MCF User Guide
Venues & Booking
Venues are council-managed spaces available for hire — village halls, meeting rooms, sports pitches and pavilions. This page covers listing a venue, setting when it is available, blocking out dates, and handling resident booking requests through to confirmation.
This guide covers the booking workflow only — free or manually-confirmed bookings that you approve by hand. Taking online card payments for venue hire is handled separately and is not covered here.
Adding a venue
Each venue gets its own listing on the public website, with photos, capacity, facilities and an availability view that residents use to request a booking.
- Go to Community › Venues in the sidebar.
- Select New Venue (or open an existing venue to edit it).
- Fill in the venue details:
- Name — the venue name as residents will see it.
- Description — the space, its facilities and any conditions of hire.
- Capacity — the maximum number of people.
- Rates — the hourly or session rate, for information.
- Images — upload photos of the space.
- Set the venue's availability and any blackout dates (see below).
- Select Create (or Save) to publish the listing.
Setting availability
Availability tells the system which days and times a venue can be booked. Residents only ever see slots that fall inside the hours you set, so they cannot request a time when the hall is closed.
- Set the days of the week the venue is open for hire.
- Set the start and end times available on those days.
- Save your changes — the public availability view updates straight away.
Blackout dates
Blackout dates block out specific days when the venue is not available, even though it would normally be open. Use them for bank holidays, maintenance, deep cleans, or dates already committed to a regular hirer.
- Open the venue for editing.
- Add a blackout date for each day (or range) the venue is unavailable.
- Save. Those dates immediately disappear from the resident's availability view.
Add recurring closures — bank holidays, festive shutdowns — as blackout dates at the start of the year so they are ruled out before anyone tries to book them.
How residents request a booking
On the public website residents browse the venues, open a listing, check the availability view, and submit a booking request for the date and time they want. The request arrives in your admin panel as a pending booking — nothing is confirmed until you approve it.
Handling booking requests
All booking requests collect in one place for you to review and decide on.
- Go to Community › Venues.
- Select the Bookings button at the top of the page.
- You will see every booking request, with the most recent at the top.
- Open a booking to view its details — the requester's name, the venue, and the requested date and time.
- Approve, decline, or cancel the booking from this screen.
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Pending | A new request awaiting your decision. |
| Approved | You have confirmed the booking; the slot is held. |
| Declined | You have turned the request down. |
| Cancelled | A previously confirmed booking that has been called off. |
The system automatically blocks conflicting bookings for the same venue and time, so you cannot accidentally confirm two hirers into the same slot. It is still good practice to review pending requests promptly.
Check the bookings list often. Residents appreciate a quick decision, and acting on requests promptly keeps your availability view accurate for everyone else.
A typical setup, start to finish
| Step | Action |
|---|---|
| 1 | Go to Community › Venues and select New Venue. |
| 2 | Enter the name, description and capacity. |
| 3 | Add the rate information and upload photos. |
| 4 | Set the days and times the venue is available. |
| 5 | Add any blackout dates (bank holidays, maintenance). |
| 6 | Save — residents can now view the venue and request bookings. |
| 7 | Review incoming requests under Bookings and approve or decline each one. |