This article will assist administrators with understanding the different methods in which availability may be opened or closed to renters.
What Is Availability, and Who Sets Availability?
An availability schedule is a schedule that lists the dates and time slots that a district or school site has determined facilities are open for (external) rental. These schedules determine the dates and time slots your community renters will be able to select as available options on the Facilitron marketplace.
Availability schedules are usually set by district administrators, and follows a district’s policies and school year schedule. This availability is usually opened on a yearly or bi-yearly basis, depending on your district, and may open for months at a time.
As an administrator, you will be able to view the default availability for your school site or district from your administrator dashboard. From your dashboard, navigate to the calendar page from the left hand navigation menu, and click the blue hyperlinked date in the upper right hand corner, where it says “Availability Open Through XX/XX/XXXX.” 
You will then be able to view the default availability only for your school site or district. Note that availability may differ according to the school site, and that additional availability exceptions or limitations may be placed on certain facility types.
As shown in the example above, Monday - Thursday dates have availability from 3:00 pm - 10:00 pm. There is no availability on Fridays, and Saturday and Sunday dates have availability open from 6:00 am - 10:00 pm.
While some districts allow school site administrators to further customize available dates and time slots for their specific site, this may not always be an option. For assistance on opening or closing availability, please reach out to your district’s Facilitron liaison (typically the Maintenance and Operations/Facilities departments), or Facilitron Support at (800) 272-2962 or support@facilitron.com.
What Is a Schedule Delay?
A schedule delay is a set number of days from the current date blocking external renters from submitting a reservation request. This is essentially a “buffer” to ensure school sites and districts have an adequate amount of time to review a renter’s request and determine if it may be accommodated or not.
A schedule delay is determined by the district in line with current district policy, and cannot be bypassed without administrator approval. While some districts allow school site administrators to approve of bypassing the schedule delay for an external renter, other districts require approval from a district administrator or school board/cabinet member.
For information on assisting a renter to bypass the set schedule delay for your district, please reach out to your district’s Facilitron liaison (typically the Maintenance and Operations/Facilities departments), or Facilitron Support at (800) 272-2962 or support@facilitron.com.
Options for Blocking Availability
The default availability opened for your school site or district will not take into account any internal events that require use of facilities. In order to ensure that the availability shown to renters on the external marketplace is as accurate and up to date as possible, it is critical for school site administrators to enter internal events for things such as sports practices, plays, music recitals, etc., as well as creating maintenance blocks for any scheduled or required maintenance.
Internal events should be created for any school based activity, such as sports practices and games, plays and musicals, band concerts, etc. Once an internal event is approved (either by the required administrators, or upon creating the event, if allowed by your role configuration), the scheduled dates and time slots will be removed from the external Marketplace availability, preventing renters from submitting a reservation request that would conflict with the internal event. For assistance with creating an internal event, please see Creating An Internal Reservation and Creating An Internal Schedule With Multiple Dates.
Additionally, maintenance blocks should be created any time one or more facilities at your school site will be undergoing routine or emergency maintenance. These blocks can be set up for multiple facilities, dates, and/or time slots. Setting up a maintenance block will also remove external marketplace availability. This will prevent renters from submitting a reservation request that would conflict with the maintenance block. For assistance with creating a maintenance block, please see Creating Maintenance Blocks.
Schedule delays and maintenance blocks should not be used in place of changing the scheduled availability. For instance, if availability is not closed for dates such as Spring, Fall, or Winter Break, but facilities will be unavailable due to staffing or other concerns, an internal event or maintenance block should not be placed. These breaks would fall into the category of an availability change or exception, and should be configured into the Facilitron platform so that all events and blocks may be accurately reported. For assistance with requesting or submitting an availability exception, please reach out to your district’s Facilitron liaison (typically the Maintenance and Operations/Facilities departments), or Facilitron Support at (800) 272-2962 or support@facilitron.com.
How to Allow a Renter to Request a Date/Time Slot Outside of Availability
If you have received permission from your district to allow a renter to reserve a date or time slot that is currently not available on the external marketplace, either due to the availability schedule or schedule delay, you may instruct the renter to submit a reservation for the closest available date and time slot, for any and all facilities required, and include a comment with their submissions from the confirmation page.
It is important that renters submit reservation requests from the external marketplace, in order for them to agree to the district’s terms and conditions, and answer any relevant application questions. Once a reservation request has been submitted, the dates and timeslots of the reservation may be adjusted to reflect the actual required use either by an authorized administrator, or a member of Facilitron Support with administrator approval.
It is not encouraged for administrators to submit an internal reservation for the external renter’s request, as the renter will not be allowed the opportunity to agree to the district’s terms and conditions, or answer any relevant application questions. The insurance requirement and fees also will not populate as needed for the renter’s rate category.