Product Rentals

Overview

Product Rentals sells a product for a period rather than outright. A customer picks a start and end date, the module prices the hire from the product's rental periods, takes a deposit, and tracks the item until it comes back.

What distinguishes it from a booking is what happens after the hire. A rental has an expected return date and an actual one; when the return is recorded, a late fee is calculated from how many days it ran over. A damage fee can be recorded against the rental, and the deposit has its own status so it can be held, returned or kept.

Availability is a calendar of reserved dates per product, which is also how an administrator blocks dates for maintenance — the same mechanism, a different block type.

It is for hire businesses: equipment, costumes, vehicles, party goods.

Availability

Item	Value
Module key	rentals
Tier	Premium
Entitlement key	rentals
Admin tab	rentals
Enabled option	aiowc_module_enabled_rentals (off until turned on)
REST namespace	aiowc/v1

Enabling the module creates the three tables below, seeds the defaults and schedules both jobs.

registerHooks() performs no licence check of its own; the module registry applies the entitlement gate centrally before calling it.

Settings

Stored in the bundled option row aiowc_rt_settings.

Stored key	Default	Meaning
enable_daily_rentals	true	Whether daily hire is offered.
enable_weekly_rentals	true	Whether weekly hire is offered.
enable_monthly_rentals	true	Whether monthly hire is offered.
default_rental_period	daily	Which period a product starts with.
min_rental_days	1	Shortest hire accepted.
max_rental_days	30	Longest hire accepted.
require_deposit	true	Whether a deposit is taken.
default_deposit_percent	20	The deposit as a percentage of the hire price.
enable_late_fees	true	Whether a late return is charged for.
late_fee_daily_percent	5	The daily late fee, as a percentage.
reminder_days_before	2	How far ahead of the return date a reminder goes out.
buffer_days_between	1	Days left free between hires, for cleaning and turnaround.
allow_same_day_pickup	false	Whether a hire may start today. Off by default.
show_availability_calendar	true	Whether the calendar is shown on the product page.
auto_mark_overdue_days	1	Days past the return date before a rental is marked overdue.

buffer_days_between is the setting that separates this from a naive calendar: without it, one customer's return date and the next customer's pickup date can be the same day.

Rental periods

A product carries its own period rows, so pricing is per product rather than global:

Field	Meaning
period_type	daily, weekly or monthly.
price	What one period costs.
min_duration, max_duration	How many periods may be hired.
deposit_percent, deposit_fixed	The deposit, as a percentage or a fixed amount.
late_fee_percent, late_fee_fixed	The late fee, likewise.
is_active	Whether the period is offered.

Per-product values override the module defaults, so a valuable item can take a larger deposit than the rest of the catalogue.

The rental

Field	Meaning
rental_start, rental_end	The hire period as booked.
actual_return_date	When the item actually came back. Empty while it is out.
status	Where the rental is in its life. pending at creation.
rental_price	The hire charge.
deposit_amount, deposit_status	The deposit and whether it is held, returned or kept.
late_fee, damage_fee	Charges added after the fact.
pickup_location, return_location	Where the item is collected and returned — which may differ.
notes	Anything recorded against the hire.

The availability calendar

Each reserved day is a row naming the product, the quantity reserved and a block type, which defaults to rental. An administrator blocking dates writes rows with a different block type, so maintenance and hire share one calendar and remain distinguishable.

Admin screen

The Rentals tab lists rentals with an overview, records a return, cancels a rental, manages each product's rental periods, blocks and unblocks dates, and edits the fifteen settings.

REST API endpoints

All routes are on aiowc/v1 and answer with the { success, data, message } envelope.

