TimeTrak SMS

Version 24.1

Contents:

Overview
Global Settings
Contact Bulk Updates
Mobile number added to clients
SMS Number added to contact form
SMS Templates
Contact can now be set on an appointment
Upcoming Appointment Reminders
Settings on client
Settings on Appointment
Scheduled event
Send Manual SMS message to clients:
Professional
App
SMS failure alerts
SMS Search Grid
SMS opt outs

Overview:

From release 24.1, SMS capabilities have been added into TimeTrak to allow appointment reminders to be automatically sent out to clients and to allow manual sending of SMS messages to clients from Professional and the App.

SMS messaging support NZ and AU numbers only.

Global Settings:

SMS can be enabled at a global level within the TimeTrak Admin Console
Global System Setup> Email & SMS> “Enable SMS” as per below:

Contact Bulk Updates:

During an upgrade to 24.1 TimeTrak will set either the contacts mobile number or phone number to the contacts SMS number providing one of these can be formatted into a NZ or AU mobile number.

Once SMS is enabled, it is recommended contacts are reviewed prior to using SMS functionality.
This can be done via the “Contact Bulk Updates” view within TimeTrak Professional as per below;

Note: This will only be visible for users when “Enable SMS” is set at a global level and “Edit Contact” is enabled on the users profile.

In this screen users can view all active contacts and filter them by the below categories.

Phone and mobile numbers can be quickly updated by clicking in the field and changing the number.

Note: Changes will be applied to the contact as soon as you click/ tab out of the field.
The SMS number will also get updated providing it already matches the number changed or was previously empty.

The SMS number can be copied from either the phone or mobile number by clicking one of the copy buttons to the right of the SMS number as per below:

Mobile number added to clients:

From release 24.1, there is now the ability to set a mobile number against a client.

This functionality is for businesses who do not necessarily add contacts for customers as the contact information is stored directly against the client providing the ability to still take advantage of new SMS features without the additional step of contact creation.

This field is available in TimeTrak Professional, Mobile and the App.

Due to this mobile number being used for sending SMS messages, validation will run to ensure the mobile number is a valid NZ or AUS mobile number.

If it does not match a warning icon will show as per below, this warning can be clicked to try format the number to a valid SMS number as per below allowing the client to be saved.

The new client mobile field can be left blank but if either the country code or number have text then validation errors will prevent the client changes from saving if it is not formatted correctly.

SMS Number added to contact form:

From release 24.1, there is now the ability to set a SMS number against a contact.
This field is available in TimeTrak Professional, Mobile and the App providing the global setting “Enable SMS” is enabled.
On creating a new contact, after adding a mobile number on exit of this field the SMS number will also get set providing the number can be formatted correctly as per below.

When editing an existing contact, “Copy mobile number to SMS” will be enabled by default providing the mobile number matches the SMS.

This ensures the SMS number is updated when the mobile number is changed.

SMS Templates:

Within the TimeTrak Admin Console there is now the option to add two new appointment template types:

Appointment SMS System Event Template
These will be used for the appointment reminder scheduled event.

Appointment SMS Template
These will be used when manually sending an SMS message from an appointment in Professional or the App.

See below example of an SMS Event Template to remind customers of an upcoming appointment.

Note: Messages over 160 characters will not be sent, this should be taken into consideration when using tokens that this does not get exceeded.
IE: Job Title which may be 60+ characters on its own.

Contact can now be set on an appointment:

The visibility of contacts against appointment’s is controlled on the user’s profile> form layout > Appointment> “Contact.”

With the changes made for SMS there is now added ability to set a contact against an appointment, previously this was read only and set from the job or task.

With the added ability to set a mobile number against a client, there is now the option of setting the client as the appointment contact.

The contact set against the appointment will be the default SMS number for any SMS messages sent relating to the appointment.

By default, when creating a new appointment, the contact will be set to either the task contact or the job contact if set, otherwise it will be set to client.

This was added in Professional, Mobile and the App.

Upcoming Appointment Reminders:

Settings on client

A new setting has been added to the client form to determine if a client receives SMS appointment reminders.

This setting will be visible in Professional, Mobile and the App providing the global setting “Enable SMS Appointment Reminders” is enabled.
And the users Profile> Form Layout> Client> “SMS Appointment Reminders” is set to visible.
By default, this will be set to disabled on all new clients.

