General Help and Questions

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Now I think you just click a little up[load button when editing a template

I guess this question/request did not deserve a response from anyone. Sadly it seems to be the only topic among many that was posted in the last few weeks that did not get a single response. How embarrassing!

Glenn

How do I upload a couple documents that I can link to them in the agreement or email?

In the same way you have the two Travel Insurance docs uploaded...

https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/767/what-is-the-resolution-center

"Turn temp down once the motion sensor reports no movement for an hour on a departure date, lock the door in case they didn't,"

This sounds overly complicated, and complicated things are subject to fail. I would say:

1) With erentallock, it set so their code automatically expires upon checkout. The door is already "locked" because no one can now get in.

2) For departure, who cares about resetting the thermostat depending on if there is no motion? If they are supposed to leave, then who cares about their comfort? This looks simpler and less prone to failure...

$70 "Honeywell Wi-Fi 7-Day Programmable Thermostat with Built-In WiFi" at Lowes with features:
-Wi-Fi enabled thermostat allows for remote access via smartphone or computer
-Free smartphone app for iOS and Android operating systems
-Can be configured to meet almost any scheduling requirement - selectable 7-Day Programmable Thermostat with option to select multiple days at a time; 4 program periods per day
-Automatically downloads software updates
-Smart Response Technology - thermostat learns your heating/cooling cycles, then optimizes to deliver the right temperature at the right time
-Auto change from heating to cooling
-Permanent and temporary holds

I may start with this SmartThings app here and then learn about the integration. http://smartthings.rboyapps.com/#a5
I do a fair bit of amateur programming so perhaps once I learn a bit more I can pass you the information.
Besides lock code generation, I am keen to add thermostat control. i.e. Turn temp down once the motion sensor reports no movement for an hour on a departure date, lock the door in case they didn't, then on an arrival date turn the temp back up an hour or so before check-in time, that kind of thing.

Sure thing, I just sent over an email.

I see a lot of docs on SmartThings about how to create scenes and automations for a specific lock you own, but not much about how to make a generic app that could interact with any lock. Do you have any link to an info article on that? We'd need to be able to connect to their API from our servers, authorize into your specific account, and then start generating lock codes from there.

No you didn't miss anything. We need to add some instruction on that to the main article but are waiting until we release the new update so it will be simpler and make more sense.

Yep, we need to promote some of those options to be more visible for sure... but the top bar is already pretty full of other locations to the point where it just barely fits on some size screens. Right now, the best way to get to the support area is to use the dropdown arrow in the top right and click Help.

Like Rich mentioned, the main search on the Support area will search everything on that site -- support articles, forum posts, and blog posts.

The search on "my booking area" will find by guest name, booking/payment id, or Airbnb/VRBO reservation number (if you've done a channel bridge to import those numbers to OwnerRez).

Unfortunately, Airbnb doesn't have a configuration for a pet fee, so you can't have it automatically collected on their side. If the guest flags the booking as having pets we'll pick that up on channel bridge imports, but they often don't do that either.

The best way to handle pets is to put the fee in your house rules and then submit a resolution request on Airbnb for the pet fee.

Did I miss an instructional article somewhere? I poked around a bit...

For the carousel to look good in full width view, you need to take separate cuts of the photos and switch it to custom photo mode (vs the property photos it defaults to). Those should be 400 pixels tall and at least 1980 pixels wide.

For example: https://www.shenrent.com/

You could also switch to inline or full page modes on the carousel (we call it "hero unit") and those will show normal aspect ratio photos much better.

For the other photos, it's looking for a 3/2 aspect ratio.

We've got an upcoming dev cycle to add some tooling around this so you'll get a crop tool on the carousel and the property photos will show the original ratio when viewed in full screen.

The carousel looks bad in one way, and the individual photos for each property is bad another way. Tried looking for tool or documentation on site, but find neither. :(

I have the same question about resizing to fit the carousel. Thanks!

Jackie

I have the Schlage touch locks at my properties. They are z-wave not WiFi and they connect through a SmartThings hub. Really interested in exploring how to program a code for a guest and include it in an email autoresponder. SmartThings is very API-friendly and works with IFTTT too. Should be possible to integrate with OR. Was wondering if you are considering this integration.

