Greetings everyone,

This month, we are back with more updates on our Communication+ product for management companies and a very cool enhancement to improve your document library management experience.  

New Feature:

1. Get Communication+ directly from the app
   In December 2019, we released a new product called Communication+ to help managers connect with their residents in a more efficient and cost-effective manner.  Through Communication+, managers can send automated phone calls and text messages to residents for only $2/unit/year.  In the communication section of the app (Send Announcement/Send Message), managers will see if they are at 0 credits and not on a plan. Management companies can purchase the Communication + plan for as little as $75/month for the entire portfolio.  Here’s how you can take community outreach to the next level with Communication +:
   • Reach out to residents who don’t have an email address on file with automated text messages or phone calls.
   • Allow residents to select their communication preferences. 
   • Send relevant messages to residents by location or user type segmentation.   
   • Reliably send out emergency phone calls to the entire community or a segment in an instant through our Reverse 911 functionality. 

Enhancements:

1. We have streamlined the folder creation process in the document library.  Now, when creating a folder, you can adjust the permissions, sort order, and description immediately in the same user interface.  This new enhancement will help managers save time in managing folders in the document library.
   

2. The opt-out notification previously stated “notifications for your community”; thus, when selecting “Yes”, managers/residents were not sure if they were opting out.  For better clarity, we now include in the message directly “Opt-out of notifications”. That way, they know that by selecting “Yes”, they are opting out.
   

About Pilera

Pilera Software is the premier community and property management suite that has helped thousands of community managers and back-office personnel enhance communications, improve customer service, and manage compliance and operations. May we help your community achieve these success stories? Contact us to see how Pilera’s community management suite can help your company.

Greetings,

This month we\’re excited to share a new feature and some new enhancements to our community and property management software.  Our developers have created a new document library feature which enhances much upon the current document library.  Additionally, our enhancements for this month includes notification emails related to work orders, insurance, and communications.  Take a look!

New Features

1. New Document Library – This feature will enhance folder and file organization, permissions, and sharing for your portfolio and community’s document library.  Currently, the new document library is in the trial stage with select clients.

Enhancements

1. Work Orders
   • Users with the Community Manager role are now notified via email when a comment is added to the work order ticket.
   • Work order notification emails are now viewable in the message center.
   • The “Notify Contact via Email” option in work orders now display only when the “Managers & Residents” see comments is selected.
2. Insurance
   • Insurance notification emails now display the insurance expiration date/time and timezone.
3. Communications
   • We have improved the email messages that are sent to the community managers when communication credits have been depleted for better clarity.
4. Board Members
   • Board members have been added as a role in Pilera.  Roles are our new way to track users and allows for future enhancements.  In the new release, board members can be seen in the user roles administration page.

About Pilera

Pilera Software is a premier community and property management suite that has helped thousands of community managers, board members, and back-office personnel enhance communications, improve customer service, and manage compliance and operations.  May we help your community achieve these success stories? Contact us today for any questions about our software or these new updates or request a quote!

Happy Friday Pilera Customers,

We hope you are all having a wonderful summer!  We have some exciting updates for you on our new features, enhancements to existing features, and more.  Without further ado, take a look!

New Features

• Enhanced Ticketing
  • View ticket assignment across the portfolio – work orders, rule violations, and activity logs.
  • Assign managers and vendors to a ticket.
  • Review assignee\’s workload by viewing all tickets assigned to them.
  • Pull portfolio-level ticket reports in PDF or Excel formats.  Learn more about this new feature!
• Work Order Reports
  • Managers can now generate a summary report of work orders on-demand for monthly meetings.
  • Print single or multiple print sheets of tickets for the maintenance staff.
• Activity/Incident/Call Log
  • All existing activity logs and incident records have been converted to tickets for improved organization.
  • Added ability to track categories and sub-categories of calls/activity/incident type.
  • Assign a task/ticket to a staff member with automatic notification about the assignment.
  • Dashboard to view all open activities assigned to a staff member.
  • Added ability to view all open calls/activity/incident across the portfolio.
  • Ability to export all calls/activity/incident occurrences in a community.
  • Filter on type of calls/activity/incident at a community or portfolio level.
• TOPS Integration
  • Create TOPS service requests in TOPS through Pilera.
  • View TOPS service requests, work orders and CC&Rs in Pilera.
• C3 Integration
  • Managers can now print mailing labels to send letters to those residents who do not have a working email address

