Automated Messages by Source
Argonautas sends a series of automated guest messages across a booking's life -- a confirmation, pre-arrival details, checkout reminders, and so on. Sometimes a message is redundant or unwanted for bookings that arrive a certain way. A channel that emails its own confirmation, for instance, makes your confirmation a duplicate.
The source message policy lets you turn specific messages off per booking source, without disabling that message for everyone.
Everything Is On by Default
The rule is opt-out: every automated message sends for every source unless you deliberately turn it off here. Turning a message off for one source never affects any other source, and never affects a message you have not touched.
This means you can leave the whole feature alone and messaging behaves exactly as it always has. You only visit it to silence something.
Where to Configure It
The controls live in Settings > Booking Sources. Each source in the grid can be expanded to reveal its message settings:
- Go to Settings > Booking Sources.
- Click a source to show its message settings.
- Toggle individual messages off (or back on). A message that is on sends; toggling it off suppresses it for bookings from that source.
- Use All off to silence every message for a source at once, or All on to restore them.
Messages are grouped by when they happen so you can find the right one quickly:
| Group | Examples |
|---|---|
| Booking | Booking confirmation |
| Inquiry | Responses to a pre-booking inquiry |
| Before arrival | Pre-arrival instructions, check-in details |
| During stay | In-stay messages |
| After stay | Checkout reminders, review requests |
| Owner | Owner-facing notifications |
Recording a Reason
When you turn a message off, you can add an optional suppression reason. It is for your team's benefit: the reason is shown in the booking's guest communications log next to the message that was skipped, so anyone reviewing the booking later can see the message was suppressed on purpose and why.
OTA Confirmations Are Handled Separately
Some sources show certain messages as OTA-governed rather than a normal on/off toggle. These are confirmations that travel through the OTA's own channel (Airbnb's on-platform messaging, for example). They read as:
- On -- sent through the OTA channel, or
- Off -- the OTA handles this confirmation.
These follow a separate, OTA-specific setting and are surfaced here for visibility. They are not the same switch as the per-message toggles above, which is why they look different.
What a Suppressed Message Looks Like
A message you have turned off simply does not send for bookings from that source. On the booking, the guest communications log records it as Suppressed (with your reason, if you gave one), rather than as a delivered message. Nothing errors; the message is intentionally skipped.
Key Concepts
- Source message policy -- A per-source, per-message setting to suppress an automated message. Absence of a setting means "send", so the default is unchanged.
- Opt-out -- You only ever turn messages off; you never have to turn anything on to keep current behavior.
- Suppression reason -- An optional note shown in the guest communications log explaining why a message was skipped.
- OTA-governed -- A confirmation whose delivery is decided by the OTA channel setting, shown here read-only.
Common Questions
I turned off a message but a past booking still received it. The setting applies to messages sent after you change it. Anything already sent stays in the log.
Does turning a message off for one source affect other sources? No. Each source has its own independent set of toggles.
A guest didn't get their confirmation -- where do I check? Open the booking's guest communications log. If the confirmation shows as Suppressed, it was turned off for that booking's source under Settings > Booking Sources. Turn it back on there if that was a mistake.
Why can't I toggle some messages normally? Messages marked OTA-governed are controlled by the OTA confirmation setting, not the per-message switch. They appear read-only so you can see their state without changing the wrong control.
Related
- Booking Sources -- The settings page where these controls live, and how sources drive commission.
- Lifecycle Templates -- The automated guest messages themselves and their content.
- Booking Lifecycle -- The guest communications log on each booking.