New Feature: iCal Import and Export Links

For those who use ReservationKey to manage vacation rentals, we are happy to announce that we now have full connectivity with external systems using iCal links. It is possible to import reservations into ReservationKey by adding the link from an external system to ReservationKey, and it is also possible for external systems to update their calendars if you provide the system with your iCal link from ReservationKey for each of your units. This means that ReservationKey can be updated automatically when a reservation is added to VRBO, or when a reservation is added to ReservationKey, sites such as FlipKey and AirBnB can be automatically updated.

Both Import and Export links are access from the Properties Settings, Rooms/Units, and click the link at the bottom right of the page.




IMPORT Links

Add as many links as you need for each property. For example, if you list your property on both AirBnB and VRBO you can have ReservationKey import reservations from both those systems.
Notes:
- If any of the days of a reservation to be imported is already booked in ReservationKey, that reservation will not be imported.
- We will run the import process nightly, so reservations will import once per day (we may run this process several times per day in the future).
- Create a generic status to use for the imported reservations, such as "Import", or if you want to track different sources, create a status for each source, such as "VRBO" and "FlipKey".




EXPORT Links

Each unit you have entered into ReservationKey has a unique export link. Just copy this link into all the external systems that you want to update from ReservationKey. Reservation data is generated dynamically, so this information is provided to the external systems in real time.



For example, to import data into FlipKey:





And now your FlipKey calendar is updated:

Set up Reservationkey's TripAdvisor TripConnect link

Although our connection to TripConnect is not completely finished, we have completed the part where you can create the connection between ReservationKey and TripConnect.

For those that are planning on using TripConnect, it would be great if you could now set up this connection in ReservationKey. As we continue to build and test this integration, it would be very helpful to have some real users already signed up for the system. Since we haven't completely finished this project, signing up in ReservationKey doesn't mean your listing will start appear in TripConnect right now, but once we finish the integration it will, and you won't need to do anything further.

NOTE: this project really is only for bed and breakfasts, hotels, motels, etc., at the time (not for vacation rentals).

To set up the connection follow these steps.

1. Go to Settings Tab, External Connections and click Add Connection. Select TripAdvisor TripConnect. Click Save Changes.




2. Now the connection has been added, but you still need to add the property(ies) you want to link. Click Enabled Properties. Click Add Property. Select a property to add.



3. You can now edit the data which will will be sent to TripAdvisor. Also, you can set which rooms/fractions that are part of the selected property that you want to make available to TripAdvisor. We have pre-filled many of the fields based on data found elsewhere in ReservationKey. But feel free to change these as needed. This will only change the data to be sent to TripAdvisor, not for all of ReservationKey. Then click Save Changes at the bottom of the page.


If you have more properties, just repeat steps 2 and 3.

Thank you for setting up this connection. Once our link to TripConnect is live, your property link should appear automatically. You shouldn't need to do anything further in order on our end.

Enhancement: Balance shows in reservation info box; information about IE Compatibility View

Thanks to user suggestions (yet again, thanks!), we've added outstanding balance information to the informational box that appears when hover over a reservation on the internal calendar.



Also, we've fixed a bug with this box that appeared with newer Internet Explorer browsers. Previously Compatibility View had to be turned on, but now this is no longer necessary. In fact, we recommend switching Compatibility View to OFF, since it causes ReservationKey to not display exactly as intended.

To set Compatibility View to OFF, just click the icon in the address bar, as seen here:



If you leave Compatibility View turned on, here is how the header looks:


Here is how it is supposed to look (Compatibility View turned OFF):

New Feature: Reminders

Now you can use ReservationKey to track your daily to-do list, by using our new reminder feature. Reminders can be created from within the Reservation Details page, in which case they will be linked to a reservation, or they can be created on the fly, without a link to a reservation.

Overview

To access the reminder list, click the new icon in the header. The icon shows the number of reminders due for the current day that have not yet been marked as completed.



