# Understanding room type and rate plan management

This section aims to clarify what the room type and rate plan management API consists of and what you can do with it.

## Basic definitions

The following definitions cover the basics when it comes to room type and rate plan management:

* **Room type:** A room type is a label or category used to organise physical rooms. An example is: Double room.
* **Rate plan:** A rate plan is a label or category used to organise prices. An example is: Non-refundable rate.
* **Rate relation** or **derived rate plan:** A rate relation or derived rate plan is a rate plan that acts as a child to a specific parent rate plan, in which it can follow the parent rate plan in the way you specify.
* **Conditions:** Conditions refer to the prepayment, cancellation, and override policies as well as restrictions and meal plan inclusion that you can set when creating a roomrate.
* **Roomrate** or **product:** A roomrate or product is the unique combination of a room type and rate plan with conditions.
* **Inventory**: Inventory, also known as availability, is when you specify per roomrate how many rooms you want to sell at what price for a specific date (or set of days). When sending inventory, you can also set further restrictions that specify under which conditions inventory can be sold.


## What is room type and rate plan management?

Room type and rate plan management refers to managing the inventory of properties via a set of API endpoints. This includes the following main sections:

* [Managing room types](/connectivity/docs/room-type-and-rate-plan-management/managing-room-types)
* [Managing rate plans](/connectivity/docs/room-type-and-rate-plan-management/managing-rate-plans)
* [Managing roomrates](/connectivity/docs/room-type-and-rate-plan-management/managing-roomrates)


## Authentication

The room type and rate plan management API uses the same [authentication methods](/connectivity/docs/authentication) as other APIs.

## Going live

Before you go live with your API integration, you'll need to meet certain requirements. For more information, see [Going Live.](/connectivity/docs/going_live/)