Facilities
Answers on facilities in Muin — listing your rooms and spaces, taking booking requests, avoiding double-bookings, and charging for use of a space.
19 questions
How do I rent out our hall?
1. In the sidebar, open **Facility Rentals**. 2. Open the **Spaces** tab and add the hall: a name people would recognize, a **Space Type**, a **Description** and the **Rules** for that room. 3. Under **Insurance & Deposit** and **Cancellation Policy**, set the deposit percentage, the cancellation fee and deadline, and whether an outside renter must show proof of insurance. 4. Turn on **Available for Rental** and save. 5. Open the space again and add a rate card under its **Rate Cards** tab, so bookings can be priced. 6. Take bookings from the **Bookings** tab, or let people request the hall through your public form. A space only appears for booking once **Available for Rental** is on.
How do I book a room for someone who called?
Open **Facility Rentals** → **Bookings** → **New Booking**, choose the **Space**, then the **Event Date**, **Start Time** and **End Time**. Muin checks the space while you fill the form, so a clash shows up before you save rather than after. Then record the **Event Type**, **Event Name** and **Expected Attendance**, and the renter's **Renter Name**, **Email**, **Phone** and **Organization**. Tick **Is Member** if a member rate should apply. Save, and the booking starts at **Requested**.
Can two groups end up booked in the same room at the same time?
No. Muin checks a space against both facility bookings **and** calendar events, and it blocks in both directions: a room committed to one of your own events cannot also be rented out, and a rented room cannot have an event dropped on top of it. The check runs when a booking is created or moved. Setup and teardown times on the space extend each booking either side, so Muin can refuse a slot that looks free on the grid. That is deliberate: it is the gap your crew needs. To check a slot without creating anything, open the **Public listing** tab and use the availability checker.
How do I set who has to approve a hall booking?
Approval chains are authored under **Settings** → **Automation**, and the facility **Settings** page links straight to them: open **Facility Rentals** → **Settings** and use **Set up approval rules** under *Who approves a booking*. A booking can be sent to one or more people to say yes before the space is held, and you choose how long they have to answer. Once a rule covers facility bookings, the booking page stops offering a direct **Approve** and offers **Send for approval** and then **Approve in the inbox** instead, because the decision belongs to the named approvers. A direct approve is refused while the rule is on. Facility Rentals setup creates a rule that sends every request to the owner. If you run the space on your own, send the booking for approval yourself, then approve it from your inbox: you are asked for a short note saying why, and the note stays on the booking's record. To require a second person instead, change the rule in **Settings** → **Approvals**.
Where do I set the deposit and the cancellation fee?
On each space, not for the whole organization, because a hall and a classroom rarely carry the same terms. Open **Facility Rentals** → **Spaces**, open the space, and set: - **Requires Deposit** and the **Deposit Percentage** - **Cancellation Policy Text**, **Cancellation Fee (%)** and **Cancellation Deadline (hours)** - **Requires Insurance** and the **Minimum Coverage ($)** you accept Cancel inside the deadline and the fee applies; cancel earlier and it does not. When you press **Cancel this booking**, the dialog shows the amount, the percentage and the deadline before you confirm.
Why don't my changes on the Facility Rental Settings page stick?
That page saves two things: **Email notifications for new bookings** and **Email notifications for status changes**. Change them and press **Save Changes**. Everything else on the page is a door to where the setting really lives: - deposit, cancellation terms and insurance are per space, under **Open your spaces** - who approves a booking is an approval rule, under **Set up approval rules** - bookings arriving from another system are configured under **Set up a booking webhook**
How do I close the hall for Ramadan or a holiday?
Use a blackout date. Open **Facility Rentals** → **Spaces**, open the space, go to its **Blackout Dates** tab and add one with the dates and a reason. Pick how completely it closes: - **Full**: every booking, internal and external - **External only**: outside renters only, so your own programming and your members can still book - **Reduced hours**: a slice of each day; bookings wholly outside that window are still accepted Leave the space empty to apply the blackout across every space you rent.
Someone reported a broken air conditioner. Where does that go?
It becomes a work order. Open **Facility Rentals** → **Work orders** and raise one, or report damage on a completed booking and the work order is raised for you. A preventive schedule coming due raises one too. From there: assign it to staff or dispatch it to a contractor, then close it with what was actually done. The write-up is required, because a work order closed with no write-up cannot answer later what was fixed. One thing to know: closing a preventive work order does not move the next due date. Record the completion on the recurring register (**Inspections**, under **Compliance**) to do that.
How do I see what our building earned and which rooms sat empty?
Six reports sit on the **Facility Rentals** tab strip: - **Revenue**: what each space earned, by period - **How busy**: what share of your available hours was actually booked - **Rent mix**: how much of the rent was equipment rather than the room - **Past Events**: how last season actually went, rather than what is booked ahead - **Idle time**: where the buildings are idle and what that is worth - **Audit check**: what a reviewer would ask for, and what is missing Revenue, How busy and Rent mix read your bookings directly. Idle time and Audit check are produced by the facility agents, so turn those on and add your permits and inspections before the first run.
How much does Facility Rentals cost?
