a customer will pay for a specific product over the life of an individual rental contract. The possibilities are huge!

rate optimization or on-demand pricing

If your market is flexible and rates are volatile then you may also want to consider rate optimization or on-demand pricing. This basically allows you to vary your rates automatically based on market demand, if you utilization rises then your rates can rise, if you utilization drops then you can drop your rates. The system has multiple configuration options to ensure that your utilization is measured at a individual location level or a regional level if that might be relevant, to assure that customers with existing quotes don’t suddenly get quoted a different rate and that customers with agreed rates are still offered the rates they expect.

special offers and best available rates

Every rates sheet in rentalresult is driven by date parameters, that means if you want to offer a special rate for August then you can do so, if you want all your rates to increase on a certain date then they will. It also means you can negotiate customer specific rates for as long as necessary before you finally make the rates sheet active. In a best available rate scenario then the system can be intelligent in the rate that it selects for the customer based on duration of contract, for example if the best rate for a 9 day rental is actually a 2 week charge, then the system will work that out rather than charging 9 individual days. Again this is a fantastic way of reducing errors and mistakes.

controlling hidden discounts

In a rental business its often not the rate on the product that loses you money, but the overall deal. Its tempting for a salesperson to give away the transport or delivery charges for free, or forget to offer the damage waiver because it seems expensive rather than realizing that these are part of the overall contract value. In rentalresult if there are charges that you want your salespeople to include every time without negoatiaton then you can make these mandatory. If transport is something that cannot be discounted then that can be configured. Using this kind of configuration we have customers who have received an annual 100% ROI for the cost of the rentalresult application purely on transport and insurance / damage waiver charges. We can even validate the customer record to see if they have a valid insurance certficate on file before applying a charge.

added value sales

When you have a customer in front of you, or on the phone, being able to add additional value to the contract is always important. Multiple accessory options allows you offer customers related products such as consumables, safety equipment etc or even additional services such as training when a product is added to a contract. This again allows you to encourage higher productivity from your salesforce. You can vary rentalrates based on accessories selected, so for example if a customer chooses an excavator with a 2’ bucket the rate might be cheaper than when they upgrade to the 3’ bucket.