Booking Rooster Course Management Software is popular with businesses that offer Heavy Traffic, Licence Endorsement, Forklift Operator and EWP training courses. This fully kiwi owned and operated business has provided discounts to members of the New Zealand Institute of Driver Educators NZIDE who attend conference since 2023. Now, it has introduced a new year-round offer for NZIDE members.
Booking Rooster's Digital Alchemist Jenna Tournier, says the organisation is pleased to support NZIDE members. "We really like NZIDE's focus on raising the standard of driving instructors in New Zealand and its emphasis on ethics. It aligns well with our approach to business and to the training sector." Most of the driver training businesses that use Booking Rooster Software use the company's Bantam Weight service plan, plus a few add-on services. "That's why we've structured this offer as Bantam Weight + 2. It helps NZIDE members get the most out of their Booking Rooster software, and save."
About Booking Rooster Software
The Tauranga based company released its course management software in 2013 and upgrades it each year to keep the technology current. Upgrades are included in all Booking Rooster Service plans - so is user-support. The company's aim is simple - to deliver training providers high return on their software investment by streamlining processes, adding efficiency and making it easier for people to book training.
Booking Rooster Founder Moira Moroney, has a special interest in the driver training sector. She previously co-owned and managed a third party warehousing operation servicing kiwi exporters and is an active member of the Chartered Institute of Transport and Logistics (CILT).
Customers book themselves and/or you add bookings.
The software includes a state-of-the art booking platform designed to allow users to self-book and for your team to add bookings that come in by phone or email. You control which courses are visible to the public for self-booking and which are kept Private. You don't need to replace your website to add this technology - it can be easily attached to your existing website. Many businesses simply add a 'Book Now' button to their website. Some have their web developers use the Booking Rooster "API" to list course details in their website. You control whether a course is available publicly and the maximum numbers for each course.
Trainer calendar feeds
There are many features to help trainers and ensure good record-keeping. Trainers can see their course calendar online and even receive automated notifications when they are assigned to a course date. The trainer clicks a link from the notification email or course calendar view to see the class list and record training outcomes for students. This can be as simple as a few clicks and comments or involve a comprehensive set of assessment criteria for things like in-cab assessments. In some businesses the trainers are still technology-shy. If that's the case for you, its possible to have an administrator record the assessment from paper-records. The most popular add-on service for trainers is automatic feed to their Outlook or Google Calendar. In this feature the course is auto-added to their Outlook or Google Calendar when they are assigned to the course. If the course is cancelled, the venue for a classroom session changed or the likes, these are automatically updated. The Outlook or Google calendar view is an add-on feature for businesses on on the Bantam Weight Service plan and a standard feature in the Middle Weight plan. You can see more details about this feature here.
Automated Certificates
Once learning outcomes have been recorded you can email certificates of accomplishment to those who passed - and to the employer who requested the training in a few clicks. Many businesses like to control when these are sent, often so that they are not issued before payment is received. You can see more about creating your own certificates here. If you prefer even more automation and efficiency you can add the automated-certificate send feature discussed at the bottom of this link - also an add-on feature for businesses on on the Bantam Weight Service plan and a standard feature in the Middle Weight plan. The automated send can be triggered by the fact the trainer has awarded the certificate, or after approval by a quality controller or administrator. Booking Rooster hasn't forgotten the challenge of printing direct onto the NZTA form straight from the software. That option is available to all driver training businesses at no extra charge.
Automated record-keeping
The learning records you enter are stored automatically and available to download as a report at any time. When your auditor arrives, simply search the driver name or certificate number in your Booking Rooster software and you'll quickly find all records you have about them. You also have an NZTA report with details of students and results for NZTA qualifications, an NZQA Report with details of NZQA qualifications, an optional AF02 report.and an optional report for worksafe certificates. The certficates report may be a Forklift Operator Certicate report like the one discussed on this link, or may cover a wider range of qualifications. If you register qualifications direct with NZQA you can even download a file covering all students and qualifications in a date range and upload it to NZQA. If you offer unit standards via another agency a custom report is added so you can provide data to them by downloading and emailing a report. Most qualifications authorities require trainers to collect post-course evaluations from students. The 'evaluation form' add-on from Booking Rooster allows you to collect this data online and print a report covering the responses for any time period. That's one more administration headache removed.
