General Help and Questions

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Hi Loretta,

Not sure how much help this will be, but leaving you a link here to check out for yourself in case you do find it helpful:  https://hubs.ly/Q01187cH0 

It would only be relevant for your Q3 about damage protection for Airbnb bookings really. I'm not sure who you currently use for damage protection and absolutely don't want to step on any toes, but in the interest of providing further info, Know Your Guest™ technology from SUPERHOG would still be applicable on Airbnb bookings for you in this instance, the damage protection is up to $5million (USD) and using our white labelled (your branding) One Step Link you wouldn't need to be integrated via the channel manager so that wouldn't be an issue and you'd still have peace of mind that your bookings are protected.

Feel free to reach out with any further questions, otherwise I will leave it with you and hope it helps.

Good luck getting your things sorted!

Kathryn & the Know Your Guest™ team at SUPERHOG

I signed up for OwnerRez for a few reasons - fast calendar syncing to avoid double bookings when using IB on several platforms was the biggest one, with the next most valuable being the damage protection insurance.  I'm setting everything up and API integrated with AirBnB yesterday and started the Vrbo integration.

Unfortunately, AirBnB requires API-integrated hosts to use their simplified pricing (our property is in the Caribbean). This puts us at a severe disadvantage competitively since none of the competition is using simplified pricing and it's not obvious to potential guests that our rate includes the guest service fee. We're already a high-priced property; now we just look crazy.

I'm willing to try leaving it API integrated if I can have a different heading on AirBnB than Vrbo .  Is that possible?  If so, how?

If not, I'll have to disconnect the API integration and have some other questions.

1) What happens to my listing when I disconnect?  Does everything go blank or stay the way it was when connected?

2) What's the best way to keep the calendars synced?  We're on three platforms - Vrbo, AirBnB, and our own website (not an OR website). Ideally, we would be on IB for at least Vrbo and AirBnB.  We almost never get more than one booking in a day and rarely are they for the same/overlapping dates, so calendars syncing every 30 minutes should be OK.  But with the new ABB policies of hosts cancelling, the closer to instantaneous syncing, the better.

3) Can I still purchase the damage insurance for AirBnB bookings?

Thank you for any help you can give me.

The block-off dates show "booked" on the single month calendar widget, although they are not booked, they are blocked. Is there a way to show "unavailable" on the calendar widget rather than "booked"?

Hi all, with deposits being such a hot topic I wanted to share a link with you that you may find useful, at least interesting. 

Know Your Guest™ technology from SUPERHOG actually gives you a few options here when it comes to having something in place to cover small damages, you can choose the traditional damage deposit route (typically larger amount, refundable), or choose our Damage Waiver (typically smaller amount, non-refundable), or even give your guest the option to choose what works best for them. With the waiver you also add an additional revenue stream into your business, and then for any larger damages, we can help you out there too with our up to $5million guarantee.

But I'll let you look and learn at your leisure: https://hubs.ly/Q01187cH0 simply click the link to our OwnerRez/SUPERHOG Partner page and have a browse, if you want to get straight to the nitty gritty click on "What We Offer" up at the top and then "Simplified Deposit Management". If you want to learn more by chatting to the team you can fill out the form on the page too or if it's easier simply let me know and I'll get you introduced to the right person.

Hope this helps anyone out there looking into your options!

Kathryn & the Know Your Guest™ team

Have you been using Channel Bridge?  You could also try the mode explained in part 2 here:

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/channel-bridge-common-issues-questions#debug

Note that Airbnb often doesn't post payments until around the time of guest arrival.  So, it may not be practical to use the "Paid in Full" criteria with Airbnb bookings.

Bump.  I am having the same issue.  Guests have paid in full on AirBnB but not updating in OR.   VRBO just shows zero for everything (but they are behind on API integration on their end apparently for full synch). 

You'll want to change the Rules, and, potentially, also the Scheduled security deposit on the Transactions tab.

Thank you.  I presume I simply edit the booking to change the security deposit hold amount and the date, so I'll try it.

In theory, yes, you could do that, but you'd have to set things up manually, and I don't really see what that's accomplishing for you.  We wouldn't recommend trying to do it that way, as there's so much scope for confusion, disagreement, and forgetfulness, but technically it is possible.

Hello, Ken - thank you for the link - that's useful information. 

But I'll ask my question this way - can I modify the booking to require a unique security deposit hold after the booking has been paid in full?  What about after arrival?  I want zero as the value for the security deposit hold at time of booking, but I want to change it to a unique value shortly before check in date.

I'm not sure I understand the question?  It sounds like you're basically just describing a security deposit hold - we collect the credit card info in advance, then set the hold a day or two before arrival and keep it active as long as necessary.

