General Help and Questions

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Leave it to VRBO to make things difficult for everyone. Thanks so much for your quick response, Chris!

Yep, that's exactly what the issue was -- tentative reservations were being mixed in with real ones. The iCal format has a Confirmed vs. Tentative flag for that (which we honor), but of course VRBO doesn't use that flag. Instead they put the word "Tentative" or "Reserved" somewhere in the iCal summary.

I've updated our calendar synchronizer to look at the event description and ignore events with the word "Tentative" in them. This should solve the issue regardless of which link you use.

Chris,
Here is my VRBO iCal link:
http://admin.vrbo.com/icalendar/59531bf7123645279c323ae52a9458a6.ics

When I opened the tab to get the ical export link for you, I noticed a setting that I do not remember seeing before. There is a big green check mark next to these words... "Include Tentative Reservations in the calendar export"

I could have missed this setting before, but it's hard to keep up with VRBO's changes which are sneaked in from time to time.

So I unchecked the box and now the export link is:
http://admin.vrbo.com/icalendar/59531bf7123645279c323ae52a9458a6.ics?nonTentative

I suppose I will now need to enter the non-tentative link into my OwnerRez settings.

Let me know if you think this was the problem, or if it's something else.

Thanks!

Yep, looks like they are not following the tentative flag in the spec.

This was for 9/12-9/15 for Martina N., correct?

If so, I've made a hotfix to the calendar sync to work around this issue and flag tentative using other values in the iCal.

I'll have a look at this. Can you send me the link for the VRBO iCal in question? I believe they're changing up some stuff with that sync, so we may need to adapt on our end.

VRBO Guest requested a booking (I have BIN), but I did not accept the booking since she complained about the VRBO fee in the booking request itself.

So, I manually entered an inquiry and sent her a quote through OwnerRez. When the guest tried to proceed with booking from her quote email, she received a message that the quote was no longer any good. I'm thinking this is because the OwnerRez calendar sync pulled in her tentative reservation from VRBO and blocked them on OwnerRez.

I have since removed the ical blocked dates on my calendar in hopes that when she tries again tomorrow her booking request will go through.

If anyone knows what I should do or not do now, please help! Thanks!!

If you have travel insurance enabled, the guest can choose it during checkout.

Then, regardless of whether they chose travel insurance, you'll see a Insurance tab on the booking. If they did choose the insurance, you'll see that there. If not, it gives you the capability to send them a link to buy the insurance separately (since they've already completed checkout).

I'm testing the system so I was probably NOT looking from the Guest side!

Thanks so much.

Do you want to apply it to all bookings or based on a rule? Or just manually added when you need it?

If automatically (to all or rule based), set the criteria on the discount to apply (either all bookings or specific bookings based on. For example, you could do a last minute booking discount by arrival within 10 days out. If you leave the criteria at "all bookings", it will automatically be applied to everything, and you'd need to manually remove it if you don't want it to apply.

If you want to manually add the discount, you don't need to add a Surcharge/Discount record for it. Currently, that section is only for automatically applied items, based on those rules you configure. Eventually we'll allow you to create manual ones there that you can select from the charges grid (like taxes work now), but we're not there yet.

If it's a manual discount, the best way is to go into Charges and add the discount directly there. That grid is fully editable, so if you added a new Rent line item after the last existing Rent line item, with a Description of "Discount" and a Rate of -10% -- that's going to be the best way to add a one-off discount.

I've created a 10% discount in Settings. How do I apply that discount to a quote or booking? I'd be applying it to rent.

Hi Chris,

Yes, that's how it appears on the live quote that the guest sees. Maybe you're looking at the quote (and its charges) in a different place? That only shows in guest-facing areas like online when they go to accept/finalize and in emails to the guest.

If it's not showing there either, did you maybe turn it off? Check your Settings > Travel Insurance settings for that property.

-Michelle

Good Afternoon,

Did you just change the way that the AIG travel insurance shows up on quotes and bookings? I thought I saw an optional line item show up on either quotes or bookings or both. I thought there was an optional check box and a 7% charge that would appear if checked. Now there just seems to be a link to the insurance purchase page, which is fine, since it looks clearer that we are not getting the money. Just trying to get a handle on how that works and appears to guests . . .

And on that 2nd question about security deposit holds, yes you can have the guest do a hold by credit card even if they paid by check (assuming you have a credit card payment method configured).

Under the booking > security deposit tab, you'll see a guest link. They can use that link to submit a security deposit. There will also be a reminder email sent to them several days before their arrival (based on your property rules) which will give them the same link and ask them to send in a security deposit. Look at the booking > security deposit tab and make sure the reminder is turned on.

Hi Nancy,

Once you've recorded the booking and charges, and you've recorded the payment they made, you can send them the guest payment link under the booking > payment page. Open that link yourself in another browser tab and you'll see what it looks like. From there, they can select a payment method to pay you with. If you have check configured as a payment method, they can select it and it will show them who and where to send the check to. Does that make sense?

-Michelle

Actually I asked this same question back in April, but I'm still having a problem.

