How to Generate a Rental Quote PDF | Latner Software Documentation

Generating a rental quote PDF turns the quote on screen into the document you send the customer, with your cover page, equipment spec sheets and terms and conditions stitched around it.

Overview

A quote is more persuasive when it looks like a proposal rather than a price list. Latner builds the quote pages from your PDF template, then wraps them in the supporting documents you have set up, so nobody has to merge PDFs by hand before hitting send.

You generate a PDF from Options › Generate Rental Quote PDF on the quote, and every generation is kept on the Rental Quote PDF History tab.
The Attached PDFs tab on the quote shows exactly what will be stitched in, and in what order, before you generate anything.
A cover page and a terms and conditions PDF can be set once in Settings, globally or per branch.
Terms and conditions can also be set per customer, which beats the setting for that customer's quotes.
PDFs attached to an equipment class or equipment model are copied onto the quote automatically when that equipment is added to it.
Both the cover and the terms can be overridden on a single quote without changing anything else.

The finished document is always assembled in this order:

Cover page
Any attachments positioned Before Main
The rental quote pages themselves
Any attachments positioned After Main
Terms and conditions
Any attachments positioned After Terms & Conditions

Before You Begin

Generating a quote PDF works out of the box, but the settings and permissions below control what you can configure around it.

Requirement	Where to Find It
Rental Quote PDF Template ID - the template your quote pages are drawn from. Leave it blank to use Latner's built-in generic quote template.	Security › Settings › PDF Templates
Rental Quote PDF Name Format - optional. Controls the generated filename, using the {{quote_number}} and {{version}} placeholders.	Security › Settings › PDF Templates
Rental Quotes permission - to open a quote and generate its PDF.	Security › Configuration › Permission Groups › Rental › Screen
Upload Documents permission - to add, edit, reorder or remove attached PDFs on a quote.	Security › Configuration › Permission Groups › Rental › Option
Create Document permission - to attach PDFs to an equipment class or equipment model.	Security › Configuration › Permission Groups › Equipment › Option
Edit Customer permission - to set or clear a customer's quote terms and conditions PDF.	Security › Configuration › Permission Groups › Customers › Option
Setting permission - to reach the Settings screen at all.	Security › Configuration › Permission Groups › Security › Screen

The Rental Quote settings under Security › Settings › PDF Templates. Leaving the Template ID blank is fine - Latner falls back to its built-in generic quote template

The cover and terms settings can be set per branch as well as globally. Switch Global to Branch at the top of the Settings screen and pick a branch to give that branch its own cover page or terms. When a quote is generated, Latner uses the branch value if there is one and falls back to the global value if there isn't.

Setting Up the Attached PDFs

Step 1 - Set the default cover page and terms

Go to Security › Settings, choose PDF Templates in the Modules list and search for Rental Quote. Two of the settings there take a PDF file:

Rental Quote Cover PDF - the pages added to the front of every rental quote PDF.
Rental Quote Terms and Conditions PDF - the pages added to the back of every rental quote PDF.

Click Upload File, pick your PDF and click Save. Only PDF files are accepted.

The Upload Cover PDF dialog. The same dialog, titled Upload T&Cs PDF, sets the terms and conditions file

Once a file is set, the button changes to Edit File with a Clear File button beneath it, so you can swap the document later or remove it altogether.

Both files set - Edit File replaces the document and Clear File removes it, which switches that part of the stitching off again

There is a separate Rental Quote PDF Terms and Conditions setting that takes formatted text rather than a file. That one prints inside the quote template itself and only works on Latner's generic templates, not custom ones. If you have your own branded template, use the Rental Quote Terms and Conditions PDF file setting instead.

Step 2 - Give a customer their own terms and conditions

Customers on a negotiated master agreement usually need their own terms rather than your standard set. Open the customer, then choose Options › Terms & Conditions › Upload Quote T&C PDF and pick the file. There is no confirmation dialog - the file uploads as soon as you select it.

The Terms & Conditions submenu on a customer. Clear Quote T&C PDF stays greyed out until a file has been uploaded

The uploaded file shows on the customer's Terms and Conditions PDFs card. From that point on, every quote for that customer uses it in place of the Rental Quote Terms and Conditions PDF setting. Use Options › Terms & Conditions › Clear Quote T&C PDF to drop back to the setting.

The Terms and Conditions PDFs card on the customer. The Rental Contract T&C PDF beside it is a separate file, used for contract PDFs rather than quotes

Step 3 - Attach PDFs to an equipment class or model

Spec sheets, operating manuals and compliance certificates belong to the machine, not the quote, so attach them once and let them follow the equipment. Open Equipment › Configuration › Classes (or Models), open the record and go to the Attached PDFs tab, then click Add PDF. Fill in:

Name - required. What the row is called in Latner; it is not printed on the PDF.
Position - required. Before Main or After Main, plus After Terms & Conditions when a terms PDF exists. Defaults to After Main.
PDF File - required, and it must be a PDF.

Adding a spec sheet to an equipment class. After Main puts it straight after the quote pages, ahead of the terms

The tab shows your PDFs between dashed markers that stand in for the cover page, the main quote pages and the terms, so you can see where each one will land. Drag a row above or below a marker to move it between positions. The Cover Page marker also has an upload icon: uploading there sets a cover page for this class or model. The terms marker has no upload icon, because terms are always resolved at the quote level.

