Effective communication with guests is key to providing excellent hospitality and ensuring smooth stays.
Haven gives guests a few ways to reach you and get information about their
stay:
- The Guest Portal — Haven's mobile-first guest
app. Every confirmed booking gets a secure access link by email. The
portal includes a property-aware AI chat for instant answers (Wi-Fi,
checkout time, local recommendations). When the assistant cannot answer
a listing-specific question and the guest agrees, it passes the full
chat into your Messages thread and emails you. Guests can also
message you directly from the portal. When your account has a phone
number, that guest chat can also text or WhatsApp you — you turn each
channel on or off under
notification settings. There is no App Store
download — guests open the portal from the link in their booking email.
The same assistant answers public questions on your property and
multi-unit sites, grades every reply, and shows you the gaps in
Analytics → Chats — see AI guest chat
and Chat insights.
- Email messaging — Send messages from the Messages tab (or a
reservation). Guests can reply to the email; that reply lands on the
same Messages thread with a via email tag and is also forwarded to
your personal inbox.
- Automated messages — Pre-configured messages sent automatically
(booking confirmation, check-in reminders, checkout reminders, rental
agreement reminders). Pause or turn off types of automated guest mail
under Guest communications settings.
- Stay texts — The booking confirmation, the cancellation, the day
before check-in, the guidebook, the door code and checkout also go out
as a text to a guest with a mobile number on the booking. Each is the
Text channel of that message on the
guest journey: switch it off there, or
change what it says. If a guest replies to one of those texts, the reply
appears on that stay's Messages thread with a via text tag. Reply
STOP to opt out of every text; that does not cancel the reservation and
does not create a thread message. Stay texts are not marketing SMS. On a
booking made on your Haven site, the guest's Text me about my
reservation box under the phone number opens ticked; a guest who
unticks it gets these messages by email only.
- Marketing texts — On the same booking page, under the phone number,
guests can separately opt in to marketing texts. That box ships unchecked
with the required disclosure beside it. Ticking it shows as Subscribed
for SMS Marketing on your Audience. Reservation SMS and marketing texts
are never the same opt-in. Marketing email does not need a checkout box
— a confirmed booking is the existing-customer basis (with unsubscribe
on every mail). WhatsApp marketing is not captured at checkout.
- Open Messages
- Select the stay or inquiry thread
- Write a reply and send
Every stay and dated inquiry appears here, including ones with no messages yet, so you can open the row and write first. Most recent is last activity on a thread that has had a message, newest first.
Threads with new messages are bold until you open them, then they unbold — the same read/unread pattern as iOS Messages. Opening a thread marks it read; a later guest message makes it unread (and bold) again.
If a guest asks the in-portal assistant something the listing does not
cover and agrees to pass it along, that full chat lands on this same
thread and you get an email. Reply here as you would any other guest
message.
Anyone can write to you through your site's contact form, the Submit an
Inquiry button, your site's forms, experience requests or the guest
assistant, so Haven screens those messages before they reach you. SEO and
website-design pitches, lead generation offers, "feature your property"
invitations, "reply with your phone number" outreach, scams and link spam
are held in Filtered instead of your inbox. You get one short email the
first time a conversation is held, saying who wrote and why it was held,
instead of the usual inquiry email. You are never texted about them, and they
never count as unread. A held inquiry with dates never becomes a booking
request and holds no dates.
- Find them — a Filtered chip with a count appears in the Messages
filter bar whenever anything is held. Click it to see only those threads;
click it again to go back.
- Why it was held — each filtered thread opens with a line saying who
filtered it and why: Filtered by Haven (the message read as selling or
spam), Mass sender (the same address wrote to many hosts on Haven in
one day), Blocked sender (the address is on your
blocked guests list) or Marked as spam (you did it).
- Not spam — moves the thread back to your inbox. Later messages from
that person arrive normally.
