Reservation

In this module the customer associate will collect the basic information about Ride, like pickup, drop-off, extra stops, extra services etc, lot of information in this module is pre saved meaning the information regarding the passenger is stored in database, and if the same passenger calls, the screen will be filled with his information based on his profile id. The module is also flexible to store any User Defined Fields (UDF's) like cost center, employed it etc, once the required details are given, based on the pickup and drop off zones the pricing engine will calculate the amount it costs for the ride.

 

Pricing Engine

This is the heart of the system as it calculates the ride cost based on the different parameters of the ride which includes the specials prices for different account types of the user profile, ride type (airport or regular), discounts for loyal customers etc.

 

Dispatch Module

Once the ride is confirmed with use, the system goes through Dispatch module where the ride is dispatched to a chauffeur based on the schedule of chauffeurs, the chauffeurs get this information on their MDT / TWP (two way pagers) and from then on they can communicate with Fleet Control at Boston Coach for various functionalities like chauffeur at location, passenger in car, any extra stops or services and so on, once the ride is completed the chauffeur communicates the same through TWP by sending a code to the system.

 

Vehicle Tracking

When the ride is in progress, this module is the key as the chauffeur communications is live in this module based on different codes that a chauffeur can send from his TWP like Code 4,5,6, and so on, this module also tracks all the communication that is sent to TWP from fleet control.

 

Ride Closeout

Once the ride is completed, the ride is closed which then starts the Accounting process, the accounting process involves Accounts Receivable and invoicing modules. The accounts receivable is used for different payments options like invoice payments, account payments and so on, the invoicing module deals with all the credit card rides so the rides that are completed are submitted for final settlement through batch process to different CC processors

 

Credit Card Transaction Manager

In 2011 Boston Coach has decided that they are going to change their CC processor to Elavon, and so the CC process has been changed drastically, the Elavon processer requires lot of customized data which is used to process the ride payments, the major change is adding the functionality of Reversals, the prior processer did not support reversal which used to cost Boston Coach for a fee, the Elavon processor which supports Reversals for cancelled rides where pre authorization is made on card or change of CC on ride and already a pre auth is done on the old card, the reversals are submitted to Elavon, this was achieved by developing SQL jobs and a real time monitor which creates the batches with these rides and submits to Elavon.

 

Above are some important modules in O2, when the life cycle is in process there are some sub systems which sends email, confirms, modifications to rides, reminders to passengers.

 

In 2010 Boston Coach started a new project called NPI (New Product initiative) ,the main aim of this project is to add Connection Vehicle types which are basically economy sedans to the existing fleet. This required lot of customizations and changes to O2, through this new product each customer account is given a preference to set their account type so that when a economy sedan is available for the given pickup and drop-off the customer is offered that service, based on this the pricing engine which is changed to accommodate this new vehicle type calculates the price of the ride

 

VWS (Vendor Web Service)

Boston Coach has many automated channels where the rides are created from those channels in O2, we have developed a new web service for TranspoNet (a Vendor) through which rides are created, modified and closed, all these actions are performed through a web service developed using latest .NET framework, the communication are done in a secure way and lot of information is exchanged between 2 systems through web services, this VWS is developed for a flexible process, so it new vendors for Boston Coach can be added to system with a very little effort as lot of the configuration is data driven and can be configured in quick time.