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How to Automate Airbnb Reminders on your iPhone

by Jay George

Airbnb is quite helpful in sending you reminders as a host, for example, they might send you a reminder a few days before the guest arrives, and they'll prompt you to reply to each message in less than 24 hours. But if you want to be a "Superhost", this is not quite enough and you'll want to be a bit more on the ball.

There are lots of different blog posts with examples of what messages can be helpful to send guests. To help me with personalisations I looked at an official Airbnb tips page and Airbnb Message Template Examples. In general, I send about 4 or 5 different messages throughout the whole process…

  1. Booking confirmation

  2. A couple of days before they arrive to remind them of arrival times and transport directions

  3. The morning after the first night to make sure they're comfortable and I'm meeting expectations

  4. A day before they check out to remind them of check-out times and the process

Sending messages throughout the process means I need a few more reminders than Airbnb sends me.

iOS Shortcuts and Reminders

If you have an iPhone there are a couple of apps that can help remind you what needs to be done throughout the guest process. Automatically setting up these reminders helps me relax as a guest because I know I can consistently follow a set process that gets me a 5-star review.

  1. Add a new reminders list called ‘Airbnb’ – The first thing I recommend you do is set up a new Reminders list. By default, you'll have 'Personal' which is fine but it's nice to separate what you need to do for Airbnb. So in Apple's default Reminders app create a new reminders list and call it 'Airbnb'.

  2. Create a new Shortcut – Open the Shortcuts app, click 'Create Shortcut'. You can now use the search bar to add different actions to the shortcut. Follow the instructions in the rest of the video, that start at 5:20. I've provided a summary of the shortcut actions below.

Variable setup

  1. Ask What is the main guest's name?

  2. Set variable Guest Name to Provided Input

  3. Ask When will the guests arrive? — set the type to date

  4. Set variable Arrival Date to Provided Input

  5. Ask How many nights are they staying? to Provided Input

  6. Set variable Nights They Are Staying to Provided Input

Calculations

  1. Adjust date, Subtract 2 days from Arrival Date setting the time format to none

  2. Set variable Arrival Date Minus 2 to Adjusted Date setting the time format to none

  3. Adjust date, Add 1 day from Arrival Date setting the time format to none

  4. Set variable Arrival Date Plus 1 to Adjusted Date setting the time format to none

  5. Adjust date, Add Nights They Are Staying days to Arrival Date setting the time format to none

  6. Adjust date, Subtract 1 day from Adjusted Date setting the time format to none

  7. Set variable Day Before Leaving to Adjusted Date setting the time format to none

Set up reminders

  1. Add new reminder, Add Send Guest Name Check In message to Airbnb with Alert At Time Arrival Date Minus 2

  2. Add new reminder, Add Send Guest Name Arrival message once you've shown them around to Airbnb with Alert At Time Arrival Date

  3. Add new reminder, Add Send Guest Name After First Night message to Airbnb with Alert At Time Arrival Date Plus 1

  4. Add new reminder, Add Send Guest Name Day Before Leaving message to Airbnb with Alert At Time Day Before Leaving

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