News and Updates - Checkfront

Xero Sync

Jason — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 13:36:37 -0400

Hello,

Last week we had authentication issues with our Xero Addon that prevented bookings from being synced to Xero during that time. This has since been resolved.

An audit has been made on all accounts with Xero enabled and checked to make sure all invoices are up to date with Xero. If not, you'll get a notification the next time you login to your account, with the option to re-sync those bookings with Xero.

If you have recently tried to activate the Xero add-on, please retry connecting the Add-on from within your Checkfront account. The Xero add-on screen should show a status of "Connected", simular to here (screen shot): http://screencast.com/t/dqwRUekIFUrr

If you require help or have any questions please let support know.

-Jason

Multi-currency

Jason — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 03:40:11 -0500

Hello - we are looking at adding support for multiple currencies in a single account. Right now this is more for our own requirements, but we are interested if other accounts may have a simular request.

If so, do you invision the ability to set base currency rates within the pricing of an item, or a more simple approach of setting the currency per item?

Any feedback welcome.
-Jason

Payment Processing With Stripe + MailChimp and more (v2.8.7)

Jason — Thu, 02 May 2013 23:23:32 -0400

Hello,

Our latest release release v2.8.7 is live, and is mainly focused on some of our popular add-ons. For starters the MailChimp add-on now allows you to map fields on the booking form with merge fields in MailChimp. So if you want to sync information other than E-mail / and Name that you are otherwise collecting in Checkfront, you can now do so. It also allows staff to opt users into your mailing list (good for over the phone bookings).

There's some discussion around adding other information to MailChimp, such as the number of bookings, next and last booking date. Feel free to weight in here. We've also had steady interest in ConstantContact as an option.

There is a fix for users of the SagePay payment gateway that improves the 3D secure flow.

And we're happy to announce support for the Stripe payment gateway. Stripe is getting very popular, and is a great alternative to Paypal for many merchants.

With Stripe there is no setup or monthly fee, and users stay on your website / booking page through the whole booking. An added bonus is the ability to re-bill the customers card without requiring the credit card again (great for collecting deposits or adding to invoices).

Stripe is currently only available in the US & Canada, but there are current betas for the Euro and UK. See: https://www.checkfront.com/stripe/

We have another smaller maintenance release in the works for 2.8.8 that addresses some account specific areas, as well as a larger v2.9 with support for gift certificates, importing, Google docs, and updated mobile apps. Stay tuned here, or here https://www.checkfront.com/updates

PS: Please make sure you are no longer using any v1 plugins for Checkfront as they will soon stop working completely.

-J

Gift Certificates (request for feedback)

Jason — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 13:36:35 -0400

Hello,

We are currently working on adding better gift certificate support in Checkfront. Currently you can create gift certificates in the platform using vouchers, but a long standing request has been a separate are to manage certificates, rain-checks, notifications etc.

Here are some ideas in the hopper now. Not all of these may make into a release.

- Create one-off gift certificates.

- Create a batch of gift certificates (ie, 100 gift certificates @ $50.00)

- Option to add gift certificates to your booking page, or as an up-sell to bookable items.

- Customizable e-mail notifications.

- Set start and expiry date (optional).

- Downloadable PDF.

- Passbook support.

- QR codes, and mobile support.

- Hold a balance (much like a gift-card).

- Hold an item balance (much like a punch card -- Ie, you can book item 2, 10 times).

- Gift certificate report that shows used and unused credits.

Please let us know what ones mean the most to you, and if you have any other suggestions.

Thanks,

-Jason

Reserved / Paid Status - Alert

Jason — Wed, 01 May 2013 13:25:32 -0400

Hello,

For a period of time last night, starting around 11PM PST, to 4:30am PST, there was an issue with bookings showing up as RESERVED, when in fact they were PAID. Payments would have gone through the payment gateway as usual and the booking would have been created, but the transaction would not have been recorded in the transaction table.

We are working to find the affected bookings and query the payment gateways to re-associate the transaction. You can however change the status of any bookings you know are paid to PAID in checkfront and a Manual / POS transaction will be recorded.

The cause of the issue is still under investigation, but is related to database locking on the transaction tables. Our last software update was April 19th.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

-Jason

Updated network status page

Jason — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 22:30:11 -0400

Hello,

We've changed the location of our network status page from status.checkfront.net to http://www.checkfront.com/status (please update your bookmarks).

This new page provides up to the minute monitoring of our network and will show any service bulletins, outages or maintenance windows. Wherever possible a notification will also be displayed when logging into your account for priority announcements.

General software updates can always be found @ http://www.checkfront.com/updates. As with our last release, major system updates will also be displayed when you log into your account.

Regards,

-Jason

Inclusive Tax Support (Beta / 2.8.5)

Jason — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 13:31:46 -0400

Hi all,

We've added inclusive tax support in our latest update. This will be useful for VAT based countries as well as Australia & New Zealand where the advertised price needs to include taxes.

