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There is nothing permanent except change.
Heraclitus, the Greek philosopher, believed in constant change. With our November 15th release with 17 updates, OwnerRez made some big changes, including a restructuring of the My Account area and the addition of Team Alerts. Not because we believe in constant change, but because we believe in continual improvement for our users. This is one of our largest releases this year, so hold on!
Since the introduction of Team Access in 2022, users have been able to access multiple accounts with Staff access (and, before that time, Portal access). Before this change, the My Account menu/area had many things in it, some pertaining to the user logged in and some to the account. For users with access to multiple accounts, in-app navigation could be somewhat confusing (contextually speaking).
Additionally, OwnerRez made some of these changes to accommodate limited screen real estate on mobile devices in preparation for future and more extensive design updates.
Here is what it looked like before this update:
They have been separated into their own menus to differentiate between account-level and profile-level items. These changes should help users instantly recognize what account they are accessing and see their profile items simultaneously.
The Settings menu has been moved under the Account menu as part of these changes. Also, Team Access Staff members can no longer access the Account Billing menu option (Billing will not be an option in their Account menu).
Now, the top menu for that same account looks like this:
The Account menu looks like this for account owners (if an Account doesn't use a Business name under Account Theming, the Account menu will say Account instead of the business name). Switch Accounts is available for users that have access to multiple accounts/portals.
The Profile menu (or My Profile menu) is now streamlined:
Some of the other items from the old My Account area/menu were moved to a new area under Settings called Advanced Tools. Team Access Staff Members do not have access to the Advanced Tools area.
The remaining items were moved/merged into the "?" drop-down in the top menu bar.
One we wanted to point out that was changed a bit was "OwnerRez Status." It was renamed "Service Status." It also now features a live status icon - if you see green with a checkmark, "all systems are go." If there is an incident, it will be yellow or red. Pretty cool!
Read the My Account Restructuring support article to learn more about the full changes.
My Alerts, formerly known as System Alerts, are alerts the system emails to you, the user. As a reminder, Guests do not receive these email alerts. My Alerts is now in the Profile menu (cross-linked from its old home in Settings for now).
On the My Alerts page, users can still do the following:
Change My Alerts still operates the same way it did before, where you can turn on or off multiple alerts at once.
Now that you know where to go to get to My Alerts and see the same functionality is still present, the biggest news to share around this change is that Staff (set up under Team Access) can receive Alerts! (If you don't have Staff, feel free to scroll down to the next blog section)
As part of the My Account Restructure, the Team Access area has moved to Settings > Advanced Tools > Team Access.
Account users can "allow" Staff Team member Alerts at the time of invitation.
Or modify existing Staff Team members to "allow" them to receive Alerts by editing that Staff member's team access permissions.
Account users can now turn on Staff Team member alerts for individual Staff Team members but cannot customize which alerts are sent; only Staff Team members themselves can customize their Alerts.
NOTE: If the user is a Portal user, and they are only a Portal user, they will not have Alerts in their Profile menu, as Alerts do not pertain to them as a Portal user.
Lastly, users with access to multiple accounts now select which account they want to use when adjusting the My Alerts settings. Below, My Alerts defaults to the account you own or the first account you had access to. To switch to another account, click/tap the drop-down and select the other account - in this example, Acme Vacations.
Learn more by reading the Alerts section of the My Account Restructuring support article, or stay tuned to the Alerts article that is currently under construction.
Announcements (formerly known as Dismissed Alerts) are an efficient way to communicate OwnerRez news and information. You're probably quite familiar by now, but if not, this is where they appear in-app:
Announcements were moved out of the old My Account menu to the "?" menu.
Before, "Dismissed Alerts" only showed those alerts a user dismissed themselves. That led to users not always knowing about everything that was announced if they didn't happen to log in while it was posted. So while moving it to a different menu, and renaming it, we made the area more helpful!
The Announcements enhancements include the following:
Check out the OwnerRez Announcements support article to learn more.
We received numerous comments and requests following the release of Schlage Door Locks Powered by OwnerRez on October 25th. Thank you for your valuable feedback. OwnerRez considered your input and made improvements to the Schlage Door Lock integration already to include the following.
Learn more by reading the Schlage support article.
