General Help and Questions

Sort by

• Newest Reply
• Newest Topic

On the ribbon calendar? My houses are different colors and the blocks are gray.

Chris, I see you were really testing BDC a few years ago. What has been your final take on them?

I think I've posted more recent experiences in other threads here and in the unofficial FB group, but at least in my market, a big fat meh. I never did list more than the original two properties because the listing process is a major PITA and it's not a productive channel.

I've also settled on a 40% markup (15% to cover the commission and 25% for pain and suffering) as well as making my cancellation policy much stricter on BDC (I'm Flexible on Vrbo and Moderate on Airbnb, so that's 14 and 5 days, respectively, but I have a 30-day cancellation policy on BDC) to weed out the speculative bookers who like to cancel last-minute. (My average days-in-advance is around 20, so if someone cancels their BDC reservation, I'm still likely to rebook dates through other channels.)

This has caused my BDC reservations to dwindle from maybe half a dozen per year to a couple per year, but I'm OK with that.

It's mostly a failed experiment but as long as I don't have to do any additional work, I don't plan to actively remove those two existing properties from the platform.

If your market caters to a lot of international tourists, though, you may find BDC a more productive platform, but for those of us in markets that focus almost exclusively on domestic tourism, I wouldn't advise bothering with BDC.

Chris, I see you were really testing BDC a few years ago. What has been your final take on them?

Hi.  Is anyone still having this problem?  My hot tub was showing as an amenity on my vrbo listing but now it is not.  I called VRBO and they are looking into it but she believes she remebers hearing it is a software issue w/ OR!  This is such a big deal!  There are only 3 listings in my area that have hot tubs and now none of them are showing as having hot tubs.  If I do a broader search (for the whole state), there are listings that do have a hot tub as an amenity so I know it's not completely down on VRBO's site.

Added:  When I talked to VRBO they could see on their end the amenity was selected but wasn't sure why it wasn't showing in the live listing.

Is there a way to color code bookings vs blocking on the calendar?  We only have one property, but I'd like to see which are legit bookings and which are just blocked off for us.  As it is, they are all red and I get lost in the mix when I look ahead through the months.

No, normally going to the API will not force the switch to PPB, even though it sounds like it will.  But if it does, you can just call up Vrbo IPM tech support and get them to put you back, if you were using subscription previously.

I paid $499/property for Vrbo annual subscription so that I dont have to pay the 5% base commision fee per booking. When I was filling out the form to set up API integration with Vrbo, the following verbiage was stated. Is it switching me to pay-per-booking?

"We've set you up with pay-per-booking

Pay-per-booking means you'll:

• Gain exposure without any upfront costs
• Pay a commission based on the amount of each booking
• Receive an invoice and be charged every 2nd of the month for the previous month's bookings

When travelers book and checkout through Vrbo, we charge you a 5% commission because travelers are paying for the Vrbo service fee.

When travelers who found you through Vrbo book directly with you and don’t go through our checkout, we charge you a 10% commission on these bookings created manually in your software and attributed to Vrbo - this is due to the travelers not paying for the Vrbo service fees"

The pet fee is what Airbnb supports currently. We have suggested enhancements.

If you have a more complex pet fee, you can specify it in your house rules and collect via the resolution center.

A flat fee is not the answer. OwnerRez needs to advocate for better tools. 

Thank you. 

There's an extended discussion of how to do that over here:

https://www.ownerrez.com/forums/requests/template-fields-for-agreement-info-guest-needs-to-add

I would like for my renters to list the names/ages when they sign the rental agreement. I've had to do this before when renting and find it useful to see who will be staying in the home and their ages.

How do I add this requirement in the reservation process?  Would I add it to the Rental Agreement?  Right now they sign electronically and I do not know where they would fill in the the info or where the spaces could be added for this?

No, and this is intentional - you don't want it publicly known what dates are actually occupied by a guest, vs blocked for some other reason.  That's tempting to thieves.