You can create an inclusive tax under Manage / E-commerce / Taxes by checking the "Inclusive" option.

When this is enabled, you must adjust your item pricing to include taxes. When making a booking, customers will see that tax amount on the footer of the order summary, and then broken out on the Tax Invoice.

Your reports will list the taxes separately. If you are using the Xero add-on for your accounting, this update also includes changes to better support inclusive taxes with Xero.

Please note this is currently in a "beta" status while we gather some wider feedback from different locales. It's possible the functionality may change.

Not all of our network has seen the 2.8.5 rollout yet, so be sure and check the version number in the upper right corner while logged in (clicking on the version number brings you to the update center).

See: http://www.checkfront.com/updates

Discontinuing Moneybookers & Partner Accounts

Jason — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 05:39:28 -0500

Hi all,

* Our Moneybookers payment gateway has had continued problems over the past few months out of our control. We are suspending Moneybookers on all new accounts. Without further notice, if you are currently using Moneybookers we will cease to provide support for it by May 08 2012. The module itself will continue to be available to you on an 'as is' basis till August 08 2012. We recommend upgrading to an alternative payment gateway.

* Partner accounts were enabled on a handful of accounts on a beta level, but we'd like to go back drawing board on this one and review what will be the best fit all members. If you have partner accounts enabled on your system currently, we will be converting these into regular staff accounts with the equivalent permissions. Contact support if this is not already been done for you and stay tuned for an updated announcement on partner accounts. If you wish to share some ideas on how partner accounts would best fit into you business, please let us know.

-Jason

Plan Updates: Extra Staff Accounts & More Add Ons

terri — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 15:46:39 -0500

Hello,

We are adding extra staff accounts to all plans at no extra cost. Staff accounts are unique logins to your system. You can control access privileges on staff accounts and restrict areas of the system to only those needed.

Our plans now include the following number of staff accounts:

Soho: 3 (from 1)

Pro: 10 (from 5)

Plus: 20 (from 10)

Enterprise: 50 (from 10)

Please note it's no longer an option to add new staff accounts to your plan with the exception of the Enterprise package. If you are currently being charged for extra accounts your billing will be updated. If you require more users, you'll need to upgrade to the next plan.

If you are sharing logins, please create unique accounts for each of your team. Sharing a single login among multiple staff can cause session related issues both in the admin and mobile apps.

As of today, all existing accounts have had their accounts updated.

We have also made the Mail Chimp add-on available to our SOHO members, and other add-ons available to our Free Trial that were previously not.

There are no changes in our pricing. Please see our plans and pricing page for more information.

Thank you,
- Terri

Accounts Manger

Update: Account Hibernation Policy

terri — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 13:21:34 -0500

Greetings Folks!

I am happy to announce that that we will no longer be charging a monthly service fee on hibernated accounts. Clients can switch their active accounts to Hibernation Mode once a year for up to six months.

This is to reduce administration and make it easier for seasonal businesses to use Checkfront. Please note that while your account is on Hibernation you will be unable to take bookings.

Please go here to read more: http://www.checkfront.com/support/seasonal-hibernation

-Terri

Checkfront Accounts Manager

Version 1.0 End of Life

Jason — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 15:22:00 -0400

Greetings,

Last January we rolled out version 2 of our customer facing booking interface. This provided a more intuitive customer experience, and more options when it came to up-sells, mixed inventories (hourly, daily, nightly) and layout. Since then we have continued to tweak the interface based on your feedback.

To date you can use either version 1.0 or 2.0 on your website. This will no longer be possible as of January 6th 2013. Any plugins still using the v1 interface will be automatically replaced with version 2.0. There is already significant functionality built into version 2.0 that is not possible with version 1.0.

If you are still using version 1.0, please consider switching over before then to ensure a smooth transition.

Version 2.0 looks like this: https://demo.checkfront.com/reserve/

If you are using a plugin such as Wordpress or Joomla, make sure it's up to date. There is an option in the setup that allows you to specify the interface version. Be sure and select 2.0.

If you are using the Droplet code, please get new code from Addons / Integrate / Droplet.

If there is a specific reason you wish to stay with 1.0, please let us know so we address it in the 2.0 interface.

Need help switching over? Please feel free to contact support.

Thanks,
-Jason

E-mail bounce alerts

Jason — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 16:56:11 -0500

As of our v2.8 release, you may notice e-mail bounce alerts showing either while viewing an invoice, or in the activity log. This means our mail system has tried to deliver an e-mail and the recipient mail server rejected the message.

The log will show the reason for the bounce as given by the remote server. This is generally something like "user not found", "Bad destination mailbox address" etc... but can also be something more cryptic such as "cannot route" or "unknown reason". If you believe the e-mail address is valid, you can try looking up the domain in http://mxtoolbox.com/ to see if an error can be found.