Check Published Date Before Unpublishing Airbnb Listing. An Airbnb-connected property was delisted after failing three availability checks due to an OwnerRez user rapidly unpublishing and republishing the property. OR has resolved this issue and has optimized the listing status check process to prevent future unpublishing issues.
Default Phone Field to User's Country. As a followup to the October 4th Upgraded International Phone Number Input release, the system was always defaulting to United States, so we changed to detect country based on the browser being used. If the culture settings are different than the guest's, it will at least default to the user's culture settings instead of always United States.
Fix Additional Guest Phone Numbers Not Getting Saved on Quote Accept. Following the October 4th Upgraded International Phone Number Input release, additional guest phone numbers collected were not appropriately saved during the quote acceptance process when the guest selected a check or custom payment method. OR corrected this bug, and additional guest phone numbers collected during the quote acceptance process will be saved correctly when the guest selects a check or custom payment method.
Fix Check-in/out Time Formatting. Errors were caused due to formatting overrides of check-in and check-out times for non-US regions. We resolved the issue by fixing the non-US formatting overrides for check-in and check-out times and also now hide ":00" if the time format used contains AM/PM (or the culture equivalent) in field codes and a couple of other spots.
Fix Lynnbrook Deposits Import Handling of Chargeback "Reversals" (e.g., When the Host Wins a Chargeback Dispute). When the host successfully "wins" a chargeback, Lynnbrook adds an adjustment labeled "+Chargeback Reversal." However, OR incorrectly added these adjustments as a negative number, which is the opposite of what it should have been when the money was returned. We have fixed this bug, and any future "+Chargeback Reversal" will be correctly added with the fee insertion to include a description of: "Lynnbrook Group Fee ({adjustment description})."
Owner Statement Column Expense Attachments Count Should Not be Summable. It was discovered that the expense attachment counts listed in the Owner Statements Expense Attachments Count column were erroneously summable. We corrected this glitch, and expense attachment counts listed in the Owner Statements Expense Attachments Count column data type are now recognized as a text format.
Optimize Email List Report. Following the November 1st Email List Report Enhancements release that added Tags to the Email List Report, we noticed that the report was running slowly on larger data loads. It was solved by optimizing the Email List Report to handle those large data loads more effectively.
Remove Defunct Identifier Mapping for vacationrentals.com. OwnerRez has removed the identifier mapping configuration for the now-defunct vacationrentals.com.
Theme Selection on SMS Templates is Ignored. An account user with two phone numbers linked to their account set up a secondary account theme not associated with any properties and then created an SMS template with a trigger; found that when the SMS messages were sent, they came from the wrong phone number due to the SMS template set theme being ignored. OR resolved this bug, and the SMS template themes set will be sent from the correct SMS phone number.
Google Vacation Rentals: Private Beta
Fixed! Thanks for all the hard work guys. I really appreciate it.
Our pleasure, Nathan!
Fixed! Thanks for all the hard work guys. I really appreciate it.
Join us live with the Hopper team on November 20th at 1 PM Eastern and 10 AM Pacific time!
An introduction to Hopper Homes and Travel Deal Tuesday. Hopper is the most downloaded travel application in North America, boasting 100 million downloads. They cater to a Millenial and Gen Z audience by being an app-only OTA, allowing you to access a high lifetime value customer that travels more than any generation in history. They have recently launched a vacation rental OTA and are growing rapidly.
Founded by Hopper on the 28th of November, Travel Deal Tuesday is recognized as the best day in the post-Thanksgiving shopping period for consumers to find deals on travel, including vacation homes. It's a great time to get your listings up and running on Hopper to get an immediate advantage, receiving early bookings so that hosts can start and stay at the top of search in their respective markets. Here are some fun facts:
The session is free to join, but you must use the Hopper webinar link to register.
You can find all our upcoming and past webinars on our Webinars page.
Join us live with the Airbnb team on November 14th at 2 PM Eastern and 11 AM Pacific time!
We will discuss strategies that hosts can use to respond to recent guest trends and market dynamics. Additionally, we will cover how hosts can improve their listings sort ranking on Airbnb and stand out from the competition.
The session is free to join, but you must use the Airbnb webinar link to register.