Enhancements

• Resident Side Services & Portal
  • Resident login information now loads faster.
  • Residents can now view Pilera help topics in the resident portal.
  • Residents can now view their account number in Pilera.
• Communications
  • Added capability for residents to opt out or unsubscribe from phone communication at the end of the call.
  • Drastically increased the outbound text/minute rate by 15 times the previous rate.
  • Improved communication template for better mobile support.
• Work Order
  • A new option “irrigation” has been added in the common area work order type category.
  • Automated report failure email content is improved.
  • The ticket assignment email now includes a description of the ticket, the community name, along with other improvements to verbiage.
  • Ability to show company level instructions on the work orders PDF print-out.
  • Work order emails sent to managers now includes the work order number for improved ease in ticket follow-up.
• Rule Violations
  • A new option “Late/Delinquent Payment” has been added as a type category.
• Emails
  • Email user interface and design have been enhanced, including improved rendering in MS Outlook.
• Other Enhancements
  • Created several custom forms for our community clients including pool forms and architecture change request forms.
  • Search view improved in all ticket modules when Google Chrome view is expanded.
  • Password reset page user interface has been improved.
  • Managers can now “pretend” to be a resident for customer support.
  • For security purposes, residents requesting new access must enter four characters to view list of matching community.
  • Improved password reset functionality.

Other Fixes

• Work Orders
  • A .png image file attached to a ticket now displays a preview.
  • An error in which ticket reports only displayed 25 tickets has been fixed and now displays all existing tickets.
  • Fixed an error in which assigning yourself to a ticket renders a submission error.
  • Work order email now contains the most recent comment associated with the ticket.
  • Images will only be printed out from the work order ticket when requested.
  • Enhanced formatting of the ticket columns in common area and unit work orders.
  • In the add unit work order popup, you can now add a space after “u” when searching for a unit number and occupant.
• Activity Log
  • The “Assign To” radio button selections have been corrected in the add occupant event log.
  • Improved the formatting of the subject line in the occupant log entry.
  • The settings button has been removed from the Event Logs page so as to avoid redirection to the Work Order page.
• Communications
  • The custom branding borders have been fixed for Gmails and Yahoo emails.
• Event Notifications
  • The community events page now functions as intended.
• Other
  • If an occupant is not managed in an accounting software, they will not see the accounting module or receive an error.

Happy 2017 Pilera Customers!

It has been a few months since you last heard from us but we have plenty of great things to show you and in the next few months some really incredible things to show off.

Need a new company website?

Pilera has launched a new company website for ACCU Inc. Check out www.accuinc.com.

• Based in WordPress allowing easy updating with drag and drop like a standard Pilera Easysite.
• Responsive and mobile friendly allowing easy viewing on mobile devices.
• Built with HTTPS and SEO in mind meaning a secure website that is more easily reached by potential and current clients.

Fixing up our Work Orders:

We continue to improve our Pilera work orders making sure they meet all our clients’ needs. This patch we fixed up some of the lesser knowns issues that may have hindered your enjoyment of our product.

• Now allow photo uploads that were taken on a mobile device.
• Updated our file handling so multiple images on a ticket can have the same name. This benefit’s mobile device photos which often have no variation in photo name.
• Fixed an issue where residents could change the created by date on their ticket. This did not modify the original date which was still tracked in our history of the ticket but it could cause some confusion.

Others & Tenant restrictions:

Did you know that for HOA communities, homeowners can manage and track their tenants and other occupants?

• Owner created tenants and other occupants can update their vehicle and contact information within Pilera while maintaining the communities security by not giving them access to other sections.

Send Multiple Documents and other Send Document functionality improvements:

A long-requested improvement of our send document feature has allowed for a better and more time efficient use of your work day.

• Send multiple documents in a single email. In the past Pilera only allowed you to send a single document per email. But that limitation is no more.
• Fully format your send document email. No more ugly blocks of text, when you send a document through email you can add headers, paragraphs, links, etc. to make sure it looks professional.
• Improved handling of large files and supported file types reducing the potential for errors.
• Improved error messages so in the case of an error we can better resolve the issue.

Integration Overhauls:

There is a lot of work on the integration front of Pilera as both TOPS and Caliber had large shifts in their API. We hope we made this transition as smooth as possible as we rewrote almost all our integration with both products.