If you are getting SPF errors, this means that your domain has been configured to only authorize mail from a specific source and doesn't include our mail server. If that is the case please see: http://www.checkfront.com/support/spf-setup/ for further instructions.

Updated iOS Apps + create new booking

Jason — Mon, 24 Dec 2012 15:58:03 -0500

A recent update went out for our iPhone and iPad apps (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/checkfront-online-booking/id559986675) that includes the ability to initiate a new booking. This extra functionality dependant on our v2.8 release. v2.8 has not been rolled out to our entire network yet, and should completed by the end of the month.

You can see the version number in the upper right corner while logged in. Clicking on it will bring show you recent updates (http://www.checkfront.com/updates/).

Thanks!
-Jason

Holiday Hours

Jason — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 01:55:30 -0500

It's hard to believe 2013 is just around the corner, but here we are. Thanks to all of our members for your support. It's been a great year for us and we have enjoyed being apart of your business.

If require support over the holidays, we will be operating on our usual support hours (M - F, 8am - 5pm PST) with the exception of: Dec 24, 25, Jan 1st and 2nd. During those times we'll be monitoring tickets and will respond to any urgent requests. Sales and non-urgent tickets may take longer to respond to than normal. General phone support will not be available.

As always our network is monitored 24/7. Any systems issues will be addressed immediately regardless of the hour.

Network status is available at: http://status.checkfront.net. Stay tuned to updates on http://www.checkfront.com/updates.

Enjoy your holidays. We look forward to sharing some very exciting updates in the new year.

Best regards,
-Jason

Mobile Apps Updated

Jason — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 21:30:10 -0500

Both our iOS (1.2.1 as of Oct 31) and Android (1.2.2 as of Nov 5th) mobile apps have been updated. Please make sure you are using the latest version (follow: http://www.checkfront.com/mobile/).

The latest updates include some performance and ui tweaks. They also address the following:

- In-correct balance due on deposits.
- Time not displayed along with date on hourly bookings.
- Cropped content on large notes (iPad only).
- New faster barcode scanner for iOS, and support for other installed scanners in Android.

Thanks for everyone's feedback and ideas around the mobile apps. These apps are now in our top five installed Add-ons system wide, along with Google Maps, Google Analytics, Facebook and 2D Barcodes. Our focus for the new year in this area is in-app bookings, real time stats and mobile payments.

Regards,
-Jason

Mobile App Beta - iPad / iPhone / Andrioid

Jason — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 03:13:23 -0500

Hola,

We are looking for members who wish to preview and test our upcoming mobile apps.    These are native mobile apps for the iPhone, iPad, and Android devices that provide ready access to your Checkfront account, including: daily statistics, booking reports, and check-in / checkout functionality.    We are interested in general feedback, feature requests, bug reports etc.

If you are interested, please add yourself here:

iOS (iPad / iPhone) : https://rink.hockeyapp.net/recruit/6b9d5ae7ae954d7eb1dfbeaf2ea6e3f3
Android (Phone / Tablet): https://rink.hockeyapp.net/recruit/07d7b93d85724e3aa90f5dfca0437e5a

Note API access is required to use any of the mobile apps. This is defined under Manage / Accounts / Staff. This is currently not available to trial accounts.

We'll post an announcement when these Apps are available for general consumption.

Have a good weekend!

Update May 8th. We've had a lot of interest in these apps.   Great to see. If
you contacted us you should have received an invite from from us via
HockeyApp.net that allows you to register your device and adds you to
our testing team.   If you have not received an invite, please just use
the links above.

We currenltly are rolling out packages to iOS users while we finish packing our Android app. If you are not yet able to download a package, look for a notification over the next few weeks.

-J

Safari Issue (Resolved)

Jason — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 20:01:29 -0400

We've had reports of the embedded booking interface not working on certain versions of Safari for Windows and in some cases on the iPad.

We've finally tracked this down to a cookie issue on Safari. With the iPad, there is a cookie setting to "only allow cookies from websites you have previously visited". In the case of the plugins customers will have never directly navigated to the booking page (as the booking window is embedded) thus cookies would be rejected when this setting was enabled.

Although the same setting doesn't exist on the Windows version of Safari, we've tracked down a bug where certain versions Safari for Windows where it incorrectly treats embedded content as a third party cookie, and rejects it.

Please note this issue was not reproducible on any versions we tested for Safari Mac (the bulk of Safari users), or any browsers on the hosted booking page.

To date all versions of the Checkfront booking interfaces have required cookies be enabled. To overcome the Safari issue our latest version (2.6.1) no longer depends on cookies to complete a booking. Please note the v1 interface still requires cookies.

See http://www.checkfront.com/updates for more information on the 2.6x release.