Here's what I just did: I cancelled the old booking, then filled out a new quote for the Johnsons showing that they had already paid $500 toward the total. They had asked me for a breakdown of charges so I wanted to send them an invoice/payment request that reflected that.

I converted the quote to a booking since they have already paid their reservation deposit of $500 by check a long time ago before I was on OwnerRez.

I am confused now how to send them a payment request. They want to pay by check.

Also, if I had already imported this back during the trial period, will I have to pay for this booking? I don't really mind doing that but I have about six or seven upcoming that I will have to do this same thing to, and I want to be sure I understand if I might have a simpler way to do all of this.

Sorry for the confusion...

Hey guys, I made some mistakes months ago when I first started on OwnerRez, when importing a bunch of bookings I'd made through other means. I didn't understand the process at the time and it's been a while since I've had a booking other than through AirBnB, so I'm not quite sure how to fix it.

So basically I have some upcoming guests for this fall and winter that I have listed in OwnerRez under "Bookings" when in fact they don't know what they owe, what they've paid, and when the next payment is due. For example, the couple coming in October, the Johnsons, have paid me $500 but owe me the full balance this month. I can't find a way to send them an invoice with a breakdown and payment request without it triggering me for their credit card number, which I do not have.

Also, can you tell me how I can handle security deposit "holds" when they only pay by check. Can I have the system ask them for a credit card hold as well when the time comes due?

Thanks!

Great response! Works well. Thanks so much.

We just pushed up a hotfix that adds this support. You can now go into the reports section and choose "arrival" or "departure" instead of just "dates of stay".

Let me know if this solves the query for you.

That's a good idea! I'll have a look-see and figure out if there is a way to add that option in addition to booked vs stay selection.

Thank you so much, I see that. However, what I notice is that when I use "booked dates" the reports base the month on the beginning of the stay, not the end of the stay. If someone check in 7/28 and leaves 8/8 the income and taxes are shown in July, not August. The issue is, trust accounting wise, until the guest leaves, in this case in August, the money is not "earned" yet and from a tax perspective (here in the US Virgin Islands we have a monthly hotel tax) the tax is considered "collected" the month of check out, in this case August.

Is there a way to have the "dates of stay" or some other filter recognize the check out date instead of the check in date for the sake or reporting?

-- Chris

Hi Chris,

Welcome!

That is, in fact, the default way taxes are treated in our system. We do that because we recommend that VR owners remit taxes for the month of the stay, not the month of the booking/payment. If a booking is canceled, it's hard to get tax money back once remitted.

When viewing taxes in the reports (Reports > Taxes or Line Item Summary) there are options to display the taxes for "dates of stay" or "booked dates" and dates of stay is selected by default.

-Michelle

I am brand new to OwnerRez, so this is probably simple. I want the income, taxes or fees to be shown in the month that the guest departs, not the month they book or pay? Is there an easy way to do this?

Have you tried using the search box at the very top of the screen? That should do a search across bookings, quotes, inquiries by name, email, etc.

My other system was able to retrieve bookings past and present by imputing their last name or first name and I was able to look at the reservation from the past and see what I charged and any notes.

Now I am searching manually.

Marji
Property Manager for Monterey Bay Vacations
831-247-5532

Thanks for that follow-up information. I believe the templates do currently send the To emails together (like a normal email message where you can see all the To's together) but I need to confirm that for you. We are planning on enhancing email templates quite a bit, and I know CC fields are going to be added. Have you considered using a group email address? For instance something like "north-property-team@domain.com" where north-property-team is a group that includes everyone you want included? They could then all see it and respond. That's not a very elegant way of handling it, but it might also work for part of this.

Just to add: one of the reasons why this would be very useful would once everybody is included in the same email "reply all" can be used to keep the conversation and everyone informed.
At my own rentals I do everything myself, none of this is necessary, but for the ones that I help run this becomes a little bit complicated when it comes to communication with everyone involved.
Ella

Good morning Michelle! :)
I'm looking to add specific email addresses to templates that later are sent by triggers. For example have the same email sent out to the cleaning crew, owner, building manager with a reminder that guests are checking in in two days. The way I have it setup right now is identical emails being sent separately to each email address. This works, however it would be easier if everybody sees that the email was sent to all of them. It really does not matter if it's in the "To:" field or "CC:" field.
If I use comma (,) or semicolon (;), will the sent folder show me these per person ( delivered, opened etc) or as one?
Will they each see the others included in the emails when they open it, the way normal emails would work?

Thank you.

Thank you Michelle. I hope it appears soon!

Good morning Ella!

Yes and no. If you're using field codes, the To field will automatically pick up all the booking email addresses of the guest when filling in the email. The main field code for the booking email (BGEMAIL) automatically does that. You can test that out.

Are you looking for that or looking for a separate CC line?

I believe you can also use comma (,) or semicolon (;) to separate regular email addresses in the template as well.

Good morning!

We don't have that kind of widget out yet, but we do have plans to add it. It will basically be the ribbon widget (showing horizontal stacked availability) with the availability to click into that to start a quote - exactly as you described.