Notifier – Event-Driven Emails

This add-on allows you to create and schedule conditional emails in any number of days before and after the check-in/check-out date.

Installation and Setup

1. Download a .zip archive with the Hotel Booking Notifier add-on files.
2. Install the plugin from your WordPress Dashboard via Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin → Browse → Install Now.
3. Activate the plugin (Note: this add-on requires Hotel Booking plugin 3.7.1 or greater).
4. Go to Accommodation → Settings → Extensions tab → Notifier → scroll down to License to input your license key and save the changes.

General Settings

Once you’ve installed and activated the plugin, go to Bookings → Notifications → Add New.

Create a Notification

First, make up a name for your notification that describes a type of notification (e.g. Key pick-up instructions).

Automatic & manual notifications

You can create various notifications and send them automatically or manually. Even automatic ones can be re-send manually as well if required via the Bookings > Edit Booking menu.

Manual sending:

A notification won’t be sent automatically, you can send it manually at any moment. To send a manual-only notification to a client, you need to go to the All Bookings menu > choose a booking > edit it > go to the Send Notification menu > choose a notification > click Send Notification and it should be instantly sent to the client’s email address.

You can also use this menu to resend automatically triggered notifications.

Automatic sending:

If you select an ‘Automatic’ trigger, go to settings and configure the settings for it:

• Choose a type of notification (as of version 1.0.0, there is only an email type).
• Set a period – in how many days before or after check-in/check-out the notification must be automatically sent.
• “Skip this notification for reservations made later than the set time frame” – Check this box if you want to disable this notification if the reservation is made later than set in the trigger timeframe.
• Choose recipients. Feel free to choose from the list or input custom email addresses.

The same notification can be sent to all recipients at the same time. The “Customer” notifications will be tied to the email address associated with a booking and will depend on the accommodation type booked.

If you choose any other recipient except for the ‘Customer’, the selected recipients will receive this particular notification on each booking. For example, this allows you to create and send notifications to the housekeeper on each booking or notify the website administrator about fresh reservations.

Then, customize the email template using available email tags (code snippets that get automatically replaced with the guest’s info). You can find these tags in various type of admin and customer emails, including in the ‘Reserved Accommodation Details Template’, which is located in Accommodation > Settings > Email Settings tab.

In addition to the default list of macros, you can find two dedicated ones:

Accommodation Notice 1 – %accommodation_notice_1%

Accommodation Notice 2 – %accommodation_notice_2%

Add one or two macros into your email template if you need to include custom accommodation-type related information. You may opt out of custom Accommodation Notices if you need the same email to be sent unchanged to all bookings.

Please note: you can use the same macros for all other types of email templates available in the Hotel Booking plugin.

Use the right menu to test how notifications work. Click “Send email” and the notification will be sent to the email address of the website administrator. A test email will use details of a random booking (you should have confirmed bookings).

You may manually update the status of a notification.

Add Custom Notices to the Accommodation Types

This is helpful when you need to diversify notification’s content based on the accommodation type.

If you need Accommodation Notice 1 and Accommodation Notice 2 macros in your notifications to be replaced with custom property information (e.g. provide different key pick-up instructions for different properties), go to the needed Accommodation types and fill in the respective fields in the Notification Customizer section.

Please note: if you leave these fields yet use the macros in the email template, the guest will receive an email notification with empty strings.

To see a real-time report on how many automated emails/notifications were sent and the time the next emails are scheduled for, go to the Bookings → Notifications menu.