Rental contracts and returns, checked against your rental system.

A contract opens at the counter or on the delivery truck: the unit, the rate, the start date, the hour meter and fuel going out, the jobsite and the customer's PO. When the machine comes back, someone checks it in, and someone else closes the contract in your rental system.

During the test, AI takes that same paperwork and drafts the closing charges for each contract, noting wherever the paper and your rental system disagree. Nothing is entered anywhere. Your reviewer checks every draft against the invoice that actually went out.

Rental time comes first. Many rate cards run by the day, the week and four weeks rather than the calendar month, and a long rental bills every 28 days, which makes 13 invoices a year instead of 12. The edges differ by contract. Some bill a rental that runs past three days as a full week, and one past three weeks at the full four-week rate; some count the delivery day and the return day as whole days; others prorate.

Rates generally assume one shift: 8 meter hours a day, 40 a week, 160 per four weeks. Hours past that bill as overtime, at a set share of the rate for each extra hour or as a surcharge, depending on the agreement. So the out and in readings both have to be right, whether they come from a driver's handwriting or a photo of the display. A meter that stopped working, or a return reading lower than the one going out, has to be flagged, not billed.

Then the return charges. Fuel is logged at check-in as a gauge reading or a photo and becomes a refuel charge at your rate on the day the machine came in. Machines with a diesel exhaust fluid tank add a second level to read at check-in. Damage has to be told apart from normal wear, tied to the check-in notes and photos, and billed according to what the customer chose on the damage waiver. Cleaning, environmental and delivery or pickup charges sit on top, where your terms include them.

When the clock stops depends on your terms: at the call-off, at pickup, or when the machine is checked back in. Some dealer contracts run until the customer calls the rental off and gets a release number, and leave the customer responsible for the machine until it is picked up. Others keep rent running on a machine that came back dirty or damaged until it is put right. A call-off date, a pickup ticket and an invoice that disagree are what customers dispute.

Last, the paper against the system. The signed contract can carry a negotiated rate, the customer's PO, a jobsite, or a rental purchase option where an agreed share of each payment goes toward buying the machine. If the counter keyed something different into your rental system, whether that is a module of your dealer management system or a separate rental package, the invoice follows the system, not the signature. Your reviewer will watch those mismatches as closely as the math.

After your reviewer's yes, contracts run through it live as machines come back, for about 30 days.

Every draft waits for someone on your rental desk to approve it before anything is entered in your rental system or an invoice goes out.

The side-by-side keeps running on live contracts. A second job starts only after those 30 days, and only if you want one.