Clicking the reminder icon opens the reminder window, which shows the daily reminder (or select a different date range). Click the check mark to mark the reminder as completed (the check mark changes to green).



Click the reservation number or guest name to open the reservation, or click the reminder description to edit or delete the reminder.



Reminders can also be created from with the Reservation Details page. Just click the Add link in the new Reminders section.





Reminders can be marked as completed by clicking the check mark, which will turn it green. Hover over green check marks to see notes about when the reminder was completed, and which user marked it as completed.


Future Enhancements

We likely will add some enhancements to the reminder system. Here are a few ideas we are thinking about:
- have the system set up reminders automatically based on what items for sale are added to a reservation
- be able to filter the reminder list by user (such as only show mine, show all users in our account)
- restrict users to only seeing their reminders

Enhancement: Hover over stars to see description

Now it is possible to add descriptions to the star icons, and when you hover over the star with the mouse, the description will appear as the image title.

To set the descriptions, go to Settings, Preferences:



Then, when you hover over the star, on both the internal calendar, and also in the Reservation Details page, the description will appear.

New Feature: {{roomurl}}

Thanks to a user request from the forum, we have created a new merge code for the email templates. The code is {{roomurl}} which will pull the URL for the room/unit. This feature will likely be most useful for property manager users, where the "rooms" are actually houses. The idea here is that you can included a link dynamically to the unit's website in your confirmation emails. Here is what the email could look like:



To add the url to your room/unit, go to the Properties Tab, Rooms/Unit, edit, and scroll to the bottom, and expand the Property Manager section, and add your URL:



Then, go to Website tab, Email Templates, edit, and add the code {{roomurl}} where you want the link to the website to appear in the email.



NOTE: if multiple rooms are reserved, the all URLs will appear, separated by spaces; the room/unit name will be used as the URL title; if there is no title entered, the URL address will appear as the link title.

Updates to User Community Forum

We've been busy adding a few new features to the user forum. You've probably already noticed the new, more prominent, link in the system header, but here are a few more features you might not have seen.

Search
It is now possible to search all conversations.




Tags
A powerful feature, is that we now have hash tags to help sort conversations. Just click on a tag to run a search for all messages marked with the same tag. For example, to see all messages that have been tagged as a new feature request just click #newfeature . When creating a new conversation, we give the option to easily click whichever tag applies to your message. You also can add your own tags by just writing them in the text of the message, such as #announcement for example. We plan to build one additional feature, where you can follow tags, which will create convenient links to these tags next to the Forum search box.




Email Notification Link
We send a notification email to the original poster whenever a new response is posted. To view the response, and respond, just click the link in the notification email. Logging into ReservationKey is not necessary. And also, this viewer formats nicely for mobile devices.



Larger Font
We've increased the font size and changed the font face of messages in order to improve readability.

New User Forum

We are happy to announce that our new internal user forum has been launched. This is a project that has been on our list of things to do for a long time, and now that we are approaching 1000 users, it seemed that the time is ripe for creating an internal forum.

It is our hope that this forum will allow our users to benefit from questions asked by other users, that users can talk directly to each other, and that users can feel free to help other users by responding to posts.

We (ReservationKey Support) will of course also be closely monitoring all the forum activity and will respond as well. It is still possible to message Support directly, but we may move the conversation to the forum if it seems to be something that other users may benefit from. It is our goal to move as much support traffic as possible to the forum and internal messaging system. This way the entire Reservation Community will benefit from the correspondence.

Of course we plan to introduce a number of additional features to the forum (such as search and conversation tagging), but we think the basic feature set is developed to the point where the forum can now be of real use.

Quick Walk Through



- click All to see all public forum posts, any private conversations you were a part of, plus any ReservationKey Announcements
- click Only Mine to see only conversations that you started or were a part of
- click Announcements to see only announcements from ReservationKey

Private messages will show the lock icon next to the title. We may move private messages to the forum at our discretion.



Click the conversation topic to open read the full message, read the responses, and to post your own response.