General Help and Questions

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I was just wondering about why we'd need to download the reviews, but I see that it is solely, to place a link on our website, correct? Do these then direct them to the various OTAs? I don't really want anything to direct them to an OTA.

It would be useful, in my opion, if there was a search function for forum content.

You can try this on IFTTT.

Connect your google calendar to the ical feed from ownerrez
Use IFTTT and create a new applet
When THIS happens...
Select google calendar
Select “when any event ends”
Selct amount of time after the event
Select the calendar with the name of the OR feed

The do this
Select Proper Honeywell app, attach it by logging in
Then select set temp.

This *should work* and probably also works with NEST and Ecobee.

Wine and OwnerRez are perfectly paired!

That finally made sense, thank you! I was trying to figure out how to insert it into the actual agreement, and couldn't picture how this would work, but it does. I will soon need a nice glass of wine :) I have all sorts of things they need to fill out, with the pet addendum too, whew! Once the light bulb went off, it was fairly straightforward...still working on some other things, but that helped a LOT!

Debi:

Set up the fields you want by going to "settings", "Messaging" and "Custom Field Definitions."

You can set up fields for them to enter names, initial different parts of your contract, provide additional phone numbers, etc.

In the section called "Show During Quote Acceptance" make sure to pick that a response is required. Then use a combination of the "Name" and "Description" fields to tell the guest what to enter.

For example, I have a field named "Initial Here to Agree to Maximum Occupancy Clause" and the definition says "Guest agrees and affirms that under no circumstances shall the property be occupied by more than ten (10) persons AT ANY TIME during your stay. Over occupancy will result in immediate eviction and forfeiture of all rent and damage deposit."

So they know they have to initial and they know what they're agreeing to.

Once you get those fields set up, and have assigned them a number for the order in which you want them to be displayed to the guest, then you can go into your rental agreement and insert the custom field name merge code wherever you want it.

Hope that helps.

I'm pretty sure I have the check in/out times set up correctly.

HOWEVER, still looking for where I upload booking agreement, how does it get signed, I have it in both word and a pdf format, and I need various spots initialed if bringing a pet, as well as their current address, cell phone number and names of all the guests, (our city requires it).

I also want to know if I pull my abnb listing in, will the rates on either source change? I have higher rates on abnb than I do on my actual website or any of the book direct sites. I pretty much just want abnb to send me the inquiry and I reply, quote, etc. as usual, but then the booking is then generated on to ORez. The same with TA/Fk. Those OTA rates are higher than my book direct.

I also use the regional sites, shorevactions.com and shoresummerrentals.com (they are book direct) and will figure out how to integrate them another day.

I’m okay to do this but I don’t want the rental property’s phone number being used as a contact since it would be a guest answering.

Got it. Would it be rude to say it would be nice not to have so many places to go to set up rates and nights? Of course, I have no idea how to program so have no idea what I'm asking. ;) Thanks for the response on a weekend - will go delete nights in spot rates.

Yep, sorry for the scavenger hunt! Unfortunately "check" "in" "out" are all common words and don't work so well in a search engine :-/

All of the rules about the property are in the Rules section. That sets the defaults for new quotes and booking, and then quotes and bookings each have their own sets of rules so you can override for a specific one.

In this case you want to set your standard time on the property rules (so it'll show 4pm instead of "standard") and then the actual time on any bookings that are not 4pm (so it'll show "early check-in at 1pm").

For bookings, the check-in/out times are on the Dates tab with the Arrival and Departure dates.

The way it works, spot rates override seasons and the min gap nights override overrides everything else.

A spot rate can either have a blank min nights or have a min nights set. If you have a blank min nights on the spot rate, then the season min nights for that night would be used but the amount for the spot rate would be used.

It sounds like you've got min nights set on those spot rates so they're overriding the min nights from the season.

The easy way to fix that is to do what Rich suggested -- export the spot rates to Excel, delete all of the min nights values, and then import again. Then the season min night value will be used (of course make sure you've got seasons for all of the ones you clear out).

What if you put in the property's address and phone number? They are likely validating for some sort of US nexus on the address check.

UGH, finally found it, under Properties, then RULES then scrolling through it all. i can't imagine why when I typed in "check in check out time" nothing came up in the search, nor when I put in rental agreement. I'm usually pretty good at these things, but this is not an intuitive "tree" for finding the various pieces. I would think that in the "interview" part of the "next" would be, "here is where you find all of the parameters for your, rental agreement, your check in/out times, etc. I'm still searching for things that I would have thought would be right out front in the "check list" for beginners, new customers. Can't figure out quite a few things yet..so I'll be back I'm sure.

I am asking for the actual booking information, I don't want to have to scroll through the "times" listed for each booking. Also, since I have many back to back bookings in the summer, I want that to show on the calendar as a slash, not a full day unavailable.