In professional this setting can be bulk updated across multiple clients.

To do this, Open the client search grid and apply any filters necessary.
Then select all clients and right click anywhere in the grid, select edit, SMS appointment reminders and then enable as per below:

A dialog box will then show asking you to confirm you want to update all these clients.

Settings on Appointment

A new setting has been added to the appointment form in Professional, Mobile and the App to determine if a SMS appointment reminder gets sent out for the appointment.

This setting will inherit from the client and be visible providing the global setting “Enable SMS Appointment Reminders” is enabled
And the users Profile> Form Layout> Appointment> “SMS Reminders” is also set to visible.

When enabled, validation will run when saving appointment(s) to check that the contact saved against the appointment has a valid SMS number and they have not opted out of received SMS messages.

If this is set to read only in form layout this validation will only warn the user and not prevent the appointment from being saved.

The SMS message will fail to send and show the appropriate error in the alerts.

Scheduled event

Appointment reminder scheduled events can be created in the TimeTrak Admin Console as per below.

This will open a form allowing you to set up the scheduled event.
Add a description, select a reminder interval and a template.
The reminder interval determines how far out to notify clients e.g. when this is set to one day the scheduled event will send all reminders for tomorrows appointments.
This can be set anywhere from Today to 4 weeks.
When set to today it will only send reminders for appointments with start times in the future.

Ensure you set the time of day the schedule event runs to an acceptable time to be sending SMS messages to your clients.

These scheduled events will run once a day and send out reminders for all appointment(s) where SMS reminder is enabled on the selected day.
A SMS reminder will only be sent once per day, per job, per scheduled event.

This is to eliminate double ups where users have breaks between appointments or when scheduled across multiple users.

After this has run all appointment’s that resulted in an SMS message being sent will show a count against them in TimeTrak Professional as per below:

Send Manual SMS message to clients:

There is now the ability to send a SMS message to a client from TimeTrak Professional and the App.

Users can send SMS messages providing “Enable SMS” is enabled at a global level and “Allow User to Send SMS to Client” is enabled on their profile.

Professional

In professional a SMS message can be sent from an appointment or time entry by right clicking on the entry and selecting send SMS as per below:.

This will open the SMS form, when sending from an appointment the default contact will be set to the contact on the appointment.

For time entries if the time entry is from an appointment, then the appointment contact will be set otherwise it will be the task or job contact.

From here the contact can be changed to either the client or any contacts on the client. When a SMS message is created against an appointment a template dropdown will be visible, allowing the user to select a template or type their own message.

Validation will run on send to check the contact has a valid SMS number, the message length does not exceed 160 characters and that the contact has not opted out of receiving SMS messages.

Once a message is sent a count will show against the appointment in calendar.

Messages on this appointment can be viewed by either right clicking “Send SMS” on the appointment and it will show under message history as per below:

Or by viewing the appointment activities as per below:

App

In the app SMS messages can be sent for appointment’s from either the calendar or the appointment details view.

When the SMS message form opens, the default contact will be set to the one on the appointment but can be switched to any of the client’s contacts.

When the contact is changed, validation will run to check they have SMS enabled, a valid mobile number and they have not opted out of receiving SMS messages.

Users can choose from the list of SMS appointment templates (these can be set up in admin console) or type a custom message.
On save validation is run to check that the message length does not exceed 160 characters.

When a message in sent from the app the geolocation coordinates are saved (providing the app user has granted location permissions).
This can be viewed in professional from the activities on the appointment as per below:

SMS failure alerts:

When “Enable SMS” is enabled at a global level, TimeTrak Professional users with the profile setting “Show SMS Errors” enabled will be able to view any SMS messages that fail to send.

If this setting is on, the alert screen will pop once a day if there have been any SMS messages fail to send in the last 24 hours.
By default, this search will only show SMS messages that have failed to send in the last 5 days, this can be changed to show all by unchecking the filter only show recent SMS messages.

SMS Search Grid:

In professional, users with “Global Administrator” enabled can see SMS message history. This can be viewed by selecting settings and then SMS messages as per below:

SMS opt outs:

Users can opt out of receiving SMS messages by replying stop to a message.
TimeTrak will no longer send SMS messages to mobile numbers that have opted out.
When opening a client or a contact if their mobile number has opted out of receiving SMS messages a warning will show
Note: This warning is only available within TimeTrak Professional: