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Further to my message above, this error appears to be more than a display bug, because according to Airbnb the message from one guest was sent to two different guests from unrelated bookings. Here is what Airbnb shows for the first example in my message above:
Possibly this is an Airbnb error, but it can definitely cause a lot of trouble if it continues....
Thanks Adria, in the end I just set up a Hosted Website for each property and gave each its own domain name. Because I started with a multiple-property page, I'm now geting GVR error messages when I try to integrate via API with GVR. I've sent in a ticket a few days ago to help sort that out, though I haven't yet heard back.
This morning I started getting messages sent by one guest showing up as having been from several. This is a bug.
Here's what the message queue looks like. Three of the exact same message from three different guests at exactly the same time.
Actually only Lillian sent the message. When I click on the message from Karen, I can see this:
As you can see, the title says it's a conversation with Karen, but all the actual messages are duplicates of my conversation with Lillian.
When I click on the conversation with Susan, I get the same thing.
This has been going on since last night. Here's another example of one guest sending a message, but it's showing up as if the same message was sent by three different guests at the exact same:
Clearly a bug. FYI.
Optional items shouldn't even be pushed up to Airbnb via the API in the first place. Please write in to the Helpdesk with specific information and examples so we can investigate and determine what's going on.
I just realized as I was working through the tedious AirBnB integration that a SEASONAL OPTIONAL ITEM (NOT a SURCHARGE, but OwnerRez doesn't distinguish between the two - which is a HUGE failure for this software!) is being rolled into my nightly rate on AirBnB!!
Why?
This raises a whole number of questions...
1) Why is an OPTIONAL item which the guest can choose to ADD or not to their reservation being AUTOMATICALLY included on AirBnB?
Again, this is an OPTIONAL item. Including it in the nightly rate, with no choice being provided to the guest, is wrong, incorrect, and practically dishonest!
2) It is a SEASONAL item, that we ONLY charge for during certain times of the year, but it appears that it is being applied ALL the time! (Am I wrong about this? Is it only being applied seasonally? Someone please let me know this so that I can be talked a little bit back away from the ledge!)
3) Why am I... the owner of the property, the host, the one who makes the rules, and decides how and if I will rent out MY property NOT allowed to determine IF this charge should be included in the nightly rate shown on AirBnB?
4) This artificially raises my price on the AirBnB site against my competition who are NOT forced to do this.
5) Not only is this an OPTIONAL, SEASONAL ITEM for Winter Months ONLY, we have a DIFFERENT OPTIONAL, SEASONAL ITEM, for Summer Months ONLY. I don't see that being fed to AirBnB and added to the Nightly Rate! (Thank goodness!) But it demonstrates the ridiculousness of the approach! A Seasonal Optional Item which may not even be appropriate to the time of the booking is being forced on reservations, meanwhile the correct one for the season is not mentioned or available?
I have, for the last decade, charged guests separately and off site, for OPTIONAL items that they add after making their booking on a 3rd party website like VRBO and others, without any difficulty. I note that this can be done for a Credit Card Authorization Security Deposit with AirBnB bookings, so why not with OPTIONAL Items?
One of the MAIN reasons why I use PMSoftware and have for over a decade, is precisely because listing sites hell-bent on controlling my business don't offer the needed flexibility for me to run it as I need to in order to be successful. I SHOULD have the option to include an OPTIONAL item on AirBnB or NOT!
At the moment, the workarounds for this problem that I can see are...
1) Disconnect the API connection between OR and Air.
2) Explain that this is happening in my description. But that's not a good solution because it doesn't fix the issue that my listings are being made less competitive by an artificially increased price.
That's about it. Does anyone have any other suggestions or information for me?
Anyone who has been provided the iCal link indefinitely has access until if/when they decide to delete it from their system?
Yes, that is correct. The design thinking is that, as you point out, that data is publicly visible on your website and listing channels anyway, it is not a secret, so is not a privacy concern. And since you might likely be using the same iCal feeds in any number of places, for example listing channels, allowing you to change or disable them would open up a whole host of problems best avoided.
Separating from long term property manager and no longer want them to have access to the calendar. I understand it’s semi public by viewing on listing sites but I’d like the details to be unavailable via the cleaning software they use, etc
Anyone who has been provided the iCal link indefinitely has access until if/when they decide to delete it from their system?
No, this is not possible. Can you explain your use case for why you'd want to do this?
Is it possible to change a default iCal export link? I know I can use custom iCal links and that is not applicable, looking specifically to change the iCal default link.
Thanks!
Some of our clients have received multiple Google Vacation Rentals (GVR) listing issues alert emails in error. These can be ignored for now, while we investigate the underlying issue.
If they give you trouble, I just got approved with an Elavon reseller who has lots of vacation rental customers on MCC 6513. Pricing at:
interchange + 0.10% + $10/mo
OR
interchange + 0.05% + $35/mo
OR
interchange + 0% + $75/mo
I started receiving lots of emails from OR starting today about GVR channel. I can't make heads or tails of this, don't see any errors, so i'm wondering if this is some sort of OR internal problem since we have not changed anything in a long time
this is the email
Running List Quality Analyzer does not show any errors. A couple of warnings that have been there for a while
And clicking on the big green "Google Vacation Rentals" button from the email shows this page.
What is the deal with that warning box: "There are no active properties connected.." when there's clearly a property connected showing on the page?
Great find. I've emailed my processor to see if they agree and can change my MCC. (I'm on an Interchange Plus plan.)
What you are referring to is called "Broken link protection". It enables OwnerRez to ensure that requests get routed to the correct page even if you change the path for that page.
