The Comms Tab is denoted by an envelope and cell phone icon at the Facility Level of your software. It is where the system stores all communications with your tenants including phone call recordings, sent emails, SMS (texts), batched documents, and more. The Comms tab is composed of up to eight tabs containing this information:
The Phone Calls Tab
In your software you have the option of integrating a tracked phone number with your account. All software customers who are also using storEDGE websites have this integration automatically activated when their software is set up. For those not using a storEDGE website but in need of a tracked phone number integrated with your software account, please contact your storEDGE sales rep.
All calls to the integrated tracked phone number are stored in the Phone Calls tab. Here you can see the caller ID information gathered from the call, the date and time of the call, and listen to the call recording.
Also included in the Phone Calls tab is the source of the call. If you have one tracked phone number listed on your website and another tracked phone number listed on, for example, the billboard down the street, storEDGE can integrate with both phone numbers and, in the source column, tell you which number was called. This helps you keep track of how many calls are coming from each of your marketing sources.
⚠️ In order to ensure PCI compliance, sensitive data such as credit card or bank account information should not be collected on a recorded call.
The Emails Tab
All emails sent by the software will be logged in this tab, including both software-generated and user-initiated emails. All replies from customers will also appear in this tab. At the top of the window, you can search or filter your results by description, email type, status, and date. You can also select Individual Emails or Conversations in the top right of your Emails tab to view a list of sent and received emails or a list of email conversations.
Each email listed will list its status. There are 10 possible email statuses you will see in this tab.
| 1 | Created | email has been saved, but there have been no attempts to send |
| 2 | Pending | email needs to be sent |
| 3 | Failed | email was not accepted by the email service provider |
| 4 | Sent | email has been delivered to the email service provider |
| 5 | Delivered | email has been delivered to recipient's email host |
| 6 | Opened | email has been opened by recipient |
| 7 | Bounced | email could not be delivered to recipient |
| 8 | Spam | email was considered spam by the receiving internet service provider or recipient |
| 9 | Resent | email has been resent - a new email will be attached to the original email |
| 10 | Undeliverable | storEDGE software user tried all methods to send and resend the email, but the email still won't deliver, so the user marked the email as undeliverable |
Created and Pending email statuses should be rare. The software should automatically send all emails. On the rare occasions that those statuses are in your list of emails, click the Open button and the Send Again button to force the software to send.
Failed emails can also be resent by clicking the Open button and the Send Again button.
Bounced emails could happen for a variety of reasons such as (1) the email address no longer exists (2) the recipient is out of the office (3) the recipient is not accepting emails (4) the recipient mailbox is full. Your best course of action may be to try sending the email to an alternate email address. Click the Open button, edit the email address and click the Send Again button to clear bounced emails from the list.
A Spam status is recorded when a recipient clicks This is Spam or Mark as Spam in email services like Yahoo, Gmail, AOL, and other similar services. While you should not have any spam complaints, they do happen. Once a spam complaint is recorded, you will never be able to deliver an email to the recipient. In the email industry, spam complaints are a clear metric to determine abuse and poor sending practices. It’s important that we take these reports seriously to ensure the best delivery for all customers.
There are times when nothing will work to deliver an email message (such as a spam status). If you've exhausted all methods, then we suggest clicking the Open button and clicking the Undeliverable button. This will update the record, letting you and other users know that the email never made it to the recipient.
Certified Email
Check your state's lien laws to determine what it means to have properly notified a tenant of a lien action. Then use the Emails Tab to confirm if a lien email has been properly delivered.
The SMS Tab
All sent or received SMS (text) messages will be logged in this tab. At the top of the window you can search or filter your results by type, status, and date.
There are 7 possible SMS statuses you will see in this tab.
| 1 | Created | The SMS (text) is ready to be sent to the storEDGE message carrier |
| 2 | Pending | The SMS (text) is scheduled to be sent to the storEDGE message carrier |
| 3 | Queued | The storEDGE carrier has received the SMS (text) and sent it to the receiver's carrier |
| 4 | Sent | The receiver's carrier has sent the SMS (text) to the receiver's mobile device |
| 5 | Delivered | storEDGE has confirmed the SMS (text) was delivered to the receiver's mobile device |
| 6 | Undelivered | storEDGE has confirmed that the SMS (text) was not delivered to the receiver's mobile device |
| 7 | Failed | There was an error sending the the SMS (text) |
The Created status should rarely be seen as storEDGE immediately schedules the SMS to be sent or immediately sends it to our carrier.
The Pending status should only be seen in the case of delinquency. Since storEDGE runs delinquency at 2 am, SMS messages associated with delinquency are held and scheduled to run at a 8 am local time so as not to disturb the receiver during the early morning hours.
If an SMS message is received when you no longer have the message dialog box open, a notification will be added to your Task List alerting you to the new message. Clicking on SMS then SMS Received in the Task List will direct you to the SMS tab in the Comms section. The new SMS messages will be highlighted. To respond to the message, click on the phone number under the tenant's name. Clicking on the phone number under the tenant's name will also remove the highlighting and clear the notification from the task list.
If an SMS message fails to be delivered, a notification will be added to your Task List alerting you to the failed message. Clicking on SMS then SMS Failed in the Task List will direct you to the SMS tab in the Comms section. The failed SMS messages will be highlighted. To remove the highlighting and clear the notification from the task list, click on the phone number under the tenant's name. It is also a good idea to remove the SMS checkmark next to the mobile phone number in the tenant's profile so you no longer attempt to send an SMS to this phone number.
Print Batches
All batched print letters created by the software will be logged in this tab. Print batches are created automatically by the software based on invoice, rate change notice, and autopay settings. Print batches are also created by you if you utilize the Print Mail action in delinquency stages or the Manual settings for sending invoices to tenants. Each Print Batch has a View PDF button on the far right of the line item list where you will bulk print the documents.
When viewing the Print Batches Tab, note that batches are arranged by:
- a particular batch number,
- the type of document,
- the date on which it was batched,
- the user who processed the batch, and
- the status of the batching process.
Clicking on a batch will show the contents of that batch in a line item list and allow you to print or email the associated documents.
Batches are divided into two statuses: Processing or Finished.
- Processing indicates that the batch is in progress and the PDF documents are not viewable.
- Finished indicates that the batch has been completed and the PDF documents are viewable.
E-Sign
If you are utilizing e-sign in any of your documents, the E-Sign tab will indicate the status of a signature request by displaying the date of the last request and how many attempts have been made to obtain a signature through an email or SMS request. You can view the signed document, resend the request or cancel the e-sign request from here as well.
Mail House
If you are utilizing the integrated mail house service* to mail any of your documents to tenants, the Mail House tab will indicate the status of those documents, provide a link to the document, display the date of action and the tracking information for certified letters.
*Additional fees apply
Reviews
If you are utilizing the storEDGE integrated marketing website*, the Reviews tab will allow you to manage the reviews customers leave on your website. When tenants leave a review, you'll be notified of a new review via the Task List. Clicking on the task list notification will bring you to the Reviews tab where you can read the review and either approve or deny the review. Approving the review will allow it to be displayed on your website. Denying the review will hide it from view on your website.
*Additional fees apply
Templates
The Templates tab lists all documents you currently have turned on at your facility. You can print blank documents from here. Read more about documents and emails in our help article.
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