Voucher Handling

For hotel and car rental bookings, Business Central needs to know who pays the vendor. That is what the voucher decision is about:

Type	Meaning
Voucher	Your travel agency pays the vendor, and the customer is invoiced by you. A voucher document can be sent to the hotel as proof.
Confirmation	The customer pays the vendor directly. You only invoice your own fee.

The choice affects which item is used on the sales order line, so it must be settled before the import can be processed.

How the Decision Is Made

• Bookings made outside the online booking tool use the voucher flag that comes with the AIR file. No decision is needed and the booking never reaches the queue.
• Online (web) bookings use the customer's default setting instead, because the flag from the web tool is not reliable. The customer card has a Hotel Voucher Option and a Car Rental Voucher Option, each set to Yes, No, or Manual (see Voucher Defaults).
  • Yes -- always Voucher.
  • No -- always Confirmation.
  • Manual -- the booking goes to the Voucher Decision Queue and waits for a person to decide.
• Subcontractor hotel vendors are handled separately: they never require a decision and never receive vouchers.

While a booking is waiting for a decision, the import has status Error with Pending Reason Awaiting Voucher Decision.

The Voucher Decision Queue

Search for Voucher Decision Queue in Business Central. The list shows one line per segment waiting for a decision, with the sequence number, PNR, product type, customer name, traveller name, hotel name or car type, city, start and end date, price, and currency.

For each line you can choose:

Action	Result
Set Voucher	The segment is marked as Voucher -- your agency pays the vendor.
Set Confirmation	The segment is marked as Confirmation -- the customer pays the vendor.
View Import	Opens the AIR Import card for the segment, so you can check the full booking first.

After you make a decision, Business Central may ask whether the customer's default for future web bookings of that type should be updated to match. If you answer no, you are asked whether it should stop asking for that customer and product type. Both questions are optional -- the decision on the current booking is saved either way.

When every segment on the import has a decision, the import is processed again automatically. You do not need to go back to the AIR Import List.

Sending a Voucher to the Hotel

Once the sales order exists, the voucher itself is sent from the order line. Open the sales order and select the hotel line, then use the actions on the lines:

Action	Result
Preview Voucher	Shows the Hotel Voucher report on screen so you can check it before sending.
Send Voucher	Generates the voucher as a PDF and emails it to the hotel.

Both actions are available only on hotel lines that are marked as Voucher and have a vendor. Vouchers are never sent to subcontractor vendors.

The email goes to the Voucher Email on the vendor card, or to the vendor's ordinary e-mail address if no voucher address is filled in. If neither exists, you get a message telling you to add one on the vendor card.

The first time a voucher is sent, the line is given a unique Voucher No. taken from the voucher number series in AIR Setup. If that number series has not been set up, sending fails -- see AIR Setup.

Voucher Status on the Line

Each sales line shows a Voucher Status:

Status	Meaning
N/A	No voucher applies to this line (for example a flight line, or a confirmation).
Pending	The line is a voucher line, but the voucher has not been sent yet.
Sent	The voucher has been emailed to the vendor.
Error	Voucher delivery failed.

The assigned Voucher No. is stored on the line as well; add the column through personalization if you want it visible.

The Travel — Status tile group on the Business Manager Role Center counts vouchers that are pending and vouchers with errors, which makes it easy to see what is still waiting to be sent.

Tips

• Review the Voucher Decision Queue regularly so bookings are not held up.
• If a customer almost always needs vouchers, set their voucher option to Yes so their web bookings never reach the queue.
• Check the pending voucher tile on the role center before the traveller's check-in date.