You can find all our upcoming and past webinars on our Webinars page.
Yes, please provide an ETA for the fix. As a work around, once the 7 digit code is created, if I go into the app and change the code by deleting the 3 zeros, will it still work as long as I don't sync it from OR again?
Is there an estimated timeframe on addressing the 7 digit code issue?
Submitted the contact form. Yes I have been using Hubitat for a number of years, across multiple locations. I use ZWave locks from Yale. When I first integrated with OwnerRez I had started to write a tool to move lock information into Hubitat from OwnerRez but didn't get to finishing it as other optimizations were easier to save time.
Eric - Can I be a part of the Hubitat beta?
Yep. Use the contact form to send a ticket in and reference my comment. We'll get you routed to the correct place. Do you already have a Hubitat controller at your property (or residence) you can use? Have you connected smart (Z-Wave or Zigbee) locks to it?
If I set my door codes to generate 7 days prior to guest arrival, will it set if a guest books less than 7 days out? I have many bookings on Airbnb in off seasons that are less than 3 days and don't want to miss a door code setting.
Yes, if it's inside the door code generation period, the code will be set immediately. There are a number of graceful fall-back steps like that that the system performs regularly. For instance, there are locks that cannot be reached/set because of down internet or other problems. The integration attempts to handle these scenarios.
Eric - Can I be a part of the Hubitat beta?
Yep. Use the contact form to send a ticket in and reference my comment. We'll get you routed to the correct place. Do you already have a Hubitat controller at your property (or residence) you can use? Have you connected smart (Z-Wave or Zigbee) locks to it?
I just make it my business to get along with people so I can have fun. It’s that simple.
Friday is the perfect day to connect and create enjoyable experiences for guests because who doesn't love a good time before the weekend? It's the essence of hospitality, with a fun side dish of today's product update with all the ingredients of our November 8th release with 22 updates, including Template Filter Body Searches and Official New Zealand Holidays Added!
Searching for templates containing specific language located within the body of your email, channel, or SMS templates was not available.
OwnerRez has added a "body" field to the Template filter, allowing users to search within the body of all email, channel, or SMS templates.
Navigate to Settings > Messaging > Templates > Filter > add your search terms in the Body field > Search.
This makes finding the template(s) you need to update much easier!
OwnerRez has added New Zealand to the Official Holidays subscription list options as requested. Users can subscribe to New Zealand Holidays by navigating to Rates > Rules > Holidays > Lists.
Learn how to maximize your holiday rates by reading the Holidays support article.
OwnerRez users are increasingly using their Hosted Website Blogs to increase traffic, build their brand, and share news with their vacation rental business followers.
Hosted Website blog pages have added a couple more options to configure either a teaser or masthead images for social media sharing and we tweaked the fallback logic for each available option, in case the chosen image is unavailable.
Check out our Adding a Blog support article.
Be on the lookout for our upcoming integration with Florida Rental by Owners (FLARBO) as an Official Channel.
Clarify Inquiry Parsing Note on Identifier Mapping Area. OR has updated the instructions for handling unrecognized inquiry emails by adding instructions on the in-app instructions on Identifier Mapping section to advise on how to handle unrecognized inquiry emails.
Currency When Stripe Charged in One Currency and Paid in a Different Currency. When Stripe charged in one currency and payment was made in another, the Stripe fees were not correctly converted to the destination currency. This glitch has been fixed, and Stripe fees will now be correctly converted to the destination currency.
Don't Blow Up When Recording Stripe Refundable Security Deposit Fees on Quote Accept for Last Minute Bookings. Errors occurred when recording Stripe refundable security deposit fees for a last-minute booking quote acceptance. OR resolved this bug, allowing Stripe refundable security deposit fees for a last-minute booking quote acceptance to be recorded correctly.
Don't Create a New Code on RemoteLock Error if Generating Code by Phone. This edge case occurred when a user encountered an error after they configured their RemoteLock integration to generate door lock codes based on guests' phone numbers, then created a booking that generated a phone-based door lock code, subsequently disabled the guest directly on RemoteLock, and then ran a batch update with the "resynchronize all bookings" option selected. In an attempt to bypass the error, the OR logic generated new door lock codes that were not based on the guests' phone numbers. We corrected this glitch, and door lock batch updates with the "resynchronize all bookings" option selected will generate new door lock codes based on the OR door lock configuration.