Rich - I know that's an option, as is just using the rate calendar. But then I'm wondering what the purpose of the settings are for "Seasons" if I have to go thru all that to adjust my minimum nights. And if setting minimum nights doesn't transfer to everywhere, how can I know that setting an override for gaps will work?

Hi, Deborah. Fairly new myself and am not sure I understand your question. Are you asking about door locks or something else? I'm interested in learning whatever I can to make the process easy on my end.

Newbie, I am trying to edit my imported bookings and set up back to back bookings, check OUT 10AM and the next guest checks IN at 4PM. I don't see a way to change the "standard" on the check in/out portion?

I live in Canada and my rental property is in the US, so I would like to set up a US Stripe account, but they won't accept my home address or phone number. Has anyone else had this problem and how did you resolve it?

@Lydia B - I know that I'm able to import nightly rates and min nights using a spreadsheet, with the Spot Rates import, and it works for me. The spreadsheet has one row for each day, and each row has a column for the property, nightly rate and min nights. I think it's safe to have other columns to the right, but the order and naming have to match.

If your min nights doesn't vary this might be overkill for what you want, but it does work.

I created a Summer season and set the minimum nights to 5. I "pushed rates" to VRBO for the purpose of pushing the minimum nights requirement. VRBO did not pick up on the minimum nights. And minimum nights showing in Spot Rates and in Rate Calendar have not changed. (I also tested AirBnB to see if the nights settings transferred. They don't.)

I have not set rates via Seasonal Rates - I prefer using the calendar or spot rates to do that. I'm just trying to set minimum nights across the board and wanting VRBO and AirBnB to recognize the minimum gap nights as "2". I thought this was what "Seasons" was for.

What am I missing?

Chuck - don't know why you were asking about the phone number, but if it's to keep folks from knowing you personal # you could get a Google Voice number that folks can call and text on. A number of owners do that to keep info private but still allow a way for potential guests to be in touch. Then you can decide if you want to answer a call or always let it go to voicemail.

You can edit it in the Hosted Website settings, under the Edit Theme/Layout button, Footer tab. You can see the email field code included in there by default - just get rid of that, and save your changes.

Can’t seem to find a way to suppress the phone number on the hosted website other than removing it from account info. Have i just overlooked the setting somewhere?

@BlueMtnCabins and @Sheron Scurlock - I am still trying to figure out the additional fees on Stripe for international and currency exchanges. Have you had any experience with these? And do you know if Lynnbrook has them as well? Since my property is in Florida, international transactions are not uncommon.

But won't guests complain when they return to a cool or warm house? I can only imagine the wrath we would get for a house that wasn't perfect the moment they walk in. Or am I not understanding how this solution works.

It is astonishing that nobody has an elegant cost effective solution to this common problem for vacation rental managers/owners.

You've imported a couple dozen reviews, but OwnerRez isn't always able to match the reviews to the correct property. For your collected reviews, it doesn't know the right property for any of them. If you know what property they are for, you can do this yourself under CRM > Reviews. Click the review, Change Details, and select the right property. Then they'll show up.

The Airbnb API connection automatically imports new reviews, but you aren't using that. You can import reviews using Channel Bridge, but you have to do that manually.

Smoking is controlled under the Amenities settings for a Property. There's no option of "smoking outside", but there's one for "ask owner" which would probably suit.

Chris - I think this thread points out the need to add a report to list custom fields ;-)

Hi, I tried searching for the answers but couldn't find them. I figured out how to import my reviews from ABB and uploaded them to OR. I have created a widget that I will be adding to my own website.

1. In the widget area, there is also the option to post a link to the reviews page. When I preview that, none of my imported reviews show up. Is there something else I have to do? https://app.ownerrez.com/widgets/e5459555e47a4c6bb8b62f438afd3ba3?view=form&propertyKey=2290226818a741219f8794c50df6ab79

2. Does OR recognize which property the imported review is for and attach the review to a particular property on OR? If not, can I go in and assign the imported review to the correct property?

3. I have download the chrome extension, will all my ABB reviews going forward automatically come in to OR or do I have to do the imports periodically?

Thanks!

Thanks, Chris. Those instructions were interesting to see; I didn't realize we could download information from the Bookings tab.

I've tried your suggestion and I think this will work...the listing site ID does download so that I am able to quickly search the bookings using that ID number.

At the end of each year I send a Bookings/Payments report to my clients for their bookings in that year. It is helpful for them to have the listing site ID number on that report so that they can match payment notifications sent from that site to the booking on the spreadsheet.I can use your instructions to quickly download the bookings and grab the listing site ID number to put into my report.

Thanks again, I appreciate your help!