Security Deposit Release email

The other day a renter responded to the security deposit release - this was the first time I had actually seen the message. Is there a way to customize the message?

Thanks,
David

Hi David,

Unfortunately, no. The release email message is hard coded. Being able to change it, as well as the other guest emails, is on the dev roadmap.

What part of the message do you like or dislike? What would you add or take away?

I did not realize it says that we will be following-up with a survey. While we do send out a thankyou note after a guest stays, we don't send a survey.

David

We actually have a maintenance release coming up in the next week that will change that text slightly to "we MAY send you a survey..." to make it more open-ended.

The reason we originally added that line was because we had a number of customers who use the "send review request" features on their FlipKey or HomeAway listings after the reservation is over.

We've had survey collection on the roadmap for quite some time - specifically, the desire to survey guests directly in OwnerRez. We've delayed working on it though because FlipKey and HomeAway have not been willing to allow us to insert the surveys into their system. Originally, our plan was to collect surveys and testimonials from the guests following the booking and then integrate with the listing sites so those testimonials show up automatically on all your listings. It's been hard to get the integration partnerships worked out however.

The maintenance update I referred to earlier in the thread was just released.

The last paragraph of the email now reads:

"Thanks for coming out! We may send you a short survey in the next few days, asking about your stay. If you get a survey, please take a few minutes to let us know how everything went. Thanks again, and if you have any questions or concern, please let us know."

That would be great if we can have the link to our reveiw. Any luck with HomeAway or VRBO letting you enter it into their system, once received?

Claudia

No, but we're planning on doing it anyway. The idea is to ask the guest at the bottom of the review "Do you mind if we submit this review to TripAdvisor, HomeAway, etc on your behalf? We won't share any private details". If they say yes, we'll use the public review pages on those website to post our review. The guest will then get confirmation emails from those sites (TripAdvisor, HomeAway, etc) asking if they really posted the review which hopefully they'll confirm. That's the best we can do. We believe it should work well.

-Michelle

Great.

Claudia

Michelle that would be great but not sure how that would work for homeaway and vrbo since don't they require the guest to login/register to post the review? That has been our major problem since they have instituted the new review process. Many of our reviews are no longer being completed due to this requirement.

How are the renters going to verify that they wrote that review? Through your system or homeaway's.

Silvia

Hi Silvia,

You may be right. I'm actually not aware that HomeAway makes reviewers have an account. If that's the case, then you're right that it wouldn't have a high likelihood of success. That being said, HomeAway is not the only site owners want reviews on. We see a lot of FlipKey and VacationHomeRentals listings as well. Both of those sites allow open reviews with email confirmation at most. And there are a good half a dozen other sites as well. If HomeAway makes reviewers have an account, my guess is that reviews will begin to plummet on their site and they'll lift the restriction at some point.

-Michelle

Michelle,

Reviews are plummeting, my sister almost always got reviews from her customers and now she is lucky to get a few. I also used to get some reviews but now it is even harder to get a review through their new process. I am not sure if VRBO changed it's way yet so it may be able to go in that way but I am sure this will change too. I hope they lift the restrictions but no change yet with all the complaints they have gotten. Especially since the reviewer proceeds to write the review and at the end of everything they are asked to login. It has infuriated quite a few people - renter and owner alike.

Silvia

What about using the HomeAwayConnect guestbook? Someone here just mentioned that. I know that's not as preferable as the real rating system because you want to see the stars and "verified rating" attribute show up. But we might be able to use the guestbook side to insert the reviews that way.

-Michelle

Silvia, I go throught the VRBO review system. It is the same. Why they changed this, I don't know, but it is nowhere near what it used to be.

Claudia

Michelle,

Are you be talking about the reviews owners could put in? Except it's from the renter? I guess this could work if you somehow stated in the review it was submitting via owner Rez? Not quite helping with the rating system as you mentioned but it's something. I guess first could try to have the guest send it via their channels and if not review appears then send them the request to do it via your system and then upload it that way.

Silvia.

Yes exactly. The owner-submitted reviews. Not perfect but something to get the HomeAway sites working for now.

-Michelle

Have there been any updates to this? I would like to include the Flip key, Homeaway or vrbo review link to my property in the security deposit release email. That would solve all of these issues wouldn't it? The client would just see the link in the email, click on it and go directly to the review page to leave their review.

We have been busy working on releasing the overhaul to the settings section and we're very close to releasing it -- it should be out in a week or two. Once we get that out, we'll go through a couple of rapid releases to complete the smaller issues that have been backing up, like the security deposit email customizations.

Thanks,

Devin