Getting started - Plugixa Car Parking

This page takes you from installing the plugin to seeing your first test booking in the admin. It takes about ten minutes and needs no payment account, because activation creates a starter car park you can book straight away.

Install

From a ZIP

1. In wp-admin, go to Plugins -> Add New -> Upload Plugin.
2. Choose the plugin ZIP and install it.
3. Activate.

By hand

Upload the plugixa-car-parking folder to /wp-content/plugins/, then activate it from Plugins.

Requirements

• WordPress 6.5 or higher
• PHP 8.2 or higher

The plugin uses Freemius for licensing and updates. After activation it asks whether you want to share diagnostic data. Skip leaves the plugin fully working and sends nothing. See Privacy and uninstall.

What activation does

• Creates the plugin’s own database tables.
• Gives the Administrator role the plugin’s capabilities. No other role gets access.
• Stores the default settings: currency USD, new bookings start as Pending, Pay on arrival switched on and booking emails switched on.
• Schedules an hourly job that expires pending bookings nobody confirmed.
• Creates starter content, so the booking form works before you configure anything.

The starter content

What	Details
Four space types	Standard, Covered, Disabled and Electric
One location	Main Car Park, active, open around the clock, billed per day
Its spaces	50 Standard, 20 Covered, 5 Disabled and 10 Electric
Prices	A price per day and per hour for each type, from 8.00 to 18.00 per day
One booking form	Default Booking Form, with the slug default

Each part is created only when its list is empty, and only on activation. An update never puts back something you deleted. The starter prices are added together with the starter location, so on a site that already has a location the four space types arrive without prices.

Rename, edit or delete any of it. See Locations and Space types.

Activation does not create any page. You place the form yourself, below.

Where the menu is

Open Car Parking in the WordPress admin menu. Under it are shortcuts to Dashboard, Bookings, Calendar, Locations and Settings.

All of them open the same page: a single application with its own sidebar. Every screen lives inside it.

Sidebar group	Screens
(top)	Dashboard
Bookings	Bookings, Calendar
Car parks	Locations, Space types
Sales	Payments, Coupons, and with Pro PRO Extras, Tax rates, Pricing rules and Customer groups
Configuration	Booking forms, Settings

A search box at the top finds bookings and jumps to any screen. See Dashboard.

Step 1: Check the basics

Open Car Parking -> Settings.

1. On General, set Business name, Currency code and Currency symbol, and the date and time format.
2. On Notifications, check Sender address and Send new-booking notices to. Both start as the site’s admin email.
3. Click Save.

Every option is described in Settings.

Step 2: Make the car park yours

1. Open Car Parking -> Locations and edit Main Car Park. Give it your name and address.
2. Set its Opening hours, and how many spaces of each type it has in the Spaces panel.
3. Open Car Parking -> Space types, edit each type you keep, and set its prices in the Prices panel.

A space type needs a price in the unit its location is billed in. A type with a price per day and none per hour costs nothing at a location billed per hour. See Pricing.

Step 3: Place the booking form

1. Create a page, for example “Book parking”.

2. Add this shortcode, or the Car Parking Booking Form block:

   [plugixa_car_parking]
   

3. Publish the page.

See Shortcodes and Blocks.

Step 4: Add the two customer pages

These are optional, and worth the two minutes.

1. Create a page that holds [plugixa_car_parking_summary]. In Settings -> Bookings -> Pages, choose it as Booking summary page. Booking emails then carry a private link to the customer’s booking.
2. Create a page that holds [plugixa_car_parking_account]. Customers use it to find a booking and cancel it. See Customer account.

Step 5: Take a test booking

1. Open the booking page in a private window, so you see it as a visitor.
2. Choose the dates and click Check availability.
3. Pick a space type, fill in your details and confirm.
4. Note the reference on the confirmation. It starts with PKG-.

Each step is described in Booking wizard.

Step 6: See it in the admin

Open Car Parking -> Bookings. The test booking is at the top, with the status Pending.

• Open it and click Confirm to accept it.
• A pending booking that nobody confirms or pays expires after 30 minutes and frees its space. Change that in Settings -> Bookings -> Booking window. See Availability.
• When the customer pays at the car park, record it in the booking’s Payments panel. See Payments.

Two emails were sent for the booking: one to the customer and one to you. If neither arrived, see Troubleshooting.

What to do next

To	Read
Add fields to the form, or make a second form	Booking forms
Offer discount codes	Coupons
Change what the emails say	Emails
See what Pro adds	Free vs Pro