The equipment class Attached PDFs tab. The dashed markers read From settings because the cover and terms are coming from the Settings screen

Equipment models win over equipment classes. When a quote line is added, Latner looks at the line's equipment model first and copies its attached PDFs; only if the model has none does it fall back to the equipment class. It is not a merge - one source or the other, never both.

Generating the Quote PDF

Step 4 - Check what will be attached

Open the rental quote and go to the Attached PDFs tab. Anything attached to the equipment on the quote is already there, copied across when the line was added, and the cover and terms markers tell you where each one is coming from:

From settings - the file set in Security › Settings › PDF Templates.
From customer - the customer's own quote terms and conditions PDF.
Override - a file uploaded against this quote only.
No cover set or No terms set - nothing will be stitched into that slot.

Click the open icon on any row to read the actual PDF before you send it.

The quote's Attached PDFs tab. The spec sheet arrived on its own with the equipment line, and the terms are coming from the customer rather than the settings

Step 5 - Override the cover or terms for one quote

For a tender or a named project you'll often want a one-off cover page. Click the upload icon on the Cover Page or Terms & Conditions Pages marker and choose a PDF. The marker's caption changes to Override and a reset icon appears - use it to clear the override and fall back to the default.

Use Add PDF for anything else this quote needs, such as a site-specific safety document, and drag the rows to get the order right.

A quote-specific cover page and an extra document after the terms. The reset icon beside the cover clears the override

There is only ever one cover and one set of terms on a quote. Uploading a second cover override replaces the first rather than adding to it.

Step 6 - Generate the PDF

Choose Options › Generate Rental Quote PDF. If your system has any Rental Quote PDF Templates configured, Latner asks you to pick one in a Select PDF Template dialog; if there are none, it goes straight ahead with the template from the Rental Quote PDF Template ID setting.

The option is greyed out when the quote has no detail lines, or when it is Cancelled or Lost.

Generate Rental Quote PDF on the quote's Options menu, with Email Rental Quote directly below it

Generation runs in the background and takes a few seconds. When it finishes, the PDF opens in a new browser tab, or downloads straight away if you have Auto-download files ticked under User Settings › File Settings.

After Generating

Every generated PDF is listed on the quote's Rental Quote PDF History tab with its line number, status, date, filename and who generated it. Click the filename to reopen it.
Generating again never overwrites the previous file. The first is Rental_Quote_15.pdf, the second Rental_Quote_15_v2.pdf, and so on.
A row showing Failed means the document could not be built. Check that every attached file is a valid PDF and generate again.
Options › Email Rental Quote sends the quote to the customer. Leave the Rental Quote PDF field blank and Latner generates a fresh PDF for the email; pick an existing one from the list to send that instead.

The Rental Quote PDF History tab after two generations. Each run adds a row rather than replacing the last file

A generated PDF is a snapshot. Changing a price, adding a line or swapping a cover page afterwards does not update a PDF that has already been produced, and it does not update one you have already emailed. Generate the quote again and send the new version.

FAQs

Generate Rental Quote PDF is greyed out. Why?

The quote has no detail lines, or its status is Cancelled or Lost. Add at least one line, or revise the quote back to Open, and the option becomes available.

I attached a PDF to an equipment class, but it didn't appear on an existing quote.

Equipment PDFs are copied onto a quote at the moment the equipment line is added, not when you generate the PDF. Quotes that already had that equipment on them are untouched. Add the PDF to those quotes directly from the Attached PDFs tab, or add the line again.

Two pieces of equipment on the quote both have a cover page. Which one is used?

The first one to arrive. Once a quote has a cover page - whether copied from equipment or uploaded by you - later equipment cover pages are skipped, so they can't quietly overwrite each other. If you want a different one, upload it as an override on the Cover Page marker.

Can I set terms and conditions on an equipment class or model?

No. Terms are resolved at the quote level only, from the quote override, then the customer, then the setting. The terms marker on an equipment class or model is there to show you where the terms will sit, which is why it has no upload icon.

Which terms and conditions win when the customer has their own?

An override uploaded on the quote beats everything. Failing that, the customer's Rental Quote T&C PDF is used. Failing that, the Rental Quote Terms and Conditions PDF setting, branch value first and global value as the fallback.

Can I use a different cover page per branch?

Yes. On the Settings screen switch Global to Branch, pick the branch and upload a Rental Quote Cover PDF for it. Quotes raised against that branch use the branch file; quotes for any other branch fall back to the global one.

Can I control the filename of the generated PDF?

Yes, with the Rental Quote PDF Name Format setting, which accepts the {{quote_number}} and {{version}} placeholders. Leave it blank and Latner names the file Rental_Quote_ followed by the quote number, with a version suffix from the second generation onwards.

Does emailing a quote generate a PDF as well?

It can. The Email Rental Quote dialog has a Rental Quote PDF field listing the completed PDFs on the quote; leave it blank and a fresh one is generated and attached. Emailing a quote that is still Open also moves it to Quoted.

I removed a PDF from the quote but the old file still has it in.

Already-generated PDFs never change. The Attached PDFs tab describes what the next generation will contain, so generate the quote again and use the new file.