Here's information on hold length and renewal:

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/security-deposit-holds#multiple-holds

Like at a hotel, we offer services at our villa in the Caribbean (such as meal preparation and sometimes local currency cash advances). I'd like to set up a credit card hold to cover these services like the hotels do.

It looks like the security deposit hold would work, but some guests don't use the services and others pay cash to avoid credit card fees. Is there a way to add a security deposit hold about a week before arrival to be collected the day before arrival?  And how long is the hold good for?  Most of our guests stay a week.

This is normal - iCals do not carry rate data.  You'll need to work towards our more advanced connection methods, such as our API connection.

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/channel-management-api-integrations

Sure, that is a core purpose of OwnerRez.

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/messaging-overview-video

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/email-templates-and-triggers

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/pre-arrival-email-templates-triggers-custom-fields

I changed some rates in the calendars in vrbo but they are not reflecting in OR. I went to settings,  calendar import/export, clicked on the appropriate ical and clicked sync now and no changes appear. It has been over 30 minutes also.

Please help

Thanks

Dan

I see the standard "Booking" email templates but wanted to add a "how is your stay so far" and "thanks for staying with us/leave a review" automated message. is there any way to do this in Owner Rez, to set them up to send at specific times during and after the customer stay?

I asked for some filters in the screen a long time ago but it's just been composted to the bottom of the list.

https://www.ownerrez.com/forums/requests/booking-email-tab-filter-to-only-show-scheduled-emails

We've looked into making changes to this, but, for now, if you want booking-type messages to be sent, it needs to be a booking, not a block.  A $0 charge booking is valid however.

Understood. In our case, we are going through rebranding. Incrementally. But when done, I guess I will have to duplicate the Theme as the account theme. Not really a big deal overall. But I suspect that as people grow their business and portfolios it is something that may be desirable.

Not currently -- the account theme is special in that it's the contact info/logo etc. on the account itself. The other themes are stored separately, but the account theme is the default and it's stored on the account.

Typically you'd want to use the account theme as the default, so there can be a fallback if there's no property in some context -- like an inquiry with no property.

Then, you'd set up the per property themes separately. If you don't have a property that uses the account theme, that's fine -- you can map all properties to specific themes and leave the default more general.

We have friends coming to stay at our home free of charge.  I would still like for them to receive the "Welcome" messages and "Check out Instruction" messages, etc before/during/after their stay.  There is important info in each.

Can I just block off time and the messages with triggers will still go out?  Or do I create a booking, change the fees to "0" and allow the trigger messages to go out that way?  Block off time seems easier and cleaner. But I'm not seeing the message options.

Is there an easy way to "swap" a theme into or out of being the Account Theme?

Example: we are rebranding property by property and nearly done. I need to update the account theme to the new name and info. We have been doing this property by property until now. However, I also want to KEEP the old account theme for a while - just in case.

So I want to make the new brand the account theme and the current account them saved in a different slot.

Hello! Deposits is currently a manual tool for logging Deposits inside OwnerRez. There are plans to do automatic deposits from certain channels (e.g., Airbnb) and some payment processors. Ultimately, allowing deposits to sync with QuickBooks. We of course couldn't build all that out at once, but we'll keep adding to it over time to get it to that point. Stay tuned!

The short answer is - they really don't.  You have to connect with the main channel account, not using a co-hosted account.

https://www.ownerrez.com/support/articles/channel-management-api-integrations-airbnb-common-issues-questions#cohosts

And OwnerRez itself does not support cohosting, per se - you can share your credentials with anyone you please, or, if you're using our Property Management premium feature, you can create a Portal Access account with Admin privileges, but in both cases the other person will have full access to everything, not just specific properties.

Got excited when I saw that there seems to be a QB integration for Deposits but when I tested, it errors out.  Is it supposed to be an integration? How does it work - I don't see any way to add a deposit date or let the system know where the fees should get booked.

Can you please direct me to a document that discusses how co-hosting listings works? I own the property and have a PM who also uses OR. How do I best achieve letting the PM manage everything (bookings/communications etc) but also have the listing show up on my direct book site. I'd also like the reviews to stay with my house should I part ways with the PM in the future. Does this mean that she should be the co-host and if so how does she manage the listing and communications?

thanks

That's right - write in to the Helpdesk explaining in detail what you want to do, and we'll help you work it out.

This is a known issue, and there are plans to add a more efficient way of doing this, though no ETA on that at present.

1. Yes its possible but you have to get the guys to turn it on. I'm not sure of wait times on the vrbo end or if they will just do it?

Can I have more than 1 VRBO account tied to my OR account? 

I have one now, API connected. 

I would like to add another VRBO Account for a different geography.