Changing a Guest's Plan Mid-Stay

A transient guest wants to go seasonal. A monthly tenant upgrades to a bigger slip. Change Plan closes out what they've already used, then hands you a pre-filled booking wizard for the new arrangement — and links the two reservations so the history stays intact.

Updated 3 days ago 5 views billing reservations packages operations deposits

Changing a Guest's Plan Mid-Stay

Someone booked one thing and now wants another. A transient boater three weeks in decides to go seasonal. A monthly RV guest upgrades to a bigger site. A tenant on nightly rates wants the annual contract. The stay isn't ending — the terms are changing, starting from a particular moment.

Change Plan handles exactly this. It bills and closes out everything they've used so far, then drops you into the booking wizard with the customer, their assets, and their spot already filled in — so you only have to pick the new reservation type and package. When you're done, the two reservations are linked, and both pages show the full history with a link to jump between them.

Why this creates a second reservation

The obvious question: why not just edit the existing reservation and change the package?

Because a reservation is more than a package selection. It carries a frozen price snapshot (so a later rate change doesn't silently rewrite what someone already agreed to), a deposit calculation based on that snapshot, a contract, an invoice chain, and a recurring billing group. Editing the package mid-flight would quietly invalidate all of it — and you'd have no clean record of what they were actually paying during the first half of their stay.

So instead: the old reservation closes cleanly with its own folio, and a new one picks up where it left off. Both remain permanently linked, so it still reads as one continuous stay. You get an honest financial record for each period and a single story.

What carries over, and what doesn't

Carries over automatically:

  • The customer
  • Their assets (boat, RV, equipment) — both their own and anything you've leased them
  • Their map placement — same slip, same site
  • Any deposit you're already holding

You choose fresh:

  • Reservation type
  • Package and add-ons
  • Dates going forward

Everything carried over is editable. A plan change often isn't a straight swap — they're moving to a bigger slip, or dropping a second vehicle, or the new package doesn't allow their old site. Change whatever needs changing.

Doing it

  1. Open the reservation and click Actions ▸ Change Plan / Package.
  2. Set Change takes effect. Defaults to right now; set a future date to schedule the switch — "they go monthly on the 1st" is a perfectly normal thing to enter here.
  3. Choose how to bill the closing reservation:
    • The changeover date (pro-rate) — bill only what they actually used. This is what you want almost every time.
    • The full original reservation — bill the whole original booking as agreed. Use this when they committed to a term and you're holding them to it.
  4. Optionally add a reason — it shows on both reservations forever, and future-you will want it.
  5. Check the close-out preview. It shows what's already charged, what's paid, the pro-ration adjustment, and the balance due at close-out. These are the real numbers, calculated exactly the way a normal check-out would.
  6. Click Close Out & Choose New Plan.
  7. The booking wizard opens, pre-filled. Pick the new reservation type and package, adjust anything that needs adjusting, and complete the booking.

That's it. Both reservations now show a Plan History tab with the full chain and links between them.

Finish the wizard

Between step 6 and step 7, the guest has no active reservation. The old one is checked out; the new one doesn't exist yet.

This matters. During that window the spot may read as available, and the guest doesn't appear on your occupancy numbers.

It's normally a matter of seconds. But if you get pulled away mid-wizard, go back to the old reservation — it will show an amber "Plan change in progress" banner with a Resume & choose the new plan button that puts you right back where you were, still pre-filled.

Don't leave it sitting. Finish the wizard or explicitly cancel the change.

How the deposit is handled

If you're holding a deposit on the original reservation, it carries over to the new one. The system works out what the new plan requires and bills only the difference:

  • New plan needs $750, you're holding $500 → the new reservation bills a $250 deposit.
  • New plan needs $300, you're holding $500 → nothing is billed, and the $200 surplus stays on the old reservation for you to refund or settle deliberately.

The system won't auto-refund a surplus. Whether it goes back to the guest or offsets their balance is a judgement call, so it waits for you.

When the carried deposit fully covers the new requirement, no deposit line is created at all — you won't see a phantom $0 deposit sitting unpaid in your compliance report.

Common mistakes

Using Change Plan before the guest has checked in. It won't let you, by design. There's nothing elapsed to bill or preserve, so there's no reason to split the booking in two. Cancel the reservation and book the new plan directly instead — you'll get a cleaner record.

Backdating past the check-in date. Rejected. You can't close out a stay as of a moment before it began.

Picking "bill the full original reservation" out of habit. That charges the guest for the entire original booking even though they're switching mid-way. It's the right answer when they committed to a term, and the wrong answer for a routine mid-stay upgrade. Read the preview before confirming.

Assuming the surplus deposit comes back automatically. It doesn't. If the new plan needs a smaller deposit, go settle or refund the difference on the old reservation.

Cancelling the change to "undo" a check-out. The Cancel this change button on the resume banner only clears the reminder. It does not re-open the checked-out reservation — that can't be undone from here. If you've closed someone out by mistake, you'll need to book them a new reservation.

Reading the history afterward

Both reservations get a Plan History tab showing the whole chain, oldest first, with:

  • Each reservation, its type and package, and its dates
  • Where you currently are, marked "You are here"
  • Between each pair, the changeover: when it took effect, who did it, the reason, and any deposit carried forward

Every entry links to the corresponding reservation, so you can move up and down the chain freely and open the folio for any period.

Plan changes stack. A guest can go transient → monthly → seasonal over a year, and the chain shows all of it. Each reservation keeps its own folio, so you can always answer "what were they paying in August?" — while still seeing it as one continuous relationship.

The tab only appears when a reservation is actually part of a chain, so ordinary bookings aren't cluttered with an empty tab.