Updated logic for Calandar / Inventory adjustments

Jason — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 13:40:54 -0400

Our latest release 2.6 includes a change in logic when manually overriding inventory the number of available items for a given day.

Prior to this release, you would adjust the total stock available. So you had a 50 items, and 10 of them booked you would set the total to 55 to add 5 more.

You now just adjust the amount left, in this case you would adjust the inventory from 40, to 45.

Although they both have the same result, the first approach was confusing if you had bookings for that day / item.

For more about the 2.6 release see here: http://www.checkfront.com/updates/

Edit booking (update)

Jason — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 05:27:50 -0500

We have made some minor changes when it comes to editing bookings. Depending on your system setup, changing the dates of an item in an existing booking would sometimes incorrectly say the item was unavailable. We've made this logic more robust to deal with different rule and event setups.

Please note the item dropdown of available items will only show available items of the same kind. In the case you are mixing item types, say daily and nightly items, you can only change it to another item of the same type. You would otherwise remove and add a new item.

For more information see here: http://www.checkfront.com/support/booking-details/#edit

E-mail bounces now showing in the activity log

Jason — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 14:01:58 -0400

If an notification (receipt, invoice) bounces it will now show in the activity log as an error. This is under Reports / Activity Log, the Activity Log dashboard widget, or by clicking on Log when viewing a booking.

The log should give you the reason the e-mail bounced (ie, user not found). If you notice SPF errors, please see here: http://www.checkfront.com/support/spf-setup/

v2.5 - New Wordpress, Joomla, and Drupal plugins...

Jason — Sat, 07 Jul 2012 03:02:26 -0400

Hi all,

We have released new plugins for Wordpress, Joomla, Drupal, Facebook and our cut and paste Droplet. These plugins introduce our v2 interface to the customer side. Each, with the exception of the Facebook app give you the option to toggle between v1 and v2 so you can test it out.

We recommend that you upgrade to the newest version of your booking implementation and use the Checkfront v2 interface. Much of the feedback over the past several months since we release version 2.0 on the admin side has helped shaped this release. If there is functionality you prefer in the v1 interface, please let us know so we can address them in a future version.

A full release announcement is here: http://www.checkfront.com/v2-5/ with more updates from 2.5 in the update center: http://www.checkfront.com/updates/.

Thanks,
-Jason

Custom Receipt URLs (new)

Jason — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 19:25:30 -0400

By default when a new booking is created the system forwards customers to a receipt page with a small thank you note and a copy of their invoice. You can now override this setting and supply a custom receipt url. This works if you are using our hosted booking page, or a cms plugin.

You can further pass arguments to the url that could help build a custom thank you message, or for using in an external tracking script. Eg http://www.example.com/thankyou/?order_id={$BOOKING_ID}&amount={$BOOKING_TOTAL}.

This is configurable under Manage / E-commerce. For more information please see here: http://www.checkfront.com/support/ecommerce/#receipt_url

Facebook App 2.0

Jason — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 20:23:16 -0400

Hi All,

Our Updated Facebook app is available for use. This makes use of the v2.0 interface, and makes available many of the recent enhancements over the last few months. You can see a demo of the app here: https://www.facebook.com/checkfront.bookings/app_132896805841

If you already have our Facebook app installed, you can simply go to your Facebook Booking page, click on settings, and select the version 2 interface. If not, you can install the Facebook App here: https://www.facebook.com/appcenter/checkfront

Please let us know if you have any questions or issues using the Facebook app. The v1.0 option will remain available for as long as needed.

Our v2.0 Wordpress and Joomla plugins are due this week. Please stay tuned for an announcement.

-Jason

Checkfront is Social on Facebook too - Join our Yearbook Contest!

ChrisDSM — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 05:49:54 -0400

Since we started our Checkfront Yearbook Campaign, I've started to follow many of our clients on Facebook. It's been fun keeping in touch this way as I love to travel vicariously around the world through you!

As the start of the summer season is fast approaching for many of you, so too is the deadline of our Yearbook Facebook Campaign. We're seeing lots of great photos posted on your photo streams. How about submitting a photo of you and your team at work to us? Only 20 days left before the deadline.

For more information check out http://www.checkfront.com/Yearbook

Cheers,

Chris

Client Support Specialist

http://www.facebook.com/checkfront.bookings

Update Notification Editor

Jason — Sat, 12 May 2012 00:57:55 -0400

We have replaced the notification editor for e-mails under Manage / Notifications / Email. Our previous editor had issue with including image tags / links, and this improves the editing features for HTML emails.

There is also a new "Live Preview" option that allows you to preview the contents of a notification complete with a sample data.

Finally, the notification support docs have been updated.

Update details here: http://www.checkfront.com/updates/

Have a good weekend!
-Jason

Adjusting the quantity in upsells & packages

Jason — Fri, 04 May 2012 13:52:26 -0400

A long standing request has been to the ability to adjust the quantity of upsells / or packaged items. This is now possible with "simple priced" items.

