General Help and Questions

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Hi Claudia,

Currently, our system requires a last name in order to create a new quote, but we'll changing that. It's caused some conflict because - as you pointed out - some people send inquiries without a last name.

What most users do currently, when a inquiry comes in with no last name, is to put in an underscore ("_") or dash ("-") for the last name so that the quote can generate.

In the future, we'll be changing it to require a first OR last name, but not both.

-Michelle

In the case of a wire transfer, you would take it offline and then record it as a manual payment in the system.

You could bill them another payment, using the credit card info they submitted previously, but you would of course make sure they understood and agreed to that. You could also contact them to send you month offline.

No, you do not ever have to see their credit card information unless they are giving it to you over the phone and you are manually entering it into the system.

The vast majority of the time, they will enter their payments directly and the scheduled payments and security deposits will be collected based on that same credit card info.

A debit card that has the Visa or MasterCard logo on it would be accepted and work just like any other Visa/MasterCard card. If it isn't backed by Visa or MasterCard, than it wouldn't work.

We currently do not have any eCheck options but that is something we're considering adding in the future.

If added, that would basically be where the guest enters the routing and account number for their checking/savings account, and it would be debited directly. Sort of like how your utility company does with "auto-draft".

The merchant account we offer, through Sage, includes MasterCard, Visa and Discover. We can turn on Amex for you too but you get a separate statement directly from them.

Technically, our merchant accounts also include JCB and Diner's Club too, I believe, but I'd have to check into that to be sure.

Yes, Amex does their own fees and statements. When we set up your merchant account - if you choose to go with us - we always turn on a new Amex account for you unless you don't want that. Amex sets their own rates and fees, and we have no control over that. It's usually 3-3.5% and a statement fee of $5-7 per month.

If you use our 2.95% flat rate (with no other fees), then it's the same rate for all MasterCard, Visa and Discover transactions. Doesn't matter what other kind of card they use - business, international, debit, rewards, etc.

We also have a lower 2.25% rate deal but it contains fees for monthly, PCI, per-transaction and all the different card types.

In my opinion, the 2.95% flat rate is the better of the two.

And of course, you are free to go get your own merchant account from any of the many thousands of online resellers that are out there. As long as they are on Authorize.Net or Sage, we can integrate with them.

Silvia, I'm going to break up each part of that into multiple questions...

The full amount is deposited into your account and the fees come out at the end of the month. In the payment processing industry, this is know as "100% deposit". Back when we were picking a payment vendor to use, we made sure to require this. We don't like when fees are taken out of each deposit because is gets very hard to reconcile your payments with your bank account.

Michelle,

I look like a piece of cake after the above post. :)

Claudia

In the Quote section of the email, can we have the number of dates in that field? What does the "1 Spring"? It would be one reservation, either way. As it reads now, it states.....

Rent 1 Spring (5/11, 5/12) at Spring rates $650.00 $650.00

Instead, can we have something like...

Rent 2 night stay (Fri, 5/11 - Sun, 5/13) $650.00 $650.00

You know me, I would like those TOTAL NIGHT STAYS in there, and DAYS.

I don't know if I explained why I like these things. TWICE, renters had to leave a day earlier than what they thought, because their wording was not the norm. They would request dates, and not think that the last date they requested is the day they exit. So, when I would send them the quote, it all looked fine. NOW, I send the nights, and the days, so that they understand better and might catch it, if it states 2 nights and they are thinking 3 nights. So, I put as much information as possible. I even go to the extent of saying the words... CHECKIN DATE: Friday, May 11 CHECKOUT DATE: Sunday, May 13... for a 2 night stay.

I felt horrible to cut two people and their families short by one day. But, it was their mistake. Luckily, one of those families loved my house and has come for the past 4 years!

So, that is why I feel the nights and days on anything can avoid problems.

Claudia

If a customer replies to the quote, it is sent to our personal email. Wouldn't it go into your system? Wasn't it actually sent from the @ownerreservation email?

Are any changes coming for this? I am not sure what it should be. Should it be all part of one...ownerreservation? Or should it be separate, when they hit REPLY?

Claudia

How about a sort in the inquiry/booking/quote sections?

Nevermind. I see you have that already! You guys are good! However, you should put the arrow or something there, to let people know you can actually sort in those fields. Until I was thinking that maybe there you can do it, I didn't know it was there. No indication of that. :)

Claudia

Hi Michelle,

I am curious about the credit card processing - I used to have a merchant account and I couldn't figure out how much they charged me - well actually I could if I subtracted the amount I charged and the amount they deposited into my account. I have a few questions:

1. If I use your CC processor (Sage) do they deposit the full amount and then at the end of the month take the fee? Or do they take their fee and then make the deposit? Kind of like Paypal does except they don't deposit into your account but their own account which you need to transfer to your account (after they have released their hold on your money).

