Conference Rooms - User Guide

• Introduction
• How to get to the Conference Rooms
• Overview of the reservations (dashboard)
• Actions and permission
• User
• Find available room
• Private room
• Add new reservation
• Room Manager
• Taking actions on the reservations
• Viewing reservation history

Introduction

Conference Rooms is the system that allows users to make room reservations quickly and conveniently, and administrators to easily decide whether to accept or reject a reservation. And all this using a modern and familiar web interface. 

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Types of users

There are two types of users in the system. 

• Unauthorised users - not logged in to OTRS
• Regular users - can book rooms
• Room managers - can book rooms and manage the reservations ie. accept or reject. 

Every OTRS's user (agent or customer user) becomes regular user of the Conference Rooms system out of the box. No prior actions are required. 

Room managers

Room managers are people specially delegated to the role of managing a given room. 

Every room should have at least one room manager. 

The room manager can also make reservations. In addition, it receives rights in the form of the ability to accept, reject or free the room. He also sees more information in the summary view of reservations as opposed to regular users.

The method of granting permission to room managers has been described on the Add rooms page. 

The room manager is identified by the email address assigned to his account in OTRS. This address should be entered in the "Room managers e-mail addresses" field. You can enter more than one address separated by a comma, without any extra spaces like this: room.manager1@intalio.pl,room.manager2@intalio.pl

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Reservations

Reservation is basically a standard OTRS Ticket, in which additional information is saved in the form of dynamic fields. The booking status corresponds to the status of the ticket. By accepting or declining the reservation, we are changing the status of the ticket.
Ticket is automatically created after sending a book request from the web interface. 

No actions on the ticket itself are required to effectively use the Conference Rooms system. 

Reservation states

Reservations have 3 states

1. Pending
   Reservation is pending when the user (regular or room manager) send a new reservation form and before acceptance by the room manager. 
2. Accepted
   Reservation is accepted when the room manager accepts the reservation conditions
3. Rejected
   Reservation is rejected when the room manager rejects the reservation. The rejected reservation is visible only to the administrator and user who made the room reservation. 

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Cities, buildings and rooms

Reservations are linked to the specific room. 
Before you can start using the system you will have to add and configure your real estate. 
You can create this elements in your OTRS using the specially created panel. It's quick and simple. 

You can find more information about adding cities, buildings and rooms here in the Administrators guide.

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Summary

This is the most important information that you must know before using Conference Rooms.
To learn all the advanced features of our system, read the rest of the user manual. 

 

How to get to the Conference Rooms

Agent

Login to OTRS's agent panel.

New room reservation

From the top menu open Conference Rooms tab and click on the New Room Reservation option. 

You will be redirected to the Conference Rooms' booking view. 

Management view

From the top menu open Conference Rooms tab and click on the Room Reservation Management option.

You will be redirected to the Conference Rooms' management view. 

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Customer user

Login to OTRS's customer panel.

New room reservation

Open Room Reservation Management menu and choose New Room Reservation. 

You will be redirected to the Conference Rooms' booking view. 

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Management view

Open Room Reservation Management menu and choose Room Reservation Management. 

You will be redirected to the Conference Rooms' management view. 

 

Overview of the reservations (dashboard)

Open the room management (dashboard) view. 

If you don't know how to find the dashboard check out this article.

The dashboard is represented in a convenient calendar view. 
You can switch between plenty of views:

• Today
• Week
• Day
• Pending
• My
• My Rooms

Events visibility

The number of events you can see in the dashboard view depends on the type of user you are. 

Unauthorised user

Unauthorised user is the user that is not logged in to the OTRS system. 

You became unauthorised user when there is no sessionId parameter provided in the URL or the user session has expired. 

This type of users can see:

• accepted reservations of all other users

Recommended personel

Cleaning services personel can use the Conference Rooms system as unauthorised users. 

The reservations calendar can be printed and passed to the cleaning services personel

Regular user

Regular user is the authorised user (logged in to OTRS) who is not a room manager. 
The regular user can be "regular" in one room and room manager in another room. This permissions are set per room, not globally for the whole system. 

This type of users can see:

• reservations that he owns - pending, accepted or rejected (all states)
• other users' reservations - pending or accepted

Recommended personel

Employees that organise meetings in the company. 

Room manager

Room manager is the authorised user (logged in to OTRS) who is a local administrator (manager) for the given room. 

The room manager permissions are given per single room, not globally. User can be a manager for one room, but a regular user for the other rooms. 

This type of users can see:

• reservations that he owns - pending, accepted or rejected (all states)
• other users' reservations - pending or accepted
• reservations in rooms in which he is a room manager (local administrator)

Recommended personel

Employees that organise meetings in the company and are responsible for accepting or reject requests for room reservations. 

Calendar tabs

Week

This tab represent a calendar view on which you can see all the reservations that are visible to you based on your current roles and will take place this week. You can navigate between weeks using the navigation arrows. 

Day

This tab represent a calendar view on which you can see all the reservations that are visible to you based on your current roles. You can navigate between days using the navigation arrows. 

Pending

This tab represent a list view on which you can see all the reservations that are currently in pending state. 

My

This tab represent a calendar view on which you can see all your private. 

You can quickly differentiate your reservations from others by looking on its state label. Your text is always added to the reservations that you own on lists. 
In calendar view your reservations are also bordered by blue line. 

My rooms

This tab represent a calendar view on which you can see all reservations that have been scheduled in rooms in which you're a room manager (local administrator). If you want to accept or reject the reservations in rooms that you're responsible for this is the most convenient way. 