Don't Dedupe Airbnb Payments That are in the Process of Being Deposited. If an Airbnb payout included two payments for the same booking, the initial processing for that deposit would only create one payment. We have updated the system to catch this case and correctly match all included payments for a booking.
Don't Delete Blocks on Bookings Only Mode iCal Import. Some calendar blocks were inadvertently deleted during the iCal Booking Import process when in bookings only mode. OR corrected this issue so that all future calendar blocks will be accurately imported during the iCal Booking Import process while in bookings only mode.
Don't Look at Check-in End When Determining Whether Airbnb Check-in is Standard. After adding the Check-In End time rule in last week's release, we found that some reservations (< 48 hours until arrival) can specify a check-in time range even when the property/listing doesn't have a check-in end time. The result was these bookings were highlighted in the calendar ribbon as having non-standard check-in times (with the red line/pipe). We fixed this to only consider the check-in start time and compare that against the property check-in start for ribbon display purposes.
Don't Look Back to Old Channels When Looking for Message Thread. Guest conversations pulled old channel booking information instead of the current listing channel booking, as expected. We fixed this glitch to no longer look for old channel booking information and instead locate and correctly display the current listing channel booking.
Fix Clicking the "Confirm" Link in a Pending Booking System Alert Shows an Error if Booking is Canceled. After a user canceled a pending booking, the Pending Booking System Alert email contained links to "Confirm and take payment now" or "Extend due date," resulting in errors when clicked because the booking was already canceled. This correction happens when the Pending Booking System Alert email links for "Confirm and take payment now" or "Extend due date" when used will now display an error explaining that the user cannot complete that process.
Fix Report Percentage Change Incorrect. In some report exports, the last "Change" column incorrectly calculated the percentage change between two periods for each property (group). The in-app report displays were correct; this bug only affected report exports. The report export calculations have been fixed.
Fix System Booking Alert Shows Time Crossed Out, Replaced With Same Time. After last week's product update, booking alert emails had default check-in/out times crossed out with the exact same time displayed to the right. This check was unnecessary if check-in/out times weren't changed. There was an extra space in the code causing this. It is now fixed.
Handle No Token Case on Listing Site Identifier Mappings. An error occurred while attempting to view a property identifier mapping with no value. OR fixed this bug, allowing users to view property identifier mapping properly.
Improvements to Inquiry Widget Resizing. A user noticed that on their direct booking websites when attempting to resize the Inquiry Widget Comments/Questions box on Mobile, the Send Inquiry button would disappear from the widget. This glitch has been fixed to still allow resizing but where the Send button stays where it should.
Remove Discount Multiplier. OR has decided to remove the ability for users to configure discounts with a multiplier. As neither Airbnb nor Vrbo support discount multipliers and this caused confusion for some of our users, we have decided to remove the option to configure discounts with a multiplier altogether.
Show Mutual Blocking Disabled Flag for Bookings. Mutual blocking disabled flags on bookings were not displayed if mutual blocking was disabled on a booking. This issue has been resolved, so that if you change a booking and set "Don't block other properties" that will be displayed properly on the Overview tab of the booking under Status.
Too Much Padding Between ProJob Global Alert and the Body When No Other Alerts are Present. When in-app global alert ProServices progress banners were displayed, the padding (i.e., margin) around them was too large. OR corrected this bug to remove the extra padding or margins around the in-app global alert ProServices progress banners.
Google Vacation Rentals: Private Beta
We have noticed a recent increase in phishing attacks targeting OwnerRez and email accounts. These attacks attempt to gain access to your OwnerRez account and other accounts linked to your email.
Anatomy of a phishing attack
In a phishing attack, an attacker will prepare a login screen that looks identical to the OwnerRez login at a similar domain. For example, OwnerRez using the word "owners" instead of "owner" or with a dash in it. They'll find your email address on a public site, like your booking website. Then, they'll send you an email alert that looks like an OwnerRez email with a link going to the fake login screen. If you type in your username/password, then the attacker will have your password. These attacks are getting more sophisticated, spending more time making the email and login look very convincingly similar to what you receive from OwnerRez.
We implemented two-factor authentication last year. This blocks many attacks because the attacker would need access to your email to get the two-factor code, even if they have your password. However, there still exists a potential vulnerability that could be exploited: If you use email 2FA and your email password is the same as your OwnerRez password, and you accidentally enter your password on a phishing page, then the attacker can gain access to your email. From there, they can retrieve the 2FA code and use it to log in to your OwnerRez account.
Maximizing security
How to defend against phishing and maximize security? There are several things you can do. First of all, we support both app-based and email-based two-factor authentication. We've required at least email two-factor authentication for everyone as a baseline, but we recommend upgrading to app-based security as it's much more secure. If you had set up a two-factor auth app for both your OR account and your email account, you'd still be secure in the scenario above as even if the attacker had the password to both your OwnerRez account and email account, they still wouldn't have access to your two-factor auth app on your email account -- so they wouldn't be able to log in to your email. You can learn how to set up 2FA via an app by reading this support doc.
The other side of security is using unique passwords for each account. Never reuse a password between accounts because this allows an escalation attack where the hacker gets the password to one account and then is able to log in to others using that same password. The best way to do this is by using a password manager. Browsers like Chrome and Safari have built-in free password managers, or if you want more control, there are many third-party managers out there -- Keeper, LastPass, 1Password, Dashlane, Bitwarden, etc. Use the password manager to generate a unique password for each site, and then you only have to remember one password to access the password manager, and it will do the rest to fill in the password for each site. Password managers also look at the URLs you're trying to log in to and will alert you if you're on a phishing URL that's similar to the real URL but not the same.
Step by step
If you follow the steps above to create unique passwords and set up app-based two-factor authentication, that provides many additional layers of security that protect you in case you accidentally do click on a phishing link. This is called "defense in depth" in the industry, and you want as many independent levels of security as possible for a high-value target like your OwnerRez account.
If I set my door codes to generate 7 days prior to guest arrival, will it set if a guest books less than 7 days out? I have many bookings on Airbnb in off seasons that are less than 3 days and don't want to miss a door code setting.
Our CEO, Paul Waldschmidt, recently sat down with Avery Carl from The Short Term Show Podcast to discuss OwnerRez and exciting updates coming next year.
The Short Term Show is a podcast about short-term rental and long-term wealth. Hosted by Avery Carl, a short-term rental expert who started with 1 property and turned it into 42 in a matter of 5 years. Avery became a millionaire in equity in 3 years and is sharing the tools she has learned with you. Avery brings on real property owners hosting real properties and crushing it in the short-term rental space along with some of the biggest names in the industry.
During the podcast, Paul and Avery discuss:
Listen below:
Eric - Can I be a part of the Hubitat beta?
Thanks!
Paul,
If you are asking about examples why the integration is inferior to other options (RemoteLock, Jarvis) then the two examples in the comments - battery low alert and webhooks for first door entry etc are great examples. I am ok to pay "more" for having those features now before I move to OwnerRez integration. The way I look at it - If a guest can not enter since the batteries died and I did not get an alert, it does not worth the $1/saving a month for me. Love to see the v2 in the next few weeks and make the switch.
When does the guest receive the code?
by Asha P – Nov 3, 2023 4:28 PM (UTC)
The short answer is: whenever you decide to send it to them. The code itself is generated at the "generate when" time setting on the integration page. There are options for generating it at the time of booking (the default option), or certain number of days before arrival, or manually (ie. you set it yourself).
Assuming the code is generated at the time of booking, you can then configure templates/triggers to send it to the guest from that point forward.
Typically, the normal pattern is to send a message [x] days before arrival if certain conditions are met (booking is paid in full, renter agreement signed, etc). You would customize the template to include the door code and possibly other information.
So it's kind of up to you.
Where do I see the code in case I need to resend to the guest?
Right on the booking overview page. Once your lock integration is in place, all bookings that are at that property (ie. the property configured in the lock integration) will begin show a "Door Code" field on the booking. It will show the code value right next to it if a code was generated. There are other options there for Generate, Sync, etc so that you can change the code or resync to the lock.
Can I set an email notification template to go out on booking and day of arrival with the code?
Yes! See above, or look at our documentation on automated messaging and field codes.
Hi, can you tell me if we will be able to adjust the check in and check out times for each individual guest?
Yes, this flows from the booking itself. Every booking has a default check-in and check-out time, which comes from the default property rules. If you don't manually adjust this on the booking, it uses the default. If you change the check-in/out times on the booking, the code will follow that new time.
Kelley nailed it:
You can adjust the checkin/checkout times of the reservation. I imagine this will update the codes if already created. Or, you can do it in the schlage app for sure.
Also, keep in mind the "grace period" settings. Grace period is always added onto the new time. So if you give a specific guest early check-in at 1 pm, and your grace period is 2 hours, the code will start working at 11 am.
Is there any way to limit the number of digits for the automated Schlage codes? The default appears to be 8 digits.. I only want my codes to be 4 total digits, but Schlage is generating 7-8 digit codes.
Just connected my Schlage lock. A few questions:
When does the guest receive the code?
Where do I see the code in case I need to resend to the guest? Can I set an email notification template to go out on booking and day of arrival with the code?
Thanks for setting this integration up!
It was such a pleasure meeting all of you face to face at VRMA. You’re an incredible team and an incredible company
Ben
You can adjust the checkin/checkout times of the reservation. I imagine this will update the codes if already created. Or, you can do it in the schlage app for sure.
Hi, can you tell me if e will be able to adjust the check in and check out times for each individual guest? I am able to do that in RemoteLock if I want to allow someone to check in a few hours early or check out a few hours late I am able to adjust just that one guests time within their booking.
Any ETA on the 4-digit code length hot fix? I ran into this same problem this morning when I activated 3 more locks that I wanted to get up and running.
Hello,
Thank you for getting the Schlage lock integration! As others have pointed out, I would like to chime in as well.
1. Name of guest and not ORB booking number as the code name.
2. Delete obsolete codes: I understand that the code will not work, but schlage allows for 100 codes to be in the lock, and this will make the code list unwieldy to say the least if we are not actively deleting expired codes in a timely manner. I am having to do this manually to keep the code list from spiraling out of control.
3. My locks have been historically set to code for only 4 digits. I noticed last night that one of my locks has now a 7 digit code set: 000xxxx, with xxxx as last 4 of the guest phone number. Prior to this, only the last 4 digits have been set.
I currently use Remote Lock and if a code is unable to be generated for any reason, they send me an email. Does OR do this as well? Do you continue to push to the lock if it isn't successful the first try? I don't see any documentation saying how your integration handles this. I manage homes in the mountains and wifi does go out from time to time.
I don't see a way in OR and also I don't see any configuration about code length in the Schlage iOS app (where I can set 4 digit codes). when I try to set a 4 digit code in OR the set code popup errors with "Code must be 8 numeric digits"
We actually ran across this earlier this morning and are preparing a hotfix to correct it.
There was also a Schlage update to the API in the past few days that fixed a similar problem for integrated partners (like OwnerRez).
Very soon, this will be fixed so that you can set a code 4-8 digits in length.
I just ran into this issue yesterday after regrettably updating my lock firmware... SO happy to hear that you are actively working on fixing this to allow us to set the code length manually as this has been a real bummer - thank you thank you! And thanks for all the hard work on the Schlage integration, so excited to finally be able to utilize this! :)
Quick follow up. Maybe I missed it but a Low Battery Alert would be nice. I change my batteries at 50% so having the option to set when the notice goes out would be an added bonus.
We do show the battery level, as you probably know, but you're right - an actual alert would be great since you won't see that battery level unless you go looking. Same with an alert when the guest uses the lock, telling you that they entered. There is a lot that can be done, but the first release was about getting a low-cost bare-metal integration out there for everyone to start pounding on.
Thanks to you as well, Nathan!
Another vote for this! Would be helpful to receive a low battery notification that we can set.
Maybe there could be an option in the OR settings to use either name or booking number? It seems most people commenting use the name, as I do.
We are changing it to use the name. The feedback on that has been overwhelming and the use case is pretty obvious. The OwnerRez engineer working on lock stuff is already actively working on putting that in place.