2. Are the fees the same whether the customer uses a reward card or not (most people now use only reward cards of some sort), what about across credit card companies? I remember MC, VISA charged the same amount (as long as it wasn't a reward card) and Amex was a separate arrangement and fee but processed with that credit card company.

3. I'm sorry if this is on the site already but since we are on the credit card topic, what credit cards does your processor (Sage) support? I imagine Visa, Master Card, ???.

4. Echecks will be a feature that interests me - would a debit card be allowed and how would it be considered - an echeck?

5. We don't need to see the customers credit card info correct? I disliked so much having to take the customers credit card information when I was taking a charge, that is another reason I switched to Paypal - the customer had full control of the information and dealt with Paypal directly. But if we need to charge them using Sage from the security deposit we do have a way to do so without having to see their CC information?

6. What happens if the charges are over the security deposit and the customer as per the rental agreement is responsible for that amount - how do we get payment then? Maybe this belongs in the security deposit topic?

7. How might a wire transfer be dealt with? Not that I have any at the moment, but I do get Europeans every once in a while and (I believe) they tend to deal in wire transfers as a norm.

Sorry for all the questions.
Thanks, Silvia

Hi Claudia,

At the moment, no, but our release for payments by check necessitates having that and it has become high priority.

-Michelle

No, and for good reason - you can have many quotes for the same date period. We thought about this some time back, but it got far too difficult to implement so we moved on. How would you envision the calendar displaying, say, 10 or 15 quotes for the same overlapping date period? The only designs we came up with where horribly complicated and confusing. We've thought about some new options but nothing has been formalized.

-Michelle

I sent you an email offline with my cell number. Please do give me a call at your convenience.

-Paul

You can manually adjust it to whatever you want. The subject is shown in the quote email form before you send it. When we release mail merge fields for the email bodies, we'll make sure to put them in the subject lines as well.

How does your system handle when the inquiry comes in without a Last Name filled in? You can't book a transaction without it. VRBO and such do not require a last name.

I was just going to try the first one and when I went to enter a Quote, there was no last name.

Claudia

Can the calendar also display open quotes? It would really be nice to see who has requested dates, and be able to see what the quote was for those dates.

Claudia

When the quote is sent, can the subject state the name of the renter, along with the dates requested. At the moment it states my house and the dates requested....

[Quote # 14990] Claudia's Vacation Home - PA for 5/11/12 - 5/13/12

Thank you,
Claudia

Hate you?!? Oh please, you're nothing. I've had people ask the same type of questions and then get MAD at the answers and start arguing and being offensive. You've been great!

Answer: open the booking, click the Legal tab, click the Open Archived PDF button.

You can also use that area to send them a request to sign a new agreement. Or if you've entered the booking manually and they never signed on to begin with.

Do you hate me yet? :(

How do I see the terms and conditions that the renter agreed upon? I tend to change my rental agreement, at times. I belong to a vacation rental forum and things come up, at times, that make me modify my agreement.

How do I see the one that was actually agreed upon, a the time they booked?

Claudia

Are there reminders, to alert customer that their balance is due, if they paid by check? Or reminders to send them Welcome Packets or anything else, which the owner sets up?

Thanks,
Claudia

Excellent news on the widget and I didnt even think of the @inquiryspot option. You probably figured out already I manage several properties. I am excited about what I see so far in your system and would be interested in learning more as well as sharing more about our business with you. Is there a place we could connect online outside this forum or speak by phone?

Thanks

FYI, you can also send inquiries from your website right now by simply sending email directly to your @inquiryspot email address.

If you look at the inquiry instructions page which is here:

https://app.ownerrez.com/inquiries/instructions

It shows a unique @inquiryspot email address for each property.

Any email you send to that address will be handled gracefully by the system. If we don't recognize the email (such as coming from VRBO or HomeAway) we give you an editor that lets you quickly enter the inquiry.

Funny you should mention that. The very next sprint - we're releasing a major update today and tomorrow - involves updates to the inquiry area with a possible embedded widget for your own website. I say "possible" because it might fall to the sprint after that depending on some scheduling. But it's coming right around the corner.

-Michelle

I understand. Would it be possible to create an inquiry form on my site that that could integrate with OwnerRez?

I really couldn't say. Over the past 6 months, we've had a large influx of new users each with their own questions and ways of doing things. It's provided a huge amount of feedback that has caused us to re-prioritize our roadmap half a dozen times. We don't build things just because one or two people requested it - that's a bad way of designing software - but there are a fair number of things that users have correctly pointed out are more important.

I could tell you 6 months, but that could easily change again.

On the other hand, we've noticed that a fair number of things would benefit by the API being out earlier such as mobile apps, calendar and inquiry integration.

OK, not a big deal, any ballpark idea of when it may be available? Don't worry I wont hold you to it. :)