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Question about Property Field Differences when integrated with Airbnb

Valerie R
Jan 17, 2020 11:30 AM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

Re: instructions on this document:

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

I'm wondering how to make sure my Airbnb guests can see the "House Manual" (or now called "Guest Resources" in Airbnb) information?

Looking at the "Property Field Differences", is it the "Guest Access" field in OR that populates to the House Manual or Guest Resources manual in Airbnb? This would be where I would have entered the Wifi instructions and house manual if I was going to do it through Airbnb (but of course I can't because I'm using the API so it is greyed out on Airbnb.)

BlueMtnCabins
Jan 17, 2020 10:40 PM
Joined Jun, 2016 1115 posts

Do you already have Airbnb listing ? if so, you will hardly need any of that because most likely you already have all that defined on Airbnb.

Lydia B
Jan 18, 2020 12:07 AM
Joined May, 2019 159 posts

Valerie - interesting question. You're right, the API fields table does not specifically define what feeds the House Manual (which is part of Guest Resources). And I can't find anything in AirBnB that's called "Guest Access". And definitely want to make sure whatever info you enter is only shown to booked guests. (Also - I know where the "Interactions with Guests" is in OR, but where is "Guest Interaction" in AirBnB?) Hahaaaa! Let me know if you figure this out.

Valerie R
Jan 18, 2020 4:29 PM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

BlueMtnCabins said:

Do you already have Airbnb listing ? if so, you will hardly need any of that because most likely you already have all that defined on Airbnb.

Yes, I already have Airbnb listings....but I can't edit the Airbnb listing through the Airbnb account because I'm using the API to integrate my Airbnb account with my OR account. This is why I was asking how I can make sure guests see the "House Manual" through their Airbnb apps....which fields in OR feeds that House Manual field? I would guess it is the Guest Instructions, but I'm not sure.

Lydia B
Jan 22, 2020 2:43 PM
Joined May, 2019 159 posts

Boosting this in hopes an OR person can help us decipher exactly what feeds what. Thanks!

Ken T
Jan 22, 2020 3:42 PM
OR Team Member Joined Aug, 2019 1472 posts

Oh, we know about this, believe me... the trouble is, there's like a million fields that need to be documented for all the various listing sites. :-/ We have an open ticket to get this done, but it is a big job. It'll happen though, I just don't have a timeline for it.

Chris Hynes
Jan 23, 2020 6:38 AM
OR Team Member Joined Oct, 2012 1400 posts

For the House Manual specifically, I don't think there's a way to set that via API. I just checked the Airbnb API docs and all I see are the Directions and Check-in Instructions fields that are configured on the Guest Instructions tab on the property in OwnerRez.

Valerie R
Jan 23, 2020 10:26 AM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

Maybe this could be put on the "To Do" list.

I do email all of our check-in instructions to the guest, but those "die hard" Airbnb-ers want to see everything they need in their Airbnb app, including the house manual. I've had more than one guest ask me about it, which is why I asked about it here in the forum.

Chris Hynes
Jan 23, 2020 11:28 AM
OR Team Member Joined Oct, 2012 1400 posts

If it's not editable because you're in Everything mode, you can try changing to Limited mode on the sync in OwnerRez which will make it available for edit again. Then switch back to Everything mode when you're done with the House Manual edits.

Yes, we've asked Airbnb API team for this many times over the past 6 months, but still waiting for an update to let us push through API. As soon as we can do it, we'll add support.

Valerie R
Oct 12, 2020 12:20 PM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

Any updates on this?

I tried using Chris' suggestion: " you can try changing to Limited mode on the sync in OwnerRez which will make it available for edit again. Then switch back to Everything mode when you're done with the House Manual edits."

But after switching back to Everything mode, the House manual information that I entered on the Airbnb listing was wiped out.

Paul W
Oct 14, 2020 11:19 AM
OR Team Member Joined Jun, 2009 825 posts

I'm asking about this internally, but as far as I know there is still no documented way to set those fields via API. Sorry to hear that your manual work go wiped out.

Paul W
Oct 15, 2020 2:06 PM
OR Team Member Joined Jun, 2009 825 posts

Looks like you're in luck!

After this topic originated, we found out a few months later that Airbnb added a previously undocumented field. Set it on the Guest Instructions tab, see pic below.

Valerie R
Oct 15, 2020 3:40 PM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

Hi Paul,

Yes, I knew there was a "House Manual" field in the Guest Instructions area in OwnerRez and assumed that it might be related to Airbnb's house manual. However, since it was not included on the Property Field Differences document it was not clear if we could depend on the Airbnb guests being able to see any information entered into this field in their Airbnb booking.

I see that now you have entered "House Manual" in the Airbnb column with ??? for the number of characters. I think I can confidently tell you the limit is 10,000 characters because I was stopped with an error message because my House Manual exceeded 10,000 characters and I had to whittle it down to fit.

Thanks for confirming that our Airbnb guests CAN see the House Manual info when they look at their bookings through their Airbnb apps.

Paul W
Oct 16, 2020 10:33 AM
OR Team Member Joined Jun, 2009 825 posts

Ah, okay. That makes sense. Yes after finding out that this was already resolved, we updated the support doc as well. We haven't confirmed the API limit on characters, so we put ??? for now. It is mostly likely 10k characters since most of those fields tend to be in that area.

When you say you got an error message at 10k, was that on the Airbnb side or OR side? The limit is definitely 10k on the OR side.

Valerie R
Oct 17, 2020 11:16 AM
Joined Sep, 2019 119 posts

Hi Paul,

The error message I received was from OwnerRez:

Please correct the errors below.
The field House Manual must be a string with a maximum length of 10000.

Paul W
Oct 20, 2020 8:19 AM
OR Team Member Joined Jun, 2009 825 posts

Ok right, that's why we put 10k characters on the OwnerRez side of the support doc. It looks like Airbnb may not have a limit at all on that field, but our OwnerRez limit is currently 10k.