Method	Path	Purpose	Permission	Required args
GET	/rentals	Every rental.	manage_woocommerce	–
GET	/rentals/{id}	One rental.	manage_woocommerce	id
PATCH / PUT /POST	/rentals/{id}	Update a rental.	manage_woocommerce	id
POST	/rentals/{id}/return	Record the return.	manage_woocommerce	id, return_date
POST	/rentals/{id}/cancel	Cancel a rental.	manage_woocommerce	id
GET	/rentals/overview	Counts and totals.	manage_woocommerce	–
GET / POST	/rentals/products/{product_id}/periods	Read and set a product's rental periods.	manage_woocommerce	product_id, periods on write
POST / DELETE	/rentals/products/{product_id}/block-dates	Block and unblock dates.	manage_woocommerce	product_id, start_date, end_date
GET / PATCH / PUT / POST	/rentals/settings	Read and write the settings.	manage_woocommerce	–
GET	/rentals/my-rentals	The caller's own rentals.	Signed-in user	–
GET	/rentals/products/{product_id}/calendar	A product's availability for a month.	Public, rate-limited	product_id, month
GET	/rentals/products/{product_id}/options	A product's rental options.	Public, rate-limited	product_id
POST	/rentals/check-availability	Whether a period is free.	Public, rate-limited	product_id, start_date, end_date
POST	/rentals/calculate-price	Price a proposed hire.	Public, rate-limited	product_id, period_type, duration

There is no create route: a rental is created by the customer buying it, not by an administrator posting one.

WooCommerce integration

Hook	What the module does
woocommerce_before_add_to_cart_button	Draws the date picker and the availability calendar.
woocommerce_add_to_cart_validation	Refuses a hire whose dates are unavailable or out of bounds.
woocommerce_add_cart_item_data	Captures the chosen dates into the cart item.
woocommerce_get_item_data	Shows the hire period in the cart and at checkout.
woocommerce_checkout_create_order_line_item	Writes the hire onto the order line.
woocommerce_order_status_processing / _completed	Creates the rental and reserves the dates.
wp_enqueue_scripts	Loads the calendar assets.

The module registers no shortcode and adds no product type: any product becomes rentable by being given rental periods.

Database schema

Table	Holds
{prefix}aiowc_rentals	The hires: order and item, product, customer, quantity, the period as booked and as returned, status, price, deposit and its status, late and damage fees, pickup and return locations, notes.
{prefix}aiowc_rental_periods	Per-product pricing: period type, price, duration bounds, deposit and late fee as percentage or fixed.
{prefix}aiowc_rental_calendar	One row per reserved day: the product, the rental, the date, the quantity reserved and the block type.

Background jobs

Hook	Interval	Work
aiowc_rentals_return_reminders	hourly	Reminds customers whose return date is reminder_days_before away.
aiowc_rentals_process_overdue	daily	Sets the status of rentals more than auto_mark_overdue_days past their return date to overdue, and fires aiowc_rental_overdue for each. It calculates no fee.

Both run on WP-Cron. The overdue job is offset three hours from the module being enabled, and the reminder job one hour, so they do not collide.

Action hooks for integrators

Hook	Fired when
aiowc_rental_overdue	A rental passes its return date.
aiowc_rental_return_reminder	A return reminder is due.
aiowc_track_event	The module is enabled or disabled.

Entitlement limits

rentals is an on/off grant with no cap on rentals, periods or calendar rows. The duration bounds and fees are store settings.

Health check

The module reports a warning when its tables are missing or WooCommerce is inactive, and otherwise reports that it is functioning normally. A disabled module reports that it is disabled.

Known gaps

• Rentals are implemented twice. This standalone module and the Bookings & Rentals module, which owns aiowc_rental_inventory and aiowc_rental_reservations, are separate implementations with separate data and separate screens. A store should choose one.
• 🔴 Late and damage fees are calculated and recorded, but never charged. The late fee is worked out when the return is recorded — from the product's rental period, or from late_fee_daily_percent if the period has none — and written to the rental row. Nothing creates an order, adds a fee to one, or takes payment. Collecting the money is a manual step, and the same is true of damage_fee.
• Likewise deposit_status records what should happen to a deposit — held, returned or kept — but the module does not move money to make it so.
• Because the fee is computed at return time, a rental that is overdue and not yet returned shows a late_fee of zero. The running total a customer owes is not visible until the item comes back.
• The availability calendar is one row per reserved day, so a long hire of a popular product produces a lot of rows and there is no archival job for past dates.
• There is no create route, so a rental taken over the phone has to be entered as a WooCommerce order rather than recorded directly.