- Spam — on any contact-form inquiry in your inbox, the Spam button
in the thread header moves it to Filtered and adds the sender's email to
your blocked guests, so their next messages are held too and they cannot
book. Not spam on that thread removes that block again.
Only those public forms are screened. Booking requests, reservation threads
and messages from your PMS are never filtered. Haven
leans towards delivering: a short or vague message from a possible guest
always reaches you, and so do businesses that want to book (corporate stays,
film crews, event planners).
The guest always gets the message by email when an address is on file.
With a mobile number on the booking, they also get the same message as a
text. The composer shows Also sent as a text when that
will happen. WhatsApp uses the same path once a WhatsApp sender is live
and the guest enabled WhatsApp.
Guest replies by email or text stay on this thread, tagged via email
or via text. Email replies are also forwarded to your personal inbox;
replying to that forward keeps the conversation in Haven.
Write the sentences you send every week once — the Wi-Fi, parking, the
late-checkout answer — and insert them into any reply. Press the speech
bubble beside the reply box, or type / into an empty reply, then pick
one: it is pasted where your cursor is for you to check and send, never
sent on its own. Save this reply keeps what you just typed; Manage
edits and deletes them. They are saved to your account, so the same list is
in the app's quick replies.
Turn on AI may use this on a saved reply and your AI assistant may
answer guests with what it says. It uses it as a private note: it never
quotes it word for word, and it keeps it to itself until a guest's arrival
details unlock, so a door or gate code in a saved reply stays safe.
Open a reservation and look under Messages to this guest: every Haven
message on that stay — sent (and opened), scheduled, not sent and why,
failed, or cancelled — and what its text and booking-thread copies did.
Resend sends one the guest lost again.
- Open the booking
- Click Message Guest
- Write and send
That send is the same conversation as the Messages tab.
Use pre-configured templates for common messages:
- Check-in instructions
- House rules
- Payment confirmations
- Thank you messages
Set up automated messages that send automatically:
- Sent when booking is confirmed
- Welcome guest and provide initial information
- Set expectations
- Sent before check-in date
- Remind guests of check-in time
- Provide access instructions
- Sent before checkout
- Remind guests of checkout time
- Provide checkout instructions
When a property requires a digital
rental agreement, Haven nudges
guests to sign it before arrival:
- A pre-arrival reminder email is queued for any booking that has not yet
signed: 14, 7, 3, 2 and 1 days before check-in and on the day. You can set
when the first reminder goes out — a different number of days before
check-in, or in the daily run on the day the guest books (or a few days
after) — under Communication → Message automations → Guest verification
& rental agreements → Pre-arrival reminder → Timing. The 3, 2, 1 and
day-of nudges continue.
- From the host reservation drawer or the standalone reservation page, the
Rental Agreement card has a Send reminder button you can press at any
time to manually re-send the prompt.
- Once the guest signs in their guide, the reminder stops and the signed PDF
becomes available to download from the same card.
- Respond to messages quickly
- Aim for same-day responses
- Set expectations for response times
- Use clear, simple language
- Provide specific instructions
- Include all necessary information
- Answer questions thoroughly
- Provide local recommendations
- Offer assistance when needed
- Maintain a friendly, professional tone
- Keep communications respectful
- Document important conversations
Hi [Guest Name],
Thank you for booking with us! Here are your check-in instructions:
Check-in time: [TIME]
Check-in location: [LOCATION]
[Additional instructions]
We look forward to hosting you!
Best regards,
[Your name]
Hi [Guest Name],
Thank you for booking with us! Please review our house rules:
[House rules content]
We appreciate your cooperation and look forward to hosting you!
Best regards,
[Your name]
- Check-in/checkout times
- Property access
- Amenities and features
- Local recommendations
- Special requests
- Answer completely
- Provide helpful information
- Be patient and understanding
- Follow up if needed
From any Messages thread, the control next to the dates in the upper right can send a payment link: quote dates on an inquiry, approve a waiting request, copy the link on an unpaid stay, or start a new stay for a returning guest.