You can disable it on the hosted website options page:
Checking in on this update? Last post was from 1 year ago, and I still cannot find this feature. Hosted websites are still creating these ungainly trailing numbers for custom pages, would love to be able to avoid them.
Wanted to pass along some knowledge after recently shopping for credit card processing services.
For a bit of background, in CC processing there's the concept of "interchange rates" which is the wholesale processing rate that merchant account providers pay to Visa, MC, etc. There is a giant table of interchange rates, which vary based on the merchant's business type (merchant category code or MCC) and the type of card the purchaser is using, i.e. debit card, basic credit card, rewards card, etc. Merchant account providers typically charge merchants a flat rate (like Stripe's 2.9%) or possibly a couple tiers of rates based on card type. And they make their money on the spread between those rates and the wholesale interchange rates. Sometimes the spread can be quite large, for example, debit cards from large banks have a federally regulated wholesale rate of 0.22%.
There is another merchant account pricing model called "interchange plus" where the provider passes the wholesale rate through to the merchant, plus a processor margin typically 0.10% - 0.50%. Historically that model has only been available to high volume merchants, but there are some processor sales channels that will offer it to small merchants as well.
The semi-recent development (as of Oct 2023) is that Visa has created an especially low wholesale rate of 1.43% for "real estate" merchants (MCC 6513), and this includes both regular and rewards card types. The goal is to incentivize landlords to accept credit cards and increase Visa's transaction volume in a category where they don't see much action -- rent payments. But I'm told this MCC is also appropriate for STR / vacation rental merchants.
Long story short, signing up with a merchant account provider who offers interchange plus pricing and getting them to code your account as MCC 6513 can provide substantially better rates than typical processors.
Following up with what I learned. There's a small monthly charge for the Converge gateway, and it varies depending on the Elavon sales channel. Via Costco, the Converge gateway is $5/mo with a $149 setup fee. Via another Elavon reseller (who has better overall rates than Costco) the Converge gateway is $10/mo with no setup fee.
I had the same issue. What i found out is that I set up "seasons" and in the seasons section I had set minimum stays. Those become the default and even override the property minimum which I had set at 3 days. Once I updated seasons to 3 night minimum, that cleared it up. Hope this helps.
I'm not clear on exactly what the question is here? Please write in to the Helpdesk with a description, specific examples, and screenshots, so we can properly understand and give advice.
Can't figure out why the widget for rates shows only the cancellation policy.
Under widgets preview it shows correct data but on the site menu or an added widget it only shows cancellation policy. Spent hours on this & can't figure it out.
???????
Any update on this Paul?
You must choose either your OwnerRez hosted website or the OwnerRez global landing page for your Google Vacation Rentals (GVR) listing Landing Page.
A hosted website generally directs the user to the Property URL which is setup in each Properties > General Info page.
A Global Landing Page sample can be seen here:
https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/google-vacation-rentals-common-issues-questions#global-landing-page
Each property would have it's own Global Landing page, which would look similar and have the property details on the right:
I have a few properties and I manage others for other people. Right now I have a single Hosted Website with multiple properties.
I'd like to connect each of the properties up with Google Vacation Rentals
I would like to use each of the per-property subpages on my Hosted Website to link to Google Vacation Rentals. Can I do this or do I need to set up a separate site for each property along with new domain names?
If I do need to make them into individual sites, can I use subdomains, such that Property 1 goes to property1.domainname.com, Property 2 goes to property2.domainname.com, etc.?
I could be interested in just using OR's Global Landing Page, but I can't actually find a live version anywhere to test it out. Does someone have a link to one?
Answers, thoughts, suggestions welcome, thanks.
You can't - and you don't need to. Inquiries don't need to be "approved", the guest can just go ahead and book without approval.
Thanks Ken
Sorry to bug you again but I think I'm still having an issue. I can't pre-approve / edit the quote in VRBO
And then I also can't send them the quote in OwnerRez because I dont have their email. How am I supposed to approve this inquiry?
The issue is that Vrbo doesn't even have a custom-quote API. We've pressed them on this for years, and recently we've gotten a bit of traction, so hopefully at some point that functionality will be available.
Note that, with Airbnb, you can already create a custom quote in OwnerRez and send it to a prospective guest via the API.
https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/air-inquiries-and-stuff#specialoffers
Ken this is massively helpful. Thank you.
But this is also a massive gap. I get more inquiries than anything in VRBO and its creating a bottle neck, disincentivizing me from even using Ownerrez. Right ? I pay a pretty penny to come centrally manage, but this is me manually working through VRBO directly now. As of now, I only use for Airbnb and VRBO. I already message people directly on AIrbnb instead, and now im having to do the same in VRBO and talk them through any post booking costs changes on a "promise"? Kinda makes sense for me to just use those two platforms directly instead then
Is this a gap with the integration between VRBO / Ownerrez?
Effectively, yes - Vrbo intentionally does not provide any direct guest contact information until the guest has actually booked. You can only communicate with the guest via the Vrbo internal messaging system (though OwnerRez does integrate with that). And, those messages block any phone numbers, email addresses, or weblinks until after the guest has already booked.
This means that, unfortunately, there is no way to send a guest a custom quote. The only option is for them to simply book their stay on Vrbo at whatever rates are posted there. Once the booking has been made, it appears in OwnerRez and you can control it there, including by adjusting the rates at that time. You can discuss this and make promises via the internal messaging system prior to booking, but you can't actually do a custom pre-booking quote.
https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/channel-management-api-integrations-vrbo#vrbo-quotes
Will do!
