Vehicle Bookings & Approvals

Vehicle Bookings let members reserve a vehicle for training, community events, or other activities ahead of time, with an optional admin approval step. Bookings can be one-off or recurring — a single request that generates a whole series of occurrences on a schedule.

Overview

StationOne supports two ways to create a booking:

Authenticated booking — members and admins book from within StationOne
Public booking — anyone with the vehicle’s QR code can request a booking without logging in (if enabled)

Bookings that aren’t tied to an event or training session may require admin approval, depending on the vehicle’s settings.

Enabling Bookings for a Vehicle

Prerequisites

Brigade admin, organisation admin, or super admin role

Steps

Navigate to Vehicles and open the vehicle
Click Edit
Scroll to the Booking Settings section
Configure the following options:

Enable Bookings
- Allows members to book this vehicle for training or community activities
- Vehicles are hidden from the “Select Vehicle to Book” list and public booking pages when unchecked
Require Approval
- When checked, bookings from non-admin users must be approved by a brigade admin (or a user with the Approve & reject bookings permission) before they’re confirmed
- Bookings linked to an Event or Training session are always auto-approved, regardless of this setting
- Bookings made by an admin are always auto-approved
Enable Public Bookings
- Allows bookings to be requested from the vehicle’s public page via QR code
- Requires public access to be enabled for the vehicle first
- Public bookings always require approval, even if Require Approval is unchecked
Booking Message (optional)
- A custom message shown to anyone booking the vehicle (e.g. special instructions or conditions)
Click Save

Booking a Vehicle

Method 1: Authenticated Booking

Open the vehicle and click Book Vehicle in the Quick Actions sidebar — or go to Calendar and select a vehicle from the Select Vehicle to Book list
Vehicles currently out of service are shown but cannot be selected
Fill in the booking form:

Start Date & Time and End Date & Time (required)
- A warning appears if the selected window overlaps a period the vehicle is out of service
Purpose/Reason (required)

Destination/Location (optional)

Notes (optional)
Admins only — an Admin Options panel lets you book on behalf of another member. Start typing a name to search registered members, or enter any name for someone without an account (an email can be added to send them notifications)
To make it a recurring booking, see Recurring Bookings below
Click Submit Booking Request

If the vehicle doesn’t require approval (or you’re an admin), the booking is confirmed immediately. Otherwise it’s created as Pending and admins are notified.

Method 2: Public Booking (QR Code)

Scan the vehicle’s QR code or open its public link
Click Book Vehicle (or Submit Booking Request if approval is required)
Start typing your name — if you’re a registered member it will autocomplete; otherwise enter your name and email manually
Fill in start/end time, purpose, destination, and notes as above
Submit the form

Public bookings always require approval and always send a confirmation email to the person who booked, plus a notification to admins.

Recurring Bookings

When creating a new booking (authenticated or public), check Make this a recurring booking to generate a whole series of occurrences from one request.

Repeat Types

Type	Description
Daily	Repeats every N days (interval of your choosing)
Weekly	Repeats every N weeks on one or more selected days (e.g. every 2 weeks on Mon/Wed/Fri)
Monthly	Repeats on either a fixed day of the month (e.g. the 15th) or a relative weekday (e.g. the second Tuesday)
Specific Dates	An explicit, hand-picked set of dates chosen from an inline calendar — the booking time from the form applies to every date selected

End Date

Set an optional End date to stop the series after a given date. Leave it blank for an open-ended series — StationOne caps any single series at 52 occurrences.

How Occurrences Are Generated

Each occurrence uses the same start/end time (duration), purpose, destination, and notes as the original request
If a specific occurrence date would conflict with an existing booking or falls while the vehicle is out of service, that date is skipped — the rest of the series is still created. Skipped dates are listed in the confirmation message.
Approval status applies per-occurrence: if the vehicle requires approval, every occurrence in the series starts as Pending and must be approved individually or as a whole series (see below)

Managing a Series

Each occurrence in a series can be viewed individually from the vehicle’s bookings list. Opening one shows whether it’s part of a series, and gives you the choice to act on just that occurrence or the entire series:

Approve/Reject This Occurrence vs Approve/Reject Entire Series — approving or rejecting the whole series applies to every still-pending occurrence, not ones already decided
Cancel This Occurrence vs Cancel Entire Series — cancelling the entire series removes every occurrence, including the original request; cancelling a single occurrence leaves the rest of the series untouched

Approvals

Who Can Approve

Brigade admins, organisation admins, and super admins for bookings within their scope
Any user granted the Approve & reject bookings feature permission for bookings in their unit — see Appointments & Permissions

Approving or Rejecting a Booking

Navigate to the vehicle and open the pending booking from the bookings list
Click Approve Booking or Reject Booking
- For a recurring series, you can instead click Approve Entire Series or Reject Entire Series to act on every pending occurrence at once
When rejecting, you can optionally add a Reason for rejection — this is included in the rejection notification

Notifications

Approval requested — sent to admins (and users with the approve permission) when a booking needs a decision
Booking confirmed — sent to the person who booked once approved, or immediately if no approval was required
Booking rejected — sent to the person who booked, including the rejection reason if one was given
Admins with the mobile app installed also receive a push notification for new approval requests

Booking Reminders

StationOne automatically emails a reminder to the person who booked (or the email address they provided, for non-account bookings) 24 hours before an approved booking’s start time. This runs on a fixed schedule and isn’t configurable per booking — it applies the same way to every vehicle and every booking.

Only sent for bookings that are still Approved and haven’t started yet
Sends once per booking — a booking will never receive more than one reminder
Respects the recipient’s notification preferences for vehicle bookings — see Email Notifications
For a recurring series, each occurrence is reminded independently 24 hours before its own start time

Managing Existing Bookings

Viewing Bookings

Open the vehicle and scroll to the bookings list to see upcoming bookings, their status (Pending/Approved/Rejected), and who booked them. Click any booking to see full details.

Editing a Booking

The person who booked can edit their own booking while it’s still Pending
Admins can edit any booking at any time

Cancelling a Booking

The person who booked can cancel their own booking
Admins can cancel any booking within their scope
For a recurring series, choose Cancel This Occurrence or Cancel Entire Series

Cancelling via Email

Booking confirmation emails include a cancellation link, letting the booker cancel directly from their inbox without logging in. The link stops working once the booking has already started, or has already been cancelled/rejected.

Vehicle Availability

A vehicle’s availability badge reflects its current bookings:

Available — no approved booking covers the current time
In Use — an approved booking is currently active
Out of Service — takes priority over bookings; the vehicle cannot be booked for any period that overlaps an out-of-service window