For those coming out to VRMA International in Orlando, make sure to swing by to see us! Nine of our fantastic team members will be there - just spot the bright green booth (#611)! If you aren't attending this year, maybe we can catch you at a future event! And spoiler: next year's VRMA International is in Phoenix, so pencil it in now!
But wait, there's more - this is a product update after all! This week's release from October 18th marks 17 updates with mostly bug fixes and a few enhancements. Read on!
New Channel
Book Direct Forgotten Coast Integration is Live!
In case you missed Wednesday's announcement, OwnerRez is excited to announce our partnership with Book Direct Forgotten Coast as a new first-class channel partner!
Learn more by reading the Book Direct Forgotten Coast Setup & Connecting support article.
Enhancements & Tweaks
HomeToGo Now Receives Real-time Listing Updates
HomeToGo has implemented another feature of the OwnerRez API to receive real-time updates (via webhooks) of rates and calendar changes, enabling faster listing updates.
Not familiar with HomeToGo? Learn more by reading the HomeToGo Setup & Connecting support article.
Phone Number Input Placeholder Follow-up
After releasing the Upgraded International Phone Number Input on October 9th, we realized that the default placeholder phone numbers appeared too realistic and may cause confusion for users and guests.
OwnerRez has adjusted the default placeholder phone numbers with a lowercase x, ex. (xxx) xxx-xxxx.
Users will now see the newly adjusted default lowercase x placeholder phone numbers in-app.
Guests will also see the newly adjusted default lowercase x placeholder phone numbers on Hosted Websites and Guest Forms.
New Check-in and Check-out Endpoints Added to the OwnerRez v2 API
Many partners and prospective partners work to provide solid API integrations for OwnerRez users through our API. We've added new check-in and check-out parameters for the Bookings PATCH in the OwnerRez v2 API.
Learn more by reading our API for Apps Overview support article.
Bug Fixes
Don't Match to CC (Except "Processed Elsewhere") or PayPal Transactions When Processing Airbnb Deposits. Airbnb deposits were incorrectly matched to the credit card or PayPal security deposit payments during the dedupe process. We fixed this glitch by changing the logic for Airbnb deposit matching to only match credit cards processed elsewhere or bank transfer-type payments, not real credit cards or PayPal-type payments. OR also enabled the ability to simultaneously change the deposit amount and deposit ID on a payment, as long as the payment/refund remained undeposited.
Ensure Phone Number Type is Retained When Sending or Receiving SMS Messages. Following the Upgraded International Phone Number Input release on October 9th, a user noticed a guest phone number that was originally saved in the system as a Mobile phone number was set to no phone type after receiving an SMS message from that number. We corrected this bug to not lose the phone type in these situations.
Fix Guest Conversation Does Not Auto Select Vrbo Even if Last Message was from Vrbo. Users who had a Vrbo guest with both an SMS (or just a mobile number on file) and a Vrbo conversation history faced an issue where the Vrbo guest conversation page erroneously preselected SMS as the method for sending a message, even though Vrbo was the last method used. We have fixed this glitch to default to Vrbo if it was the last used communication method in the guest conversation.
Fix Owner Double Select on Re-enabling a Booking "Is Managed." When owner changes were made to a Booking > PM > Change > Owner > a different owner was selected and the "Is Managed " radio button was unchecked, and the "Is Managed " radio button was rechecked without saving, both the original and the new owner were reselected on the Owner dropdown menu. We corrected this issue, and owner changes made to the Booking PM section will now save correctly.
Fix ownerrez.com Search Results for Some Numeric Searches. We found that some ownerrez.com search terms that included numeric characters yielded search results that included erroneous characters. This bug was fixed by better handling "HTML markup" when a search includes numeric characters.
Fix Partially Hidden Tooltip on Email Template Delete Button. When users attempted to delete email templates with associated triggers, an important tooltip explaining why the deletion isn't allowed was partially hidden due to positioning overlaps. This glitch has been resolved, and tooltips will now be visible when users attempt to delete email templates with associated configured triggers.
Fix User Email Suppressed Alert Stuck on in Some Edge Cases. This involved Third-Party Alert subscriptions (TPA). If a TPA email address became suppressed after a hard bounce, and even if the TPA user was then unsubscribed from the alerts in Communication History, the Email Suppressed banner ("Emails that we are sending to you are bouncing") would stay active confusing the users for that account. We've corrected this to remove the banner from displaying if the suppressed email is unsubscribed from the TPA.
Improve Handling of Large Number of Properties on API Integrations Grid. OwnerRez users with large numbers of API-connected properties connected to a single listing channel noticed that their connect-property count was inaccurate in the Properties column of their Channel API Integrations grid. This issue has been corrected to properly handle when the number is greater than 25.
Improve Page Number Calculation in Forum Latest Discussions. The Latest Discussions section of the OwnerRez forum displayed a page 2 link before there were enough comments (20+ comments) to generate the need for page 2. Fixed!
Remove Non-alphanumeric Characters From Internal Discount Names Synced to Vrbo. Although Vrbo could accept non-alphanumeric characters from internal discount names on a pull sync, they could not accept non-alphanumeric characters from internal discount names on a push sync. While these internal discount names are not displayed to users, OR will now only send alpha, numeric, and space characters from internal discount names synced to Vrbo.
Send a Rate Push to Vrbo After Expanding Booking Window. When a property booking window was increased OR did not immediately do a rate push to Vrbo, it could have created a gap in time in which a booking could have been made without proper property rates and rules information available to Vrbo. A user experienced a booking that came in right between the update of the availability and the calendar update of the Vrbo listing with incorrect nightly rates. OR has corrected this bug by adding an immediate Vrbo rate push after any new Min and MaxDaysBeforeArrival property rule changes.
Show When Dates are Unavailable in Channel Rate Tester for Vrbo. Channel Rate Tester results when testing for Vrbo would not say dates are unavailable for a property - it would just show the rates/charges. We resolved this issue to say when dates are unavailable due to the property being reserved for Vrbo, like it does with Airbnb and HomeToGo rate testing.
Spell Out "Vacation Rental" On User Onboarding Intro. The OwnerRez new user onboarding introduction form asked, "What is your experience level in the VR industry?." We realized some thought VR was an acronym for Virtual Reality, not Vacation Rental as intended. OR changed the question to "What is your experience level in the Vacation Rental industry?."
