Escapia

Pros

The functionality is easy, quick & prompts you to never miss a step.

Cons

Nothing; it really works well & has been planned out very well.

Pros

The software is adaptable to our needs, and the follow up customer service is amazing.
We love the new Escapia Connect being integrated through Escapia, that makes it so quick to connect to the platforms.

Cons

1. Some reports that we would find useful, in particular to the rates, are not easily available
2. Uploading vendor invoices at end of month for owners not efficient

Pros

Escape customer support has done a good job troubleshooting and explaining how things work when I contact them. There are also lots of training resources, self-help articles, explanatory videos, etc, available. I have also heard that the Escape accounting features are useful and thorough. I have not had any experience with the accounting side of Escapia.

Cons

One of the things that have been most frustrating about Escapia is the Owner web feature, which is supposed to provide an owner portal where our property owners can log in and see property details, upcoming reservations, owner documents, etc. Owner web itself is pretty limited, which is fine if that's what you want. One problem is that as of now owners cannot reset their password, and so they always have to contact us if they forget it so that we can change it for them. Another challenge has been that many of our owners own more than one property and that for accounting purposes each of these units has to be set up with different owners. That means that when one of those owners logs into the owner portal they can only see one of their properties unless they set up separate logins for each property, which includes separate email addresses. But then those email addresses will automatically be where their owner statements are sent, so if they want all the owner's statements to go to one email, they will have to forward them. We do not want to make our owners jump through hoops like this. We want their experience to be as simple and streamlined as possible.

Escapia also lacks some features (such as automated emails, simpler reports, better filters for sending a guest communication, and the ability to add attachments to that communication) that would make the software more functional. I have also heard from our maintenance and housekeeping teams that Escapia is challenging for them to understand and use as they would like to. Basically, we've ended up using other software and strategies to fill in the gaps and give us the features we want, which is a little disappointing considering the seeming hugeness and complexity of Escapia.

Pros

Their onboarding team and support teams are in a different league from their competitors. We spent a significant amount of time reading similar reviews and contacting other property managers while we researched a PMS. We saw consistent complaints of poor experiences and it made us concerned as we had launched software before in other industries and knew how painful that could be. Escapia's sales team went above and beyond to put our concerns at ease, and true to their word the onboarding experience was extremely well executed. They clearly invested time into this crucial part of their business. This gave us added confidence that we were partnering with a team that understood our industry. Our main onboarding contacts, [sensitive content hidden], were extremely patient with us and knowledgeable about the product. They knew when to step back and let us figure something out, and when to step in and drive us in a direction. The onboarding tool they used was perfect, and the fact that they even had one made us happy. Some of their competitors had nothing but broken spreadsheets and links to outdated information. When you're responsible for managing advanced deposits in high amounts, you cant afford to put yourself at risk by putting the flow of those funds in the hands of a team that can't organize their own onboarding materials. Escapia hitting the ground running with a great onboarding experience gave us the confidence we needed to invest the time and money into their product. That amazing experience continued into their post go-live support team. First, they have a wonderful knowledge base for self-help. Second, and most importantly, they have actual humans who you can call who know the product and are a joy to speak to. They have international hours of support so if you find yourself working late into the evening after a busy day and run into an issue, there is a good chance you can make a phone call and get help within minutes. They are continuing to develop their product, and every person you speak to on their team gives you renewed confidence that this is a long term investment that will work out.

Cons

Escapia satisfied all of our critical requirements. There were no surprises during the onboarding or after go-live that we either personally experienced with other competitors, or read about online in reviews. No PMS is perfect though given how different this industry can be based on location, size, management styles, local regulations etc. Escapia has an older look to it, but after you get trained on it you understand the flow of everything. Functionality is of course way more important than looks. Within our first year, Escapia rolled our new development that addressed some of the things at the top of our wish list. The only thing remaining that we don't like about Escapia is the service/task management module for maintenance or general tasks. It's not critical, but we would love to manage this part of our business within the Escapia platform. In it's current form, it would create more work for us rather than make things easier. We imagine this is only true though for teams that have a high volume of small cost or no cost tasks. For longer term stays or maintenance items that are less frequent with more complex task and price tracking, it is actually quite good.

Pros

It had integration with VRBO and it's easy to use.

Cons

Partner reservations do not get put onto the Overdue Payments list. No guest reminder unless you use the Escapia contracts. Those will send daily reminders.