An example would be a booking, with multiple up-sells, such as t-shirt, drink tickets, # of pets etc where a configurable quantity is required. These can be priced per booking, or per day / night.

Simple priced items do not use events, and are not tied to your booking parameters (adults etc). They can exist in, or outside of a package.

To create a simple priced item, create an inventory item as you normally would. Specify the quantity, or set to unlimited. For pricing, select "use simple pricing", supply the item amount, and create the item. If the item is included as part of a package, the option will be presented to supply a quantity.

Please note the following limitations:

This only works on the v2.0 Checkout, either internally or on the hosted booking page. If you are using a CMS plugin the quantity will be set to the same as the parent item. New plugins are around the corner, so hold tight.

"Lock calendar" needs to be enabled (default) under the advanced settings.

You may wish to adjust the visibility of your packaged items. See the visibility option in the advanced tab.

SagePay and 2Checkout payment processing (completed)

Jason — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 04:00:53 -0400

Hi all,

Our SagePay and 2Checkout payment modules are now available beta. Please e-mail support@checkfront.com if you are interested in participating.

Stay tuned for a full release announcement.

Update:

SagePay and 2Checkout are now available for general use. Setup guides are here:

SagePay: http://www.checkfront.com/sagepay/
2Checkout: http://www.checkfront.com/2Checkout

Cheers,
-Jason

Calendar date navigation error [RESOLVED]

Jason — Fri, 04 May 2012 12:18:42 -0400

Between 3am PST, and 9am PST there was issue with when booking internally when using the sidebar calendar to select a date (not the search, drop down calendar or while viewing an item). This would cause a "unable to load item" message when selecting a booking.

This was due to a conflict on a remotely hosted system library, and has since been resolved.

Apology for the inconvenience.

Thanks,
-Jason

2.4 update

Jason — Thu, 03 May 2012 22:57:20 -0400

Hi all,

Our 2.4 update has been rolled out across the network. This includes:

- The ability to specify a quantity in up-sells or packages.
- Added SagePay and 2Checkout payment gateway.
- The ability to select the card card logos that are displayed on the payment page.
- Improved activity log, with more relevant descriptions and addition events tracked.
- Updated documentation.

More updates and fixes outlined here: http://www.checkfront.com/updates/

Best,
-Jason

Updated Plans and Pricing

Grant — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 15:41:03 -0400

Greetings,

Checkfront has updated plans and pricing. Please note this is for new customers. As a thanks for your early support, existing customers continue at their current plan till further notice. You can see the updated plans here: http://www.checkfront.com/plans/

If you are on an existing trial you have the opportunity to take advantage of the old pricing till the end of your trial.

If you are an existing customer and wish to upgrade to a new plan, you have till May 9th to do so. After that time plan changes will be at the new pricing.

The updated plans will help us better align our support resources and contribute to further advancement of the platform, mobile apps, and add-on development. Checkfront is committed to offering an affordable, scalable pricing model and unbeatable value.

If you have any questions or comments please feel free to offer your comments in the forum, or contact support directly.

FAQ:

• How much does Checkfront cost?

You pay a fixed price based on your volume, support and number of accounts. You can subscribe monthly, or take advantage of our annual discount. There are no long term contracts and you can cancel anytime. We also offer a 30 day money back guarantee on all new subscriptions.

• Do you take a commission?

No. Paying a booking system a commission doesn't make sense in our opinion -- you do the hard work. Checkfront knows what our costs are, and they aren't dictated by how much you charge your customers.

• What happens if I go over my booking quota?

Each plan includes a set number of bookings per month. This helps us allocate the appropriate resources to your system. If you continue to book over the allocated quota in your plan for several months, we'll ask that you upgrade to the next level. At the end of 12 months if you have exceeded your overall allocated number of bookings, you'll be invoiced at 0.49 cents (USD) per booking. If you do more than 12,000 bookings a year, please contact our sales team for a quote.

• Can I get a discount?

Checkfront offers 15% discounts on annual subscriptions and 15% for Non For Profit businesses.

More FAQs

v2.3c Update

Jason — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 18:59:21 -0400

Hello,

Our latest update 2.3c has been released network wide. There was no downtime or service interruption. No action is required on your part. The update includes the following:

- The customer calendar (Calendar / Customers) is now ordered by weight and divided by category. This should make it easier to navigate when viewing longer inventories.

- The availability calendar show in the "Availability" tab while making a booking now only shows availability for the specific item, not the category.

- Added Dalpay payment gateway for our friends in Iceleand.

- Maps add-on taken out of Beta.

- Support for dashboard notifications added (system alerts).

The following issues have been resolved:

- Fixed discounts on "per booking items" uses the base price instead of the season price.

- Can't drill into vouchers by discount on the voucher report.

