Live chat and your own email address

What it is

Two blocks on the Settings screen in the website administration. Both features are part of the Premium plan.

Live chat

Why you need it

A guest asks about a room before booking and you answer from your phone. A question that would otherwise stay unanswered turns into a booking.

How to set it up

The chat runs through the Tawk.to service. You set up an account with them yourself, it is free.

1. Set up an account at Tawk.to and create a chat widget.
2. In Tawk.to open Administration - Chat Widget and copy the code.
3. In the left menu open Settings and find the Live chat on your website block.
4. Paste the code into the Tawk.to identifier field. You can paste the whole script here too - we will take the code out of it ourselves.
5. Leave the Widget identifier field at default unless you created more than one chat widget in Tawk.to.
6. Turn on Show chat on the website.
7. Save.

Switching it off makes the chat disappear from the website, but the settings stay saved.

When the chat is not shown to a guest

Three situations:

• Until they allow functional cookies.
• During a booking - so it does not cover the Book button.
• During online check-in.

This is deliberate. A guest who is already ordering must not get anything in their way.

Your own email address

Why you need it

Confirmations and reminders will reach guests from your address - for example bookings@mountainguesthouse.com - instead of the system one. It looks more trustworthy and lands in spam less often.

How to set it up

1. In Settings find the Your own email address block.
2. In the Website address you want to send from field enter just the address without www - for example mountainguesthouse.com.
3. Fill in the Part before the at sign - for example bookings. It can contain only letters without diacritics, digits, a dot, a hyphen and an underscore.
4. Fill in the Sender name - for example Mountain Guesthouse. This is what the guest sees in their inbox.
5. Save.
6. In the Records to set up block, records appear that need adding where your website address is registered.
7. Once you have added them, click Verify.
8. After successful verification turn on Send from my address.

Verification can take several hours. That is normal - the records have to spread across the internet.

Nothing is lost until it is done

E-mails go out from our address. The system always tells you why:

No e-mail is lost because of this. The guest always receives it, just from a different address.

Removing the connection

Use the Remove connection button, or clear the address and save. E-mails return to our address.

Common problems

The blocks are locked for me. Both features are part of the Premium plan.

The chat does not appear on the website. Go through: is Show chat on the website turned on, is the identifier valid, and did you allow functional cookies in the cookie bar? Try it in a private window and allow cookies.

The system says the identifier is not valid. Copy it from Tawk.to again, or paste the whole script here.

Address verification did not work. Check that you added the records exactly as they are listed, and that you added them with the right provider. Try again in a few hours.

I entered an address and the system will not accept it. Enter it without https:// and without slashes - just mountainguesthouse.com.

The system says the address cannot be verified. The server is missing access to the e-mail sending service. That is on our side; e-mails to guests keep coming from our address for now. Get in touch with us through support.

E-mails to guests still come from your address. Check the Send from my address toggle and the verification status.