Communication and Marketing
There's a heavy emphasis on communication in the software. Booking confirmations are sent automatically - and in cases where you want manual intervention before confirmation the request is automatically acknowledged. Those who register for the course are sent email reminders before the course. This helps reduce no-shows - a big time waster for training businesses. You can see more information about the course-day email reminders here.The optional SMS reminder service can be used to alert people about the course 1-2 days out to further reduce no-shows. Add to this the in-built email marketing tools to promote individual courses or all upcoming courses of a type, in an area, or in a date range and you have a lot of communications and marketing power on the Bantam Weight plan. You can boost the marketing effort even more with marketing add-ons. The most popular automated marketing add-on's in the driver training sector are renewal reminders and progression reminders. Renewal reminders look at the expiry date you have stored for the driver's last forklift operator certificate, Dangerous Goods licence or other certificate that expires and sends them a friendly reminder - with a link to all your upcoming course dates for that type of course. Progression reminders are very useful for heavy vehicle training. The software uses a combination of the issue date of a person's Class 2 licence and their date of birth to trigger an email offering them a class 4 licence course at an appropriate time and something similar when they are likely to be eligible to progress from class 4 to class 5.
Support by Kiwi's for Kiwi's
When you work with Booking Rooster your software is fully set-up and supported by kiwis who are available in our business hours. Once its set-up your team receive online training on the basics so they can be up and running quickly. When you need help you simply email Booking Rooster and can expect a response same day. If its more urgent , you are encouraged to phone for help. The software is very powerful straight out of the box - but each business has their own business rules and if the standard approach doesn't fully fit your processes its usually possible to have things customised to suit. All custom projects are quoted or estimated before work starts, so you are never committed to unexpected costs.
Options for all shapes and size of business
Booking Rooster have options to suit businesses with any number of trainers. Most driver training businesses choose the Booking Rooster's Bantam Weight plan ($695+GST set-up and a monthly service plan of $395+GST per month) and add 2 or 3 add-on services. Since the NZIDE special covers the Bantam Weight plan +2 add on features, it's very likely it will be all you need. How many extra people would you need to train to totally cover that cost?
The NZIDE Special OFFER - Bantam weight + 2
Driver training businesses that identify themselves as NZIDE members to Booking Rooster qualify to have any two add-on features fees-free when signing up to the"Bantam Weight" plan. The offer covers set-up and the monthly service fee for the add-on services. The add-on options are:
- Automated marketing package - this includes 'renewal reminders' for qualifications that need to be renewed regularly (usually 24, 36 or 60 months after certificate issue) and 'progression reminders'. The progression reminders are based on the last class of license passed and the driver's date of birth. They simply let the driver know that they are likely to be eligible for the next class of license soon. You can see more details about this feature here.
- Automated certificate sending - so Forklift Operator Certificates and other certificates of accomplishment are sent automatically once approved by the instructor or quality controller. You can see more details about automated certificate sending here.
- Post-course evaluation - your own evaluation form made accessible from a QR code you display in course or a link automatically emailed to the driver after the course. They enter their responses and you see them in a report you can run any time.
- Partner programme - this recognises your key account-holders or 'partners' as they book and applies your own special terms to their bookings. This is useful if you offer corporate discounts or if you allow some customers to pay on the 20th of the month after booking but want to require (or simply encourage) everyone else to pay before the course. It's great for improving cash-flow. You can see more details of the partner programme feature here.
- Outlook or Google calendar feeds - puts events automatically into the trainer's own Outlook or Google Calendar and updates the event as tickets are sold. You can see more details about this feature here.
The booking Rooster team is happy to help you explore these options.
Your next steps
To explore this option simply email support@bookingrooster.co.nz or call 07 575 6903 or 09 390 5221. We usually start with a quick phone discussion. If it sounds like Booking Rooster might be for you, we encourage you to meet with us online so we can understand more about your business and you can explore how Booking Rooster could help you streamline processes and boost your customer communication.