- In some cases when mixing night and day items the date dropdown while creating a new booking would auto forward an extra day.

- When booking by the hour when an end time of 12am, the system limits the last booking time till 11pm.

- PDF export wont download if a space is used in the file name.

Thanks for everyone's feedback. Please contact support if you have any configuration based questions regarding the above.

Have a great long weekend!

-Jason

v2.3 Update (packaged items, removing taxes & editing bookings)

Jason — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 02:14:36 -0400

Our latest v2.3 release includes some updates and general fixes. None of these require changing the day to day use of the system with a possible exception on the last item*.

- You can now remove packaged items post booking, and opt-out of taxes.

- We've included the tax totals and subtotal while in the edit screen.

- Changing countries post booking will show a dropdown of states / provinces where applicable.

- When adding and removing items to an invoice, you now stay on the edit page instead of forwarding back to the invoice (this should make it easier when adding and removing multiple items).

- The 2D barcode no longer shows while viewing the booking in the admin (if you have the Add-on enabled). It still shows up on e-mails and print-outs.

- A customer button now appears in the sidebar while viewing an invoice of their is a matching customer profile.

- The customer calendar now displays more than 50 items.

- The inventory calendar displays bookings for that day when clicking on a date / item (as it was in < v.1.9).

- The apply discount code input has been moved beside the total when creating a booking.

- Paypal Chained Payment support.

- * On some occasions, adding or removing new items from a booking would trigger an email notification (when enabled). For instance, if there was a PAID booking, removing all of the items would trigger a CANCEL notification. This is no longer the case. You can now make multiple changes to a booking without triggering multiple notifications. If you wish to send an updated invoice, you can use the e-mail button while viewing the invoice. This doesn't not impact notifications in any other way.

We have also made available the Customer Map add-on for all accounts. More information here: http://www.checkfront.com/interactive-maps/

If you have any questions or require help with any of the above, please use your support console.

Thanks!
-Jason

New Support System

Jason — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 16:16:43 -0500

Hello,

We have outgrown our support system and this week have transitioned to a new platform (Desk.com). Please note all open tickets in the old system have been moved over. No action is required on your part however there may be a minor delay in closing out the existing support queue.

Your ticket history will be unavailable in the support portal for the time being, however you can continue to log requests in the same manor as before.

The new system will allow us to better monitor response times, prioritize support requests and give us a greater insight into our daily support needs.

-Jason

New Booking Interface - Request for Ideas

Jason — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 23:23:50 -0400

If you're using any of our cms plugins, eg Wordpress, Joomla, our dropbox, or just booking through the back-office, you're interacting with our central booking widget in one way or another.

Although the back-office application has seen continued development since we released version 1 last year, the general booking interface has not. It's been the least spectacular feature of the system for better or worse. For the most part, it's served everybody well, but we're ready to move on.

We are now turning much of our efforts into the front-end integrations and booking interface, and would like to hear any suggestions you may have.

To date, here have been the some feedback on our widget(s):

PROs

Dead easy to install, pretty much anywhere.
Fully integrated into your website - adapts your branding, style and colors, and can be further customized via CSS.
Minimal steps to complete booking.

CONS

Tabbed navigation gets clumsy after it spans the page.
Loading all of the inventory at once can lag in the case of hundreds of inventory items.
Requesting the number of people / days etc at the top can be confusing, more-so with large categories.

Here's what we are looking at for our new interface(s):

Replace the tabs with an interactive list of available categories.
Support for sub-categories.
Include a search option and widget.
Request the booking parameters when an item is booked (instead of the header).
Allow more pictures, and the ability to zoom in.
Provide an expanded calendar view that shows availability and events and can initiate a booking.
(More) native integration with content management systems, including better session handling.
Provide more options to developers looking to extend or replace the booking process.

Please help us refine this list. Suggestions are welcome here, or via a support ticket.

As always - thanks!

Updated Terms of Service

Jason — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 16:14:12 -0500

Hi all,

We have updated our terms of service to include usage if the API. Please see http://www.checkfront.com/terms/#api for more information.

Regards,
-Jason

$0 sales - bypass payment gateway?

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 09:56:39 -0500

Is their someway to bypass the payment gateway if there are $0 in sales? (Say someone uses a free coupon) Currently, paypal won't allow the reservation to be completed because the total has to be greater than $0.01. Any thoguhts?

Setting the default date when making a booking

Jason — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 16:11:22 -0500

You can now set the default start date when making a booking. Previous to this option, depending on your system setup this would have either been "Today" or "Tomorrow". Setting the Default Start date by number of days under Manage / Setup / Config will advanced the calendar the defined number of days. Setting this to 0 will default to the current date.

More information in the support library here: http://www.checkfront.com/support/setup/#config

Weekly Summary Reports (E-mail)

Jason — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:32:43 -0500

We've added weekly summary reports to active accounts. This is a 7 day snapshot of bookings and activity on your account that get's sent via email at the end of the week.