I had the same thing happen to me about a year ago. When they first implemted this.. i was experimenting with different channel managers doing the free 30 day thing. and BAM!! i get hit with this mandatory pay the fee thing.. i spent some time with Airbnb customer support and basically told this was what the Host wanted etc.. so i had to live with it. I terminated all the API connections and about 6 months later they suddenly and unexpectedly changed it back to Guest pay service.. no notice or explanation..

So when i got on board a couple of months ago with owner rez.. i only hooked up the iCal. and removed insta book.. seems to be working great. 

There's a fix for this!!  Total backdoor thing that I found on the Unofficial OwnerRez Support Group on Facebook.  Here's the link to the post, solution in the comments:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/702265430182289/posts/1289626564779503/

For those that aren't on FB, here's the text of the comment from John N Leslie Davidson, this is what worked for me just a couple of days ago: 

Actually the only way I could see the option [to switch back] and or see the option not greyed out was to click the link she posted from within my Facebook app on my iphone which has like a browser mode when you click a link within a Facebook post. Not sure if it was all just glitchy earlier or if they just didn’t roll out the change as well as they thought. The live chat feature on AirBnb told me it was no longer an option for api. However the posted policies don’t mention it for the US that way yet. But I agree it is probably gonna happen at some point or already is in process. Regardless I was able to change it to guests paying the fee for now.

Please write in to the Helpdesk with a specific example and we'll take a look.

I created a template email and then added a scheduled email when guests book. You can schedule it for the specific day there

How do I get my triggered emails to say 10:30? I’ve set it to 10:30a in the overall system settings. 

Please send this in to the Helpdesk, along with the booking and/or inquiry number.

Hi--

I created and sent a special offer through OR as $100 total and I don't understand why it shows differently under the guest portion.  It should read $100 + $xx Airbnb service fee + $18 (Mexican taxes ABB collects).  It should be about $140-ish.  

TIA

These support docs and videos may be helpful:

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/rates-overview-video

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/rates-setting-seasonal-rates-video

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/rates-using-the-rate-calendar-video

Otherwise, please write in to the Helpdesk for assistance.

I had the same problem, but it's because my property is in St Lucia in the Caribbean.  If you API integrate with AirBnB, you are required to use the simplified pricing (where you pay the guest fee) unless your property is in one of the the following countries:  US, Canada, Mexico, Uruguay, The Bahamas, Argentina and Taiwan.

When I disabled API integration, I was taken off simplified pricing.  So I'll have to settle for iCal integration for AirBnB.

Airbnb in particular only allows round hours for checkin/checkout times.

Hello new user here in Australia!

I accidentally deleted my standard default rate after using the setup wizard. Now I can't find a way to add back my default rate before I connect my OTAs. 

Can someone point me to how to add default rates into my property 

Thanks

Stacey

I've set my check-out time to 10:30a. However, I've noticed that in all correspondance that guest are receiving, as well as what is pushed out to Airbnb and VRBO, the system is saying that check-out is at 10:00a. How do I fix this?

Hi, John here (Donna's husband).

Two questions:

1.  Some VRBO listings show prices on the calendar and some don't.  VRBO support seems to think this is a glitch and all listings should show prices.  Does anyone know what causes calendar prices to disappear on VRBO?

2.  PriceLabs sets prices all over the map, different for every day.  I'm glad they're so smart about it, but in our beachfront market it seems like we're the only listing with inconsistent pricing from day to day.  It's a weekly rental, so guests expect an unchanging price, at lease for a week at a time.  Can anyone offer suggestions of a fix while still using PriceLabs automation?

Thanks and Best.

John

Thanks Ken

No, that's not actually controlled from inside OwneRez - you'll have to work with Airbnb also to get that switched back in their system, if they're willing.

I would like to see this as I have the same issue.  I can trigger once a booking is created, but I would like to send out a reminder email the day before trash pick up.  Simply adding in the trigger field "a day of the week" seems reasonable.  Any update on this?

Yes, all the dynamic pricing systems work generally the same way and follow the same rules with OwnerRez.