$29 a month, or $290 a year, for up to 2 spaces. **Usage** on **Products → Facility Rentals** shows how many bookable spaces you have against what your plan includes. Adding a space past your plan's count is refused with a message naming the plan to move to.
What does Run setup do for Facility Rentals?
On **Products → Facility Rentals**, **Run setup**: - Drafts one space for each room your website names, with its capacity when the page states one. Drafted spaces are not open for booking until you check them and turn on **Available for Rental**. - Suggests an hourly and a full-day rate for every space without a price. - Writes renter rules and a cancellation policy, adds an approval rule that sends every request to the owner, and creates and publishes your rental request form. It only fills what is empty, so running it again never overwrites your changes.
What does Facility Rentals need before it can go live?
**Go live** waits for every checklist item: a room people can book, the rules renters must accept, a price, who says yes, a priced space open for booking, a live rental request form, and Stripe connected so renters can pay deposits online. Each missing item has a **Fix** link.
How do I put the rental request form on my website?
Open **Products → Facility Rentals → Install on your website**, copy the snippet, and paste it on the page where renters should ask for a space. It shows your request form with your availability. On WordPress you can use the Muin plugin: create a connect code on the Product Home, paste it into **Settings → Muin**, and add the **Muin Facility Rentals** block to a page.
What does a renter see after sending a request?
The thank-you screen gives them a status link. It needs no account. It shows each step of the request, what you still need from them, and what they owe. Until you answer, they can withdraw the request there, and nothing has been charged. Once approved, they receive the rental agreement to sign, and the status page offers the deposit payment link first, then the balance.
Does Muin tell us whether our rental income is taxable?
No. Muin does not give a tax or legal opinion. The facilities audit (the **Audit check** tab in Facility Rentals) sets the rules beside your records, so you know what to ask your adviser. Each finding has four parts: 1. **The rule**: the federal rule on unrelated business income from renting real property and any state tax on renting real estate that your state's registry entry lists. 2. **Its official source**, with when it was read. 3. **Your record**: the year's priced rentals and what they charged for the room, for equipment and for services. 4. **The question for your adviser.** The same audit covers accessibility: ADA Title III and its exemption for religious organizations, and Section 504 where you receive federal financial assistance. When no rule for your state is on file, the audit says so and compares only the federal rules.
How does the renter organization registry check work?
When a booking's screening includes the organization step, Muin searches the state business registry for your organization's state by the renting organization's name. The registry comes from Muin's jurisdiction registry: the corporations and charities filing system your state's registry entry names. The booking's **Screening** card shows one of two answers: - **Searched**: the registry, the name searched, how many results came back and how many match the name exactly. - **Not performed**: the reason, with a link to search the registry yourself. This is what you see when the registry site blocks automated searches, when no registry is on file for your state, or when the registry gives no readable answer. When the automated search was not performed or found no exact match, search the registry yourself and press **Record a manual registry search**. Enter what you found (**Active entity found**, **Inactive entity found** or **No entity found**), when you searched, the registry page you searched, and for a found entity its name and status. The card then shows **Recorded by** with your name and the date. The organization step is **Verified** only when your own record is complete and the registry confirms an active entity, by an exact name match from the automated search or by a search by hand that found an active entity. Everything else is **Not performed** with the reason; a renter is never failed because a registry could not be read. A search that was not performed is never shown as "no match". This is a business registration lookup only; Muin does not run criminal or offender-registry checks on renters.
How do I import our past bookings without emailing staff?
Go to **Settings → Data Import** and choose **Facility Rental History**. Upload a CSV with one row per booking: the space, the renter, the event date and times, and what you charged. - The import sends staff no new-booking notifications. - A booking dated before today lands as **Completed**; a later one lands as **Requested**. - The amount you charged is the booking's price, so no rate card has to match it. - Your own booking id is kept. Search for it on the **Bookings** list. - A blank minors, alcohol or amplified-sound answer is recorded as not answered, never as no. - A row that cannot land is listed with its reason, and the other rows still land.
Can a renter pay the deposit or balance by bank transfer?
Yes, when your organization accepts bank transfers. Open **Payments → Settings** and turn on **ACH Bank Transfer**. Every rental pay link then offers bank transfer next to card. - A bank transfer takes 2 to 4 business days to clear. Until it does, the renter's booking page shows **Payment pending**, and the hold on the space is kept. - The deposit or balance counts as paid only once the transfer clears. - If the bank returns the transfer, the renter gets an email with a new payment link, and your admins get a notification. The booking stays waiting for that payment. - Who pays the processing fee is the same **Allow payers to cover processing fees** setting (under **Fee Coverage**) that applies to cards. - If too many of your bank debits are reported as unauthorized (above the 0.5% bank network limit), bank transfer is paused on your pay links until the rate comes back down. Cards keep working.
How do I make sure renters name us as additional insured?
Open the space under **Facility Rentals → Spaces** and turn on **Requires Insurance**. In **Additional insured name**, enter the name renters must list, usually your organization's legal name. When a renter uploads a certificate, Muin checks that this name appears as the certificate holder or in the additional insured notes. An address or a legal suffix such as "Inc." next to the name is fine. A certificate naming someone else is refused, and the reason tells the renter to ask their insurer to add the exact name. Leave the field blank to check only that the certificate lists an additional insured.
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