Tour Booking Guide

This guide explains how to manage bookings on Travel-Riders — from receiving a request to confirming payment and handling cancellations.

1. Booking Lifecycle Overview

Every booking moves through the following statuses:

  1. Pending Assignment — a customer has submitted a booking request; waiting for you to accept or decline
  2. Pending Payment — you accepted the booking; the customer has been emailed a payment link for the deposit
  3. Partially Paid — the customer paid the 50% deposit; the final balance is due before the cutoff window
  4. Fully Paid / Confirmed — the full tour amount has been received; the booking is confirmed

Cancelled is a terminal status reachable from any stage — either by declining the request, or by cancelling a paid booking and issuing a refund.

2. Receiving a Booking Request

When a customer submits a booking request, you receive an email notification and the booking appears in Dashboard → Bookings & Assignments with status Pending Assignment. You can view the customer's full rider and pillion profiles before deciding whether to accept.

A badge on your profile icon shows how many bookings are waiting for your action.

3. Reviewing Customer Details

Click the rider or pillion profile button on a booking card to view the following details:

  • Full name, email address, phone number, postal address
  • Passport number
  • T-shirt size
  • Blood group, allergies, current medication
  • Emergency contact name and phone number
  • Driving license number and category
  • Motorcycle make, model, and year

This information is provided to help you prepare for the trip safely. Handle it with care — you are acting as a data processor under GDPR for this data. Do not share it outside the platform or retain it after the booking is completed.

4. Accepting a Booking

  1. Click Accept & Request Payment on the booking card.
  2. Select the room or accommodation type that matches the customer's party (this determines the pricing).
  3. Confirm. An automated Action Required email is sent to the customer with a link to pay the 50% deposit.

The booking status moves to Pending Payment. The customer cannot be charged until you complete this step.

5. Declining a Booking

If you cannot accommodate the booking, click Decline and select a reason:

  • Tour fully booked
  • Dates unavailable
  • Requirements not met
  • Equipment mismatch
  • Tour cancelled or rescheduled
  • Custom reason (free text)

The customer is notified by email with your reason. The booking moves to Cancelled and no payment is collected.

6. Payment Flow

Once you accept a booking:

  1. The customer pays a 50% deposit. The booking status becomes Partially Paid.
  2. Before the final-payment cutoff window (configured at your onboarding, default 30 days before tour start), the customer is prompted to pay the remaining 50% balance.
  3. When the balance is paid, the booking status becomes Fully Paid / Confirmed.

If a customer books within the final-payment window, the full 100% is due immediately — no deposit split. Payouts are processed automatically by Stripe after each payment.

7. Cancelling a Confirmed Booking

You can cancel a booking that is in Partially Paid or Fully Paid status. Cancelling issues a full refund to the customer via Stripe. This action cannot be undone.

Use cancellation only in exceptional circumstances such as tour cancellation due to force majeure or a safety incident. Refunds typically reach the customer within 5–10 business days.

8. Tips for Operators

  • Act on pending requests quickly. Customers waiting for assignment receive no payment prompt until you accept. A slow response can lead to lost bookings.
  • Keep capacity accurate. Set realistic pilot and pillion seat counts on each tour to avoid overbooking situations.
  • Use Sold Out instead of Unpublish when a tour is full but you want it to remain visible for future interest.
  • Check your messages. Customers may reach out before or after booking with questions — respond within 24 hours as required by the Seller/Operator Agreement.