• We now show user account numbers for residents in Caliber, CINC, C3, VMS, and TOPS.
• Released Caliber V2 to all our Caliber clients.
  • Fixed financial issue where decimals were not showing.
  • Fixed bug where managers could not update their email address.
  • Prevented and fixed a major bug where Caliber passed over information that could have corrupted phone numbers.
  • Fixed error where PayLease single sign-on was not working with new Caliber API.
• Enhanced TOPS integration.
  • Fixed a bug with TOPS where we would accept previous owner information into Pilera.

Continuing to learn with our Knowledge Base:

Our knowledge base is getting pushed to its limits as our customers continue to use it more and more. To better improve everyone’s experience with the product we have rolled out some fixes. Learn more about the Pilera Knowledge Base.

• Fixed a bug where on-site managers could not access the Knowledge Base.
• Added a limit so that upon exporting a topic great than 32,000 characters the text is truncated. This is due to a limitation where Excel could not handle the information and cause errors.
• Improved the Knowledge Base export reliability.

Image handling in Marketplace:

The marketplace is one of Pilera’s original functions, we took steps to improve the functionalities image handling

• Fixed a bug where marketplace allowed unsupported file types to be uploaded causing minor visual errors.

General:

• Fixed several Easysite visual issues caused by missing styles. Most notably involving the navigation

Dear Pilera Customer,

We are here to give you another round-up of our updates from the past few months. We have all new features, bug fixes, and usability updates to show off!

New Features!

Pretender lets you see through the eyes of your residents!

• Improve your support for residents by being able to see what they see when they log into Pilera.

Check out the new Community Calendar!

• Display your Community Calendar directly within Pilera.
• Embed any calendar with an embed code.
• Keep your owners up-to-date through one Portal.
• The calendar can be shared with the community Pilera Easysite.

 Communication Credits

• Now there is an option to purchase communication credits at the company level, instead of per community.
• More bundle options for communications credits purchase.  Save money by buying a bigger bundle!!

New Help Center for Managers

• Get instant access to help by clicking on the help button!
• Managers can access articles on how to use Pilera.

Improved Features!

Two new auto-generated portfolio-level reports!

• Work orders report: This report provides an insight into your service requests workload.  In one Excel spreadsheet see all of the currently open work orders across your portfolio, as well as any new ones which haven\’t been addressed in 48 hours or any pending work orders not touched in more than 30 days.  Always stay on top of your work order requests and improve resident satisfaction.
• Lease expiration report: This report provides a list of upcoming leases about to expire within the next three months so that you can stay on top of your lease renewals.

Provide multiple payment options to your residents!

• Use Pilera\’s single sign-on PayLease option for those in a rush, as well as linking to any other external provider or bank.  Now, you can allow your resident to choose what works best for them!

 UI Overhaul for Managers

• Organized to be easier for new managers.
• General clean-up of information tables, alignment, and formatting throughout the software.
• When not applicable, the floor is no longer shown to the residents.
• Easy access to the occupants\’ profile details by clicking on their names.
• A more accurate count of the occupants in a community.

 Send Documents to ALL Units or Floors in a building

• A bug was found where you could not send documents to all units or all floors in a building. It has been patched.

Enhance your outgoing emails with Tables and Formatting!

 Community Specific Knowledge base, Forms, and manager/board modules

• The knowledge base, Forms, and the manager/board modules can be turned on or off at a community level.
• Knowledge base articles can now be exported as an Excel file.
• Fixed an error where tags with apostrophes were causing errors displaying an article.

 Tickets

• Now Pilera will automatically rotate any photos taken from your mobile to show the correct orientation.
• Closed unit-level work order tickets will now show on the resident\’s view. This will allow residents to know the status of their service request even on completed tickets.
• Our tickets now default to open tickets opened within the last year as opposed to the last 3 months.

 Contact Us Form

• The Complaint Type has been added to the Manager Contact form in Pilera.

Mobile App

• Updated the Mobile app so that it can save your user name making repeated logins easier.

 C3 Updates

• Users can now see their balance in Pilera.

Hello Valued Pilera Customer:

We are starting 2016 strong with many new features including online forms and automated reports. Keep reading to get the full details!

Online forms are the future!

• You can visit our promotional page for some more details. Click here
• Create forms, surveys, elections, and more!
• Pilera pre-fills select fields so the information is as accurate as possible

• Allow residents to only submit the form once or as many times as you want
• Drag and drop form creation makes it easy and fast

• Have forms both for a single community or all communities with our community and client-level forms
• Forms are viewable in Pilera. We continue to be the one-stop portal for your residents
• Approval and workflow mean you can sign off on any form
• Please contact [email protected] if you would like to include forms in your package!

