Car category mapping

Car category mapping is matching each vehicle group in your fleet to the category the market uses, so your prices get compared with the right competitors. It usually means mapping your own group names to ACRISS codes, and those codes to the categories a broker shows shoppers.

How to do it

1. List your vehicle groups as your booking system has them.
2. Give each one an ACRISS code from the ACRISS matrix.
3. Note which shopper-facing category that code lands in: mini, economy, compact, intermediate, SUV, people carrier.
4. Compare prices only within that category.

Worked example

Hypothetical. Say you run 40 cars in three groups:

If "Mid hatch" were checked against economy rates, you'd think you were expensive and cut prices for nothing. At Queenstown in the Rate Pulse sweep of 7 Nov 2026, the typical economy rate was NZ$176 a day and compact NZ$210. That gap is about 19%, all from a wrong mapping. See the Queenstown page.

Why it matters for a rental operator

Every pricing tool, rate shop and broker listing depends on it. Get it wrong and every comparison after it is wrong too, quietly.

Review it when you add a model. Then search for your own cars on the broker sites you sell through, and check they show up in the group you expect.

See it in Rate Pulse

Each airport page splits rates by category. Use the one that matches your mapped group when you benchmark. Start at Rate Pulse.