You can configure what day you prefer the report to be sent (it will be the previous 7 days), switch it to monthly, or disable it completely by clicking on your account profile when logged into your Checkfront account.

Please note the summary email is only available to accounts with report, or administrative rights granted in their account. This is setup under Manage / Setup / Accounts.

Please not that the revenue figure is calculated from your transactions. If you not applying payments in the admin, or accepting them on your site, this amount will be 0.

If you have suggestions as to other useful information you'd like to see on this report, please let us know.

-Jason

Wordpress 3.3 update (resolved)

Jason — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 17:20:10 -0500

Some users are reporting issues with the Checkfront plugin and the last Wordpress 3.3 update. This issue seems to be theme related, including the default theme with Wordpress 3.3. To be safe (it's difficult to downgrade), please hold-off on this Wordpress update while we determine the issue and provide an fix.

If you are already using Wordpress 3.3, and are having issues with completing a booking, please contact support for a possible workaround.

Thanks,
-Jason

New Test Payment Gateway

Jason — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:21:02 -0500

We have added a new test payment gateway under Manage / Extend / Payments. This can be used when setting up your account to test an end-to-end transaction on the system.

The test payment gateway will allow pretty much any credit card number, expiry date etc. It doesn't not validate the transaction at all, so please be sure and remove it before going live!

If you don't want to accept payments at all, just place your system in reservation mode only instead of using this. This is under Manage / E-commerce.

Mixing hours, days and nights in v2.0

Jason — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 11:31:32 -0500

Hi all,

Previous to version 2, inventory items with different booking units (night, day, hour) needed to be in different categories. v2.0 brings this setting down to the item level (now under the advanced tab), as it is no longer dependent on the global search header.

It's important to note that if you are using a CMS plugin or dropbox, vs the hosted booking page, you are still using v1.9 of the booking interface. This requires that you keep inventory items in the same booking unit, under the same category.

Once we have released new plugins that support the v2.0 checkout process, you'll be able to mix and match as needed.

Thanks,
-Jason

Network Upgrade

Jason — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:24:48 -0500

Version 2.0 saw a larger than normal number of new accounts added to the system. Depending on the location of your node ( see: http://status.checkfront.net or Manage / System in your account), you may have noticed a drop in performance while performing some tasks, or in the odd case a page time out. We believe this was limited to us-west1.

We have since scaled up out network to meet the new demand, and the system should be a zippy as ever.

Some members also see that their server id has changed. No action is required on your part. No downtime was required during the upgrade.

Thanks,
-Jason

v2.0 Released - FAQ

Jason — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:27:59 -0500

We are happy to announce the release of version 2.0 of the Checkfront platform. See here for the full announcement: http://www.checkfront.com/v2/

This was delayed a few weeks, with a couple false starts. We appreciated everyone's patience, and hope it was worth the wait.

There were a few left over updates that got held back from this release. These will show up in the coming weeks when ready.

FAQ

Although you should still feel at home in v2.0, there are some changes to how the system works. We'll try and keep a FAQ fresh here with answers to some of the common questions coming in.

Feel free to post your on questions here, however PLEASE post support related questions and issues via your support portal. It's much easier for us to track an issue via a ticket.

Q: Do I need to re-configure anything?
A: You should not need to reconfigure anything to maintain the same setup. Where applicable, we have converted your old settings automatically.

Q: Items and categories aren't being displayed in the right order.
A: Prior to version 1.0, you could set the "position" of an item or category. In v2.0 you set the weight. The reason for this change is that people had a hard time putting items in a correlating order in larger inventories (1,2,3) to set the desired display order. Now, with a weighted system, you can enter in a nominal number to get an item to be displayed at the top, and leave other items to auto-sort if needed. We have automatically converted your positions to weights.

Q: It doesn't appear rules are being enforced when looking at items available to book as it did in v1.
A: Rules are not enforced when viewing the main list, but rather when you click on book now and input your dates etc.

Q: My website still shows the older booking interface. When does this get updated?
A: The v2.0 update does not extend to our CMS plugins. These are currently a work in progress and will be make available as soon as possible. If the new booking interface is a must for your customers, please consider using the hosted booking interface. Go to Manage / Extensions / Integrations / Hosted for more information.

Q: When will a mobile app be available?
A: We're working on that. No ETA. However v2.0 is very mobile friendly. Looks great on an iPad!

Q: Under the Accounts menu it says I don't have access to add a Partner account.
A: Partner accounts are enabled on a select few accounts, as the final implementation is not locked down. Stay tuned.

Q: Can I got some more documentation?
A: We be working hard to make our documentation, video tutorials and knowledge base as complete as possible. If you have unanswered questions and require help, please make use of our support team. They wake up every morning eager to solve problems!