Is there some magic to how we should put in photos? On my hosted website, I am getting the bottom half of a famous man. Another chops into the picture from all sides. Another is bizarre

Is there some photo editing/editor, some magic sizing, some way that my pictures will work and be as I imagine them?

Can I pick how to display them, so they aren't cropped badly?

The carousel takes a horizontal slice out of the middle of each picture...!

https://www.jimthorpevacationrentals.com/

While we are at it:

The Support link at top should be in "My Booking Area"

The Support page should enable opening a support ticket if what is on the page doesn't answer the question.

The only way I see to email for Help is the Contact link, which seems more aimed at new prospects (Sales)

Have not started AirBnB yet, but isn't there some not so obvious ways when it comes to requesting money? Things like pet or custom fees. I have heard this song before, unfortunately...

It appears that Airbnb does not have a way to set a pet fee as part of the surcharges. While there are manual ways to get around this on a per booking basis, these seem highly undesirable. If I recall, the surcharges do not transfer over when you push OR rates to Airbnb. Does anyone know of a clean way to handle this?

Randy

JTVRs - my thoughts

1) Agree, it's a minor annoyance. My practice is to keep OR open in two tabs in Chrome. One for the My Booking Area and the other for the Forum. And I've learned to get to the Forum by going to ownerreservations.com and clicking on Forum.

2) I never use that search, but for me it works to find the guest last name. But I never know the guest's last name so not super useful. I agree would be nice to know what is being searched

3) This one I can help with. Go to https://www.ownerrez.com/support and use the search there. I agree would be very nice to have it in the forum itself, but it's still useful where it is. I've never complained because there are many other features I'd like in the Forum, such as being able to 'like' someone's post, attach files (including images), have info about how many posts a user has made, that sort of thing.

I purposely avoided wifi locks. In the mountains wifi is over satellite and not unlimited. Power outages happen too. I don't want to rely on the connection that can fail. having 10 digit code is a small inconvenience compared to other possibilities. I have a very good ownerrez template with illustration how to operate the erental lock. The only issue I had is not with guests but with some repairmen.

Having used this for a number of months now, here are several items that slightly annoy as a user:

1) When in "My Booking Area" I cannot easily go back to the main page *has Forum, Support, Contact, etc). Seems there should be a Green "Go to the Main Page" in the same place that brought me here, or whatever to toggle back and forth.

2) There is a search on top right of My Booking Area. Not really use it, not really sure PRECISELY what it is for

3) Would greatly appreciate that Search in the main OR area. To this day, I still do not know how to search the Forum. That is by far the most annoying thing. There may be a hidden way to do it, but every other forum I was ever in had an obvious Forum search box

Yep - my thinking as well. The wifi tracking and all is nice, but there's never really a time when I need to rescind codes in the middle of a stay. I'd rather have something that just works, without internet, all the time.

Good idea

I was wanting something that didn't have recurring fees but that was highly reliable, easy to use and wasn't reliant on wifi. eRentallock has been great for us so far as wifi internet isn't very reliable in the area of our rental. Even though you can't delete codes remotely and you have to be at the lock to create the shorter code, I'm still really happy with the system.

Hi Paul
Yes an intro would be good thanks.

"Those travel insurance document/links... You don't have to show the raw URL. You could use a hyperlink where the word is [Travel insurance policy summary] and link goes to that URL. Use the link menu on the editor to build a link out of it."

Why don't you put one link to those somewhere in your default legal agreement? I just added in this in several places in my version:

We are not "insured" for your possessions, trip, emergencies or Booking; it is strongly recommended you purchase appropriate travel insurance [Travel insurance policy summary] - this will appear in our correspondence with you.

Until they discover the ridiculous Extenuating Circumstances from Airbnb. One woman posted that she averages a 5% loss of revenue to this on AirBnB bookings in her area.

I am hoping that even if some people take the travel insurance, it might head off some who might use Ext Circum as a last minute cancellation method.