Hostel rooms and residents

The hostel area tracks your buildings, rooms and beds, who lives where, and what each resident is charged. Use it when you open a hostel, at the start of each term, and whenever a resident arrives, moves or leaves.

Before you start

• The student or staff member must already have a record.
• Know your buildings: name, type, gender, and who the warden is.
• Know each room's number, type, how many beds it has and the monthly bed charge.
• You need permission for hostel blocks, rooms and residents. Leave and gate passes are a separate permission.

If you do not see this option, it may not be included in your plan or your role may not have permission; ask your administrator.

Steps

Set up blocks and rooms

1. Go to Hostel > Buildings / Blocks and click Add New Block.
2. Enter the Block Name, Block Type, Gender, Warden and, if you have one, Assistant Warden. Save.
3. Go to Hostel > Rooms and click Add New Room.
4. Choose the Block, then enter the Room Number, Room Type, Bed Capacity and Bed Charges (Monthly). Save.
5. Repeat for each room. The rooms list shows Available / Beds so you can see free space at a glance.

Give a room to a resident

1. Go to Hostel > Residents.
2. Click Issue Room and choose Issue Room to Student or Issue Room to Staff.
3. Use Select Student (or Select Staff) to find the person.
4. Choose the room and bed, set the Start Date, and add any Discount on the bed charge.
5. Save. The person now appears in the residents list with their room and monthly charge.

Day-to-day changes

• Shift Room moves a resident to another room or bed and keeps the history.
• Suspend pauses a resident (for example on long leave or for disciplinary reasons). Use Lift Suspension to bring them back.
• Vacate ends the stay when a resident leaves. The bed becomes free again.
• From a resident's record you can see Resident History, Hostel Fee History, Issued Items, Meal Plan and Approved Visitors.

Leave and gate passes

1. Go to Hostel > Leave / Gate Pass and click New Leave / Gate Pass.
2. Choose the Resident, the dates and times, and the Reason. Save.
3. Approve or Reject the request. Use Print Pass if the gate needs a paper copy.
4. When the resident comes back, click Mark Returned.

Good to know

• Fill rooms through Issue Room, not by editing room capacity, so the bed count stays correct.
• Use Suspend Selected, Vacate Selected or SMS Selected to act on several residents at once, for example at the end of term.
• Items such as mattresses or lockers given to a resident can be recorded and later returned to stock.
• Visitor Log, Attendance and Requests under the hostel menu cover visits, roll call and resident requests.
• Text messages depend on your region and on the messaging provider your institution has connected.

Common questions

Why can I not pick a room?

The room may be full. Check Available / Beds on the rooms list, or add beds to the room if it really has space.

For an overview, see Hostel.