AirBnB add configurable alerts (or IFTTT recipes) for second-order text notifications

AirBnB add configurable alerts (or IFTTT recipes) for second-order text notifications

This suggestion may be a bit hard to describe, so I'll start with what functionality I'm after:

 

Currently, when I confirm a booking, I go and manually create two reminders in my iOS or Google calendar. One reminder, 7 days PRIOR to the booking, is to alert me (via text msg) to send the guest the new door code and some other info related to their arrival. The second alert (text msg) is set for the day they check out, to remind me that we need to clean the apartment.

 

If you think about it, both of those reminders should be easy enough to have happen programmatically and automatically, every time a booking occurs. Either by AirBnB setting up some slightly user-configurable "alerts" (which would NOT be all that hard) or by enabling some tie-ins to services such as IFTTT (If This Then That). I use IFTTT for other things, and I was hoping I could have an AirBnB auto-entry in my iOS or Google calendar trigger those reminders. But it won't work. If I share my AirBnB calendar with my Google calendar, I *can* use IFTTT to generate a new Google cal entry for any specific date/time after the booking commences, but (due to the limitations of Google's "Quick Add" feature) I can't create any new event *before* the booking, and I certainly can't create one with a relative date (such as "7 days before) instead of a specific date (such as "September 21, 2016"). And, triggering a reminder ("Clean apartment") based on a guest's departure date is even more difficult. (Be aware that I want the alerts to happen via text message, and not depend on me checking my email or viewing the AirBnB calendar, etc. I want a text popping up right in my face.)

 

So, I can imagine a couple of different routes to achieve this. The most obvious and, as I've said, not really all that difficult, would be for AirBnB to set up a small system of host-configurable alerts based on already-existing AirBnB-tracked events. For the Do-Something-In-Advance category, let me set up an automatic alert that happens based on the start of every booking. I choose the number of days in advance and I supply the text for the message to be sent to myself. For the Time-To-Clean message, no need to let me select the day, since that's already known. Maybe I don't even need to supply the text, but just click a box for "Send Clean/Prep reminder".

 

Getting really ambitious, I suppose AirBnB could expand the capability of such a system so that hosts could use any date to trigger any reminder. (For instance, if halfway through a long booking -- whatever "long" might mean to a host -- one could trigger a reminder to provide clean sheets or ask the guest if they need blah-blah-blah.) That sounds ambitious, though, so I suggest starting with events triggered by the start and end of bookings.

 

The second way to achieve this, without AirBnB implementing the whole thing themselves, would be to enable more flexible tie-ins with services such as IFTTT. As I mentioned way back at the beginning, this doesn't work right now. Not because of anything having to do with AirBnB or IFTTT, but because of the limitations of Google Calendar and (even more) the iOS calendar. Maybe AirBnB could enable a way for hosts to set additional *automatic* (has to be automatic; remember, we're trying to make it so that I don't have to do this manually for every booking) AirBnB calendar entries. Which hosts could then, by sharing their AirBnB calendar with iOS or Google, feed into those calendars. At which point, the hosts could set up IFTTT recipes to trigger events for dates other than just check-in.

 

If any of this is too poorly explained or just doesn't make sense, feel free to contact me directly, AirBnB. And if any host reading this has any workarounds already making this possible, please contact me and make my day!

 

 

14 Comments

Hopefully, Igloo Homes will be able to sort out their Digital lock system to be fire rated for apartments etc.

Their system would send the Guest the codes accessible only for their stay.

I think that may help you and it may also be programmed to send cleaners a new passcode and info about dates the cleaning is needed.

 

Dede0
Level 10

Thanks, @Maria-and-David0, but we don't have Igloo locks. And we don't use "cleaners", Them are us. Or, rather, me.

 

I need a way to have certain reminders automatically generated based on the start/end of each booking. Not *at* the start/end, but based on those dates.

Dimitri0
Former Community Manager
Status changed to: Archived
 
Dede0
Level 10

This makes me sad.

Akash0
Level 2
any solution to this yet?
Dede0
Level 10

@Akash0 Sorry, but no. Even though this would be trivial to implement (via either of the routes I suggested), AirBnB hasn't made the slightest move to do so.

I hate to be negative because I *love* the concept of AirBnB (and I also dig the extra cash we generate), but AirBnB's coding teams seem barely competent enough to keep the platform afloat. Actually, they're pretty bad at that if we're being honest. So, the idea that they'd devote resources toward improving the platform is, I guess, simply delusional.

Tim209
Level 7

@Dede0 we were having the same problem notifying our cleaners, so we wrote some software for ourselves that links to our airbnb and VRBO calendars and automatically schedules our cleaners. Anyway, we decided to release it to the public for free, so you might want to check it out - TurnoverBnB.com

Dede0
Level 10

@Tim209 I went to your website, signed up, etc, but the email verification message has never arrived (hours after). I know my email was entered correctly because I use an auto-expand shorthand for my address.

I suppose I'll start ovre and see if I can get the verification message.

I'm really hoping that your service can accomplish what I'm after -- especially the reminder message that I want sent to myself 7 days before a guest's arrival...

Tim209
Level 7

@Dede0 We'll look into it right away. Did you check your spam folder, by chance? Also, we've been having intermittent issues with icloud accounts for some reason

Dede0
Level 10

@Tim209 I did check the spam folder -- nothing there. And then I went and backed out from the confirmation page on the site and found that I was, without verification via the email, to continue setup. Which I did. However, at the end of setup (my email, my listing, my "cleaners" phone [me], etc, etc) i reached a point where clicking Continue (or whatever), resulted in nothing. No texts, no calendar updates, nothing.

 

If you'd like to continue this discussion offline, my email is:

 

steve. FILLER williamstx FILLER @ FILLER icloud FILLER . FILLER com

 

We'll see if tht=at survives AirBnB's redaction algo...