Not every guest books right away. Some want to ask first — about getting there, parking, pets or an early arrival. That's what the "Message the owner" form at the bottom of your booking page is for. It's a separate channel from the booking form: the guest doesn't pick dates or hold a slot, they simply send a question.
Where the guest finds the form
On your booking page, in the section marked with the "Contact" label and the "Message the owner" heading. The section is always visible — whether or not you have a payment gateway enabled, or the page runs in inquiry mode.
The guest fills in three fields:
- Full name
- Email address — the one you'll reply to
- Message — the question itself (up to 2000 characters)
After sending, they see a confirmation: "Message sent! The owner will get back to you soon."
Where the message goes
The message reaches you by email — at the notification address set in Settings → Notifications. If you haven't set a separate recipient, it goes to the address you log into the panel with. Details: Email notifications — recipient address.
The email contains the guest's name, their email address and the message text. The subject is "Message from a guest – [apartment name]", so you immediately know which listing it concerns.
Contact messages are not stored in the panel — they're a plain email. You won't find them in the booking history or the reservations list, because no dates are attached to the message.
How to reply
You reply straight from your mailbox — the guest's address is set as the reply-to in the email. Hit "Reply" in your mail app and write as usual. The conversation continues between your mailbox and the guest, outside erphome.pl.
This is what separates this channel from messages to the guest within a booking: those you send from the panel and they're archived on a specific reservation, whereas a pre-booking contact is a single email with no linked stay.
When the guest is ready to book
If you agree on dates during the conversation, you have two options:
- Ask the guest to book themselves through the form on the page — they pick dates, see the price and (with a gateway enabled) pay online. See: How the booking process works.
- Add the reservation manually in the panel if you prefer to enter it for the guest — e.g. after arranging it by phone. See: Manual reservation.
Limitations
- The form supports no attachments or formatting — plain text only.
- A guest can send at most a few messages per hour from one address (spam protection). The same limit protects the booking form.
- There's no automatic reply to the guest — they only see the "Message sent!" confirmation on the page. Write back when you're ready.
Related articles: Sending a message to the guest · How the booking process works · Manual reservation · Email notifications · Which emails the guest receives · Reservation activity log