Igloo Lockbox

Does anyone use the Igloohome lockbox? I'd like to use it for our car which won't always be parked at our house near the bridge.

I'm curious what the process is to ensure the lock gets updated with the codes and what happens if it's not near wifi/internet access - can it be remotely unlocked?

Would appreciate any info from real life users

Thanks!

I use an Igloo lockbox on one of our properties. There are a couple of options:

1. You can generate algorithmic codes automatically from OwnerRez. This is the advantage of not requiring any internet connection for the lockbox, or, in fact, any real network connection between OwnerRez and the lockbox at all.  The downside with algorithmic codes is that they're long (9 digits). That can increase friction for guests sometimes. I've literally watched a guest struggle to put their code into a lockbox until I finally unlocked it for them myself.  This may not be an issue for you, and the ability to algorithmically generate the codes without an internet connection could be an advantage. There are some tricky things to be aware of for those algo codes. For example, they must be used within 24 hours of the start time that they're activated for, or they will expire automatically. 
2. You can get a Wi-Fi bridge that will connect the Bluetooth lock box to the Internet. Technically, this can then be integrated with OwnerRez so you can do things like generate codes based on the last four digits of a phone number. However, this requires your bridge to have permanent plug-in power. Be within a Wi-Fi router distance. And be within just a few feet of the lock box in order to communicate with it over Bluetooth. I've also personally found this to be an incredibly unreliable configuration. It probably would not work at all for your environment with a car. Unless you can put the bridge and a Wi-Fi connection right next to the parking spot.

All that said, I just came here on the forums to try to find examples of other people using Keyboxes that are integrated with OwnerRez because I'm finding that the Wi-Fi bridge solution for my Igloo keybox is really unreliable.

Thanks - yes I found the documentation and I got the bridge. I haven't had luck with it yet (also haven't spent a ton of time trying yet either). Since I can bring the lockbox in to the house near the router/bridge that shouldn't be an issue.

I was having trouble getting the lockbox code to update to the lock so I need to try again.

Yeah, I'm having issues with it as well.  Overall, I've been disappointed with the Igloohome bridge system reliability  regardless of integrating it with OwnerRez.

Not sure if I did anything different but I was able to successfully set up the bridge at my rental and it seems to be working. I did have one time where the bridge wasn't connected but my rental is in an area with unstable wifi. So pretty sure it wasn't an Igloo problem. We'll see once the rainy season starts and power goes on/off...

Might be good to make sure your bridge has the newest firmware if it's not working consistently. I have the door code generated just like my Schlage lock.

On the Igloo app there is a separate tab for OwnerRez codes which I love!

Overall since I retried setting everything up, it's working well.

I do have the bridge setup, and am able to automatically generate codes from OwnerRez about 80% of the time.  A few tips I learned to help make this fairly reliable:

• don't generate the code until a couple of days prior to arrival - configurable in OwnerRez (minimizes problems with updates - see below)  
• schedule a "code check" task for the day before arrival to manually check that the code is installed in the lock (because it doesn't always work, and I don't want a guest to be locked out)
• updates will fail - if a reservation changes and OwnerRez attempts to update an existing code to change the dates for example, it will fail, causing the code to disappear completely. After such an event, I have been unable to get a code pushed from OR into Igloo at all, and everything has to be done manually after that.
• If a guest requests a date change (or I upsell them on an early check-in), my workflow is to:
  • manually delete the guests existing code from the Igloohome app (if it's already been setup - so this only applies if the change happens in the window between when I've configured OR to generate the code, and the booking change)
  • make the updates to OwnerRez booking
  • that triggers a code generation, which Igloo home sees as entirely new and mostly works
  • manually confirm that the new code is installed correctly

I've found that one a code fails to generate from an OR booking once, it will never work for that booking again, so from that point onward, I have to make sure the code for that booking is setup manually.  If bookings flow smoothly without changes, it mostly works without intervention, but I do have to manually check and confirm so that nothing goes wrong.

Hope these tips help.