Reservation details

To open the reservation details simply click on the reservation in calendar view or list view. 

Actions and permission

There are couple of actions that can be performed on a reservation based on your roles and current reservation state. 

• Edit
  Edit currently open reservation. Press save changes to send an update. 
• Accept
• Reject
• Release
  When the reservation is accepted it can be canceled by owner or the room manager by pressing release button. 

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Unauthorised users

Pending

Not visible for this type of user

Accepted

No action is available

Rejected

Not visible for this type of user

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Regular users

Pending

Reservation owner:

• • • • • Reject
        • Edit

Not reservation owner:
No action is available

Accepted

Reservation owner:

• • • • • Release
        • Edit

Not reservation owner:
No action is available

Rejected

Reservation owner:
No action is available

Not reservation owner:
No action is available

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Room managers

Pending

Reservation owner:

• • • • • Accept
        • Reject
        • Edit

Not reservation owner:

• • • • • Accept
        • Reject
        • Edit

Accepted

Reservation owner:

• • • • • Release
        • Edit

Not reservation owner:

• • • • • Release
        • Edit

Rejected

Reservation owner:
No action is available

Not reservation owner:
No action is available

User

Instructions for using the system for the user who makes the reservations - regular user.

Find available room

Go to the main Conference Rooms panel. 

You can find a detailed description on how to get to the Conference Rooms here.

You can switch between two main filter menus:

• Time Range
• Specific Room

Specific room

Use this menu to switch between Cities and buildings or filter the rooms by their names. 

Note that rooms filtered out by those values won't be visible on the rooms list above the filter screen. 

You can also select your requirements from the dropdown list such as:

• internet connection
• projector
• catering

You can find more information about modifying additional resources list here. If you don't have access to OTRS system configuration contact your OTRS administrator. 

Time Range

Use this menu to search for available rooms by dates.

Available filters

• Date start
  Provide a start date of your reservation
• Date end
  If Automatic Date is turned on end date is automatically set to half an hour after the start date
  If you wish to set the date manually, click on the Automatic Date button to set it to manual mode. 
• Select the type of room
  For example: conference, computer, other
• Number of seats
  Enter maximum number of seats needed
• Select your requirements
  As described above in the Specific Room section

Click Save in the bottom right corner of click anywhere outside of the filters container to show the filtered rooms list.

Rooms list

In the upper part of the screen you can see filtered list of rooms. Each block is a different room which can or cannot be available to book. 

Room Details

If you look for detailed information about the room just click DETAILS button to expand the room card.

Available room

Available label means that the room meets all your requirements and is ready for booking at the times you specify.

Click BOOK to open the New reservation form. 

Not available at selected times

Not available at selected times label means that room meets all your requirements but it is not available at selected times. You can still try to find available times by clicking ANOTHER TIME. You will be redirected to New Reservation form. 

Private rooms

Private rooms are special type of rooms that can only be booked by room managers. 

Find out more about private rooms here.

Private room

Private rooms are special types of rooms that cannot be booked by regular users. Only room managers of the given room are allowed to book it. 

If you wish to book private room contact your private room manager. 

You can find a list of private room managers (Local administrator) if you expand the room's details. 

Add new reservation

1. To open the add new form click on the BOOK or ANOTHER TIME button in the room card. 

Available dates

You can set start and end date using date picker fields (like in the filters) or you can take a quick look on the calendar view by clicking SEE AVAILABLE DATES.

There 3 views that you can choose from:

1. Week
2. Day
3. List

To set your reservation start and end date go to week or day view and create schedule by simply dragging it on the calendar view.

This view will also conveniently show you other people's reservations so you see when the room is actually available to book. 

Grey spots before and after an event represents the minumum time between reservations. This parameter is configurable through OTRS system config. You can find out more in the administration guide. 

Description

Write some description about your reservation ie. OTRS training or Daily standup. This field is required.

Numer of people

Enter maximum number of people that will tak part in the meeting. Note that you can't enter a value that is bigger than room's capacity. 

Selected equipment

Choose the equipment that is necessary for your meeting from the list.

Management meter will take part

Check this field if the VIP will be taking part in the meeting. This information can be important for the staff that is responsible for preparing the room before the meeting. 

Optional note

You could also add an optional note that will be saved in the reservation history. 

Send in a request

Press send in a request button at the bottom of the form to send a reservation request. 
You will be redirected automatically to your OTRS customer or agent panel accordingly. 

Book a private room

Only room managers are able to book private rooms. If you wish to book a private room you need to contact one of the local administrators. Room manager can create an event for you. 

You can find a list of room managers in the room details. 

What's next?

Now your reservation is in pending state and it was passed to your room manager to accept it. 

Room Manager

Instructions for using the system for the user who is responsible for managing the reservations - room manager (local administrator).

Taking actions on the reservations

If you are a room manager your main task is to accept or reject room reservations requests. 

Looking for reservations requests

Th most convenient way to get an overview of the current situation is to use a dashboard's My rooms view. 

Check out this link if you don't know how to get to the dashboard.  

Taking action (accept, reject, release, edit)

Go to the reservations details by clicking on the event in the calendar or a list. 
You will see available actions on the bottom of the details form. 

Action buttons visibility is strictly dependent on your current role and reservation state. Read more about permissions here. 

Viewing reservation history

Every action on the reservation is saved in the reservation history including user notes. 

To check out the reservation history open the reservation details from the calendar or list view. 
You will find HISTORY button on the bottom of the screen near the rest of the possible actions.