More upgrades to keep your brand up front!

• Residents will be directed to your login page when they click on the ‘login to change your settings’ link in the footer of any emails you send through Pilera.  

Automated reports have continued to improve!

• Please visit our promotional page for more details. Click here

Document privacy is easier than ever!

• Restrict who you send a document to by board member, manager, etc.
• Restrict who can see documents from the public, the community, the manager, etc.
• Send documents now has a preview of the recipients list before sending, just like announcements

Language translation option now in Easysite!

• Occupants can now specify their language preference directly in Easysite

TOPS specific

• TOPSConnect residents can now view their balance details on their landing page

VMS specific

• Ledger transactions will no longer show if voided

CINC specific

• Online payments are now supported

Performance enhancement

• Previewing and sending an announcement or message is now up to 90% faster

Dear Valued Pilera Customer:

As your complete property management solution, it’s our goal to offer solutions that make communication efforts with your residents faster and more efficient. We are very excited to share with you our recent enhancements.

Customize Pilera to match your company logo colors!

• You can now re-brand Pilera with your company colors.  See samples below:
• Available as part of Basic Plus and Premier packages

Common Area Work Orders:

•  Managers and Residents can now log a Common Area Work Order in Pilera as well as check on the status.  Photos can also be attached.  Internal Management comments can be added.  Upon completion, you can also track who completed the job, labor hours and material cost.
• Free enhancement for Basic Plus  and Premier packages.

Incident/Call Log Feature

• Managers can now keep a log of any inbound communication they have with an occupant in one place.
• Incidents and Calls can be logged at unit or occupant level.
• Free enhancement for Premier package.

Automated Welcome E-mails

• Welcome emails can now be sent to new occupants automatically during nightly syncs. This option needs to be turned on per community.

Advanced SMS Text Capabilities:

• Management companies can now purchase their own dedicated SMS number through Pilera to use for their outgoing and incoming text messages to users.
• Residents can now properly unsubscribe from receiving text messages by replying “STOP”. We will automatically alter the resident’s communication preference accordingly. Dedicated SMS number required.
  • Residents can re-subscribe automatically (after having replied STOP) by texting “START” to their SMS number. We will automatically re-enable their SMS communication preference. Dedicated SMS number required.
• Residents can now sign up for SMS messages from Pilera for their community by texting their name, address, and community to their management company\’s dedicated SMS phone number. The text will automatically forward to the email of their client admin requesting Pilera subscription. Dedicated SMS number required.
• A resident may now call a management company’s dedicated SMS phone number. The call will automatically connect to the management office for the user\’s community (NOTE: The call is automatically connected to the resident’s community management office phone number, versus a client level admin). Dedicated SMS number required.
• If interested, please contact us for pricing of this new optional feature.

Attention Jenark Users!

• With our new Jenark integration module, now Work Orders can be created from Pilera using the button available on the Work Order detail page.  You can also see Jenark work orders, rule violations and architecture change requests within Pilera.  And create Jenark work orders and architecture change requests within Pilera.
• Jenark clients now have a “compound” account number shown for occupants if desired. This number takes the format of combining the Entity, the Unit and the Resident ID into one number. Such as 1254AS00001-02.
• Jenark Entity ID and Account Numbers now are shown in the Unit detail tab.

Communication Enhancements to all packages:

• We retry email addresses which previously incurred temporary failures. Previously, any e-mail failure was permanent. Examples of temporary failures: mail server timed out, mailbox full, etc.
• We now record detailed e-mail status from the recipient\’s e-mail provider.  For example, if the recipient\’s e-mail server is not accepting new emails, etc.
• Client managers now receive an e-mail notification when an occupant reports any Pilera e-mail as spam or unsubscribes.
• E-mail status in message center now indicate when a user has clicked a link in an e-mail.
• Managers and Occupants may now unblock/reset their email if it was previously blocked due to unsubscribe, delivery failures, etc.
• Occupants are now automatically notified via email when they are resubscribed to Pilera communications (including if resubscribed by a manager). This now also automatically re subscribed to email communication preference.

Work Orders:

•  When updating a Work Order, the option to notify the resident via email, or not, has been added.

Document Library:

• For communities that are not apartments, tenants will not see the document library, nor receive any notifications about new added documents in the library.