Setting Up SMS Reminders
Set up SMS reminders so your customers are notified prior to their upcoming job. Reminders are sent at 9:00 AM in your business's time zone, the day before your customer's scheduled job.
How to Enable SMS Reminders Setting in Housecall Pro
For new users:
Click the gear icon in the top right corner of your HCP account to go to Settings.
Select Jobs from the Settings menu on the left.
Click the General tab on the Jobs settings page.
If you're on the previous version of settings:
Click the gear icon in the top right corner of your HCP account to go to Settings.
From the left-hand menu, select Jobs and then Job reminders from the dropdown menu.
In your SMS Reminders settings:
SMS job reminders will be toggled off by default. Click the gray toggle under Set SMS reminders to enable job reminders. The toggle will turn blue when enabled.
How to Customize Your SMS Job Reminders
Customizing the SMS message in the job reminder allows Pros to tailor the information in the SMS job reminder according to which aspects of the upcoming job they wish to show or hide.
The default message format will display the following: Hi Customer First Name, Technician Name from Company Name is scheduled to arrive Job Date at Job Time.
Job Reminder Example:
To customize your SMS Job Reminders:
Navigate to the SMS reminders settings page.
Click on the blue pencil icon to the right of the SMS Preview section within the Job Reminders settings.
Here you will see your default SMS settings with pre-formatted variables, which you can either keep or remove from the message by clicking the X icon next to the variable.
To add variables, click the Add variable drop-down in the Edit SMS window and select the variables you wish to include in your job reminder.
Variables available to add or remove:
Company name
Customer first name
Invoice number
Job date
Job time
Tech first name
Tech last name
You also have the option to edit the text surrounding the variables. For example, you may wish to start the message with "Hello" instead of "Hi."
To do this, simply delete the text you want to remove and type in the text you would like to be displayed in your SMS job reminders.
When you have proofread your job reminder message and you are happy with how it will look, click the blue Save button.
📌Note: SMS job reminders have a maximum allowance of 160 characters, including the content of the optional variables. We encourage you to consider this when crafting your desired job reminder message.
How to Preview Your SMS Job Reminder Message
To preview your SMS Job Reminder message:
Navigate to your SMS reminder settings.
Click on Preview under the Set SMS reminders section, to the left of the SMS job reminder toggle.
The SMS job reminder preview window will then appear on your screen.
To close the window, click Close.
SMS Job Reminder FAQs
Are these reminders sent for estimates as well?
No, the SMS job reminders are currently only sent for jobs at this time.
What happens when 'Send to customers with notifications off' is toggled on?
Even if specific customers have turned off their notifications, when the toggle is on, this will override that setting, and the SMS job reminder will still go out.
Learn more about turning customer notifications off here.
I am not currently approved to send SMS. What does that mean?
Each organization must have a custom number in order to send SMS messages to customers. This includes SMS job reminders. Additionally, there is a registration process that all organizations must go through before choosing a custom SMS number.
Learn more about setting up your Texting Number.
Can I customize the time and frequency of these messages?
No, the time and frequency of SMS job reminders cannot be customized at this time. All messages will go out at 9:00 AM in your local time zone, the day prior to the job.
I have all the settings turned on, and my customer is still not receiving their reminders.
Customers have the option to opt out of SMS communications, so if a customer is not receiving job reminders and your SMS job reminder setting is toggled on, the customer may have opted out of SMS communications. They can always respond to the original message with START to be able to receive messages from you again.
How do I send email reminders?
Email reminders can be set up through the Email Automations app in Housecall Pro.
Having trouble finding what you need?
For further assistance, please reach out to our Chat Support team
via the Blue Chat Bubble in your Housecall Pro account, or
contact our Phone Support team at (858) 842-5746.