Q: I see it's now possible to view a larger image of an item, along with the thumbnail. Where can I add more photos?
A: You can currently only add 1 photo, but will be able to add more soon.

Q: Information on my invoice is being displayed in the wrong area.
If you have fields starting with the id customer_ they will show up as part of the address area on the invoice without a label. Other fields will show at the bottom of the invoice. v1.9 had an issue where some customer_ fields showed at the bottom, so you are likely seeing a correction in this. Rename the fields in the field editor to something else an they will show in the invoice notes. If you need historical fields renamed, open a ticket with support.

Q: I make use of the hourly booking options. I still only see the ability to book on the hour. When will quarter hourly be available.
A: v2.0 has this logic baked in, however we haven't yet finalized the front-end. Technically this is available via the API. Keep an eye on our blog for an announcement.

Q: I was hoping v2.0 would solve problem X, or introduce feature X.
A: v2.0 is an important milestone for us, but we are by no means stopping here. This release sets the groundwork for some exiting updates and new features in the coming months. Please keep your feature request, feedback and suggestions coming. See: http://www.checkfront.com/feature-request/

Storing credit card numbers in the system

Jason — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 02:21:49 -0500

Please note, it is against our terms of service to store credit card details in your system. Doing so breaks our PCI compliance.

You may not store credit card details in notes, or add fields in the field editor to capture them. This includes the number, expiry and cvc.

To capture payments, you'll need to connect your account with one of our support payment gateways such as Paypal or Authorize.net. There is currently no other option for merchants who wish to manually enter in credit card numbers in their POS.

If we don't offer a payment gateway supported by your bank, please contact support and we'll see what options are available.

Maintenance Release (2a)

Jason — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:51:52 -0500

The following issues have been reported and FIXED in the latest version:

- Double scroll bars in IE 8 when making a booking.
- Some custom fields reverting when editing a booking (post booking).
- Required fields not shown as required an admin when creating a booking.
- Wrong day of week name on dashboard calendar in some locales.
- Booking Index filter not applying the end date when selected.
- Availability calendar on the new checkout could not be forwarded in some browsers.
- Discount codes not being applied if a space was included in the user input.

Some initial feedback has seen the following changes:

- Adding more items to a booking now returns you to your last selected date.
- Search now prefers bookings over customers in the results.
- Sidebar calendar added to the daily summary.
- Added prev and back date navigation to the customer and inventory calendar views

If you experience any issues please open a ticket with support so it can be properly escalated.

Thanks!
-Jason

2 column dashboard

Jason — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 02:39:23 -0500

With he new dashboard, we've had a some requests to allow a wide and long version of a widget to allow for more information to be displayed per panel.

If you remove two widgets from your dashboard and refresh your page, your dashboard will be divided into two fullsize columns. There currently isn't support for two horizontal widgets, but we'll consider it in a future release.

-J

Checkfront v2.0 coming December 12th (moved)

Jason — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:56:23 -0500

Hi all! Our next major update before the holidays kick-off is set for December 7th December 12th. This marks version 2.0 of our platform. Version 2.0 includes several new features and platform improvements, many based on member feedback. These include:

New admin booking interface (cms plugins to follow).
Customer profiles.
New interactive dashboard.
Improved calendar interface.
Improved hourly bookings.
New reports.
Partner accounts.
Improved mobile support including charts on iOS devices.
General UI updates.
Several fixes and maintenance updates.

As our network is based in several countries, we are scheduling a system wide maintenance window from the hours of 2pm December 12th to 2pm on December 13th (PST). No downtime is expected during this time, however admin logins may be unavailable for a brief amount of time, and the platform may seem less 'zippy' than usual while your node is being updated. Please stay tuned here for further information, or look for an official announcement on our blog. Network status can always been seen at http://status.checkfront.net

UPDATE: Dec 7th 12pm PST: Our QA has identified an issue with our new booking interface that is preventing us from rolling out any new code. We hope to resolve the issue soon, and complete the update within this maintenance window.   Any updates to that timeline will be announced here. Thanks for your patience.

UPDATE: Dec 8th 10am PST:   We have re-scheduled this release and maintenance window for Monday December 12th starting at 2pm PST.

UPDATE: Dec 12th 12:30pm PST:   This release will begin around 2pm PST today, starting with our customers in Asia. This will continue to the UK, and US network through to 4pm PST tomorrow (13th).

Archived bookings explained

Jason — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 12:12:30 -0500

A few members have asked what an "Archived Booking" is. 30 days after the end of a booking, it is automatically archived. This means it can no longer be edited. The dates and items listed in the booking cannot be changed from this point on. You can however still apply a payment, or refund a transaction.

You don't lose any information on the booking once it's archived, however some back-end data used for determining availability is purged to optimize the performance of your system.

If you run across an archived booking that you need to re-active, please open up a ticket with support and provide the Booking ID. We'll look for an automated way to do this in the future.