The biggest update since June. Your automations can now ask a guest a question and act on the answer, Hello Hotel notices when a phone number changes hands so a message never goes to last month's guest, and the rates a visitor sees in chat are now the rates on your booking engine.

Ask a guest a question — and branch on the answer

Automations could only send. Now they can ask. A new Guest question step texts the guest a message with two to five numbered options, waits for the reply, and sends the workflow down a different path depending on what came back — so "How was your stay? Reply 1 for great, 2 for okay, 3 if something went wrong" can send happy guests a review link and route everyone else to a person.

• A guest who replies with a number is routed by the workflow. Their reply appears in the thread, but it doesn't land on your team as unread, and it doesn't set off any other automation

• Anything that isn't a bare number — a sentence, a question — comes through to your team like any other message and takes the workflow's "other" path, so a real reply is never swallowed

• A "no reply" path handles silence, and each answer is available to later steps in the workflow

• There's a new Guest Checked Out trigger built for this: fire a set number of hours after checkout, or at a specific time a set number of days later. A guest counts as checked out once Mews records the departure

• One open question per guest at a time, with a cooldown so nobody gets asked twice in quick succession. A guest who texts STOP is opted out before any question is processed

Reply matching works over SMS. Pair it with the new review link variable — set your review URL once in organization settings and drop it into any message as a branded short link.

Add Internal Note replaces Create Alert

The Create Alert action is gone, replaced by Add Internal Note. Instead of a bare alert with no text and no addressee, a workflow now writes a staff-only note on the guest's conversation — with merge fields, and with @ tags that alert the tagged people exactly the way a hand-written note does: the Tagged for you row on their dashboard, plus a push to their phone. The note shows as written by the workflow, so nobody wonders who left it.

The right guest gets the message when a number changes hands

Hotel phone numbers get reused: a front-desk line typed onto one reservation, a partner's mobile on the next, a number recycled by a carrier. Hello Hotel now works out who a number belongs to before your automations fire, so a check-in text goes to the guest arriving today rather than the one who had that number last month.

• Runs automatically as reservations sync from Mews — nothing to switch on

• The guest who lost the number gets a banner on their thread explaining that it moved, and texting is removed from their composer until a new number is on file

• When it's not clear-cut, the pair lands in a conflict queue with a dashboard card and a Merge contacts screen, and any switch can be undone from the decision that made it

Rates in chat now match your booking engine

Room search in web chat and availability answers from AI Assist now quote the rates behind the booking engine URL on your AI agent settings page — the same rate set, priced for the party size, that the "Book now" link lands on. A visitor no longer sees one price in the chat and another at checkout.

If you haven't added your booking engine URL yet, results fall back to your public rates and no booking link is appended — so paste it in under AI Agent → Settings to get the full effect.

See your AI credit usage on the billing page

Settings → Billing & Usage now shows Agentic AI Credit consumption alongside your minutes and messages. Credits are measured from actual usage — one credit per thousand tokens — across call and voicemail summaries, AI-drafted replies in the composer, and web chat AI turns, so the number on your invoice is never the first time you see it. Current month only, like the rest of the usage view.

WhatsApp message templates (early access)

If you're on WhatsApp early access, you can now author message templates in Hello Hotel, submit them for approval, track that approval on the new templates page, and send approved templates from the composer. WhatsApp stays by request — ask through the in-app chat or [email protected] and we'll connect your Business Account.

Smaller things you'll notice

• The composer picks the right channel. When a guest can be reached more than one way, replies default to the channel they last messaged you from

• Voicemail counts per number. On accounts with more than one line, the dashboard's Voicemails card breaks counts out by number, so you can see which line is piling up callbacks

• Your own line, named. Your organization's phone numbers now appear in Contacts under the line's name and marked Organization Phone, instead of showing as "Unknown"

A few things worth knowing about this week: web chat is available on every account, guests can now get a check-out link the same way they get a check-in link, and AI Assist has started listening to your phone calls.

Web chat on your own website

Drop a small script on your site and visitors can start a conversation without picking up the phone. Those conversations land in the same shared inbox as your calls and texts — same thread, same team, no second tool to check.

• Room search, right in the chat — a visitor asking about availability gets real rooms back with photos, multiple rates, and a direct booking link with accurate pricing, so they can go from question to reservation without ever leaving the conversation. Rates are the ones your Mews booking engine would quote

• A kill switch — turn the widget off from Hello Hotel without touching your website

• AI mode — visitors open straight into a conversation with an AI that answers from your knowledge base. A “Talk to a human” option is always there, and becomes prominent the moment the AI can’t answer something

• Sessions stay open for 24 hours and a returning visitor can pick up where they left off for up to 7 days

One thing to be clear about: web chat AI mode is the only place in Hello Hotel where the AI replies to someone on its own. In the shared inbox, a person still reviews, edits, and sends every message.

Guest check-out links

There’s now a check-out link variable to go with the check-in link. Use it in the composer, in a snippet, or in an automation.

• The guest’s session is created when they tap the link, not when you send the message — so it still works in a snippet that’s been sitting in your library for weeks

• The link stops working 24 hours after departure

• Nothing to switch on; Mews decides which reservations are eligible

Long texts stop before they send

A text that’s too long for the carrier now gets caught at the moment you press send. Your draft stays in the composer, and the warning tells you how long the message is against the limit — instead of the message landing in the thread as a failed bubble.

• The cap is roughly 1,530 characters, and drops to about 670 as soon as you add an emoji — the same message can hit the limit at very different lengths depending on what’s in it

• Photos and group threads are exempt; those go out as MMS

AI Assist now hears your calls

Calls and voicemails from the last seven days are part of the conversation AI Assist reads, in order alongside the texts.

• If someone called about rates and your team said “I’ll text those over,” the draft contains the actual rates instead of repeating the promise

• Just hung up and the summary isn’t ready? It falls back to the call transcript, so the draft is useful immediately

Clearer message failures

When a text fails because the number isn’t 10DLC registered yet, the message now says so and points you at Settings → Compliance — rather than leaving you to retry something that can’t succeed until registration clears.

Tag automations fire however you add the tag

Your guest-tag-added automations now trigger whether the tag comes from the contact detail panel, from bulk tagging on the contacts screen, or from Zapier.

Last time we said group threads couldn’t take attachments yet and that it was coming shortly. It’s here — plus cleaner message previews in your inbox.

New: Send photos and files in group threads

Attachments now work in group conversations exactly the way they work one-to-one.

• Send images to the whole group — photos deliver natively, so everyone sees the picture in their messaging app.

• PDFs and larger files send as links — same as in a one-to-one thread, so nothing gets stuck.

• Up to five attachments per message.

Cleaner previews in your inbox

An attachment-only message used to show up in your conversation list as a literal 📎 or 📷 character. Now it reads as plain text, consistently everywhere a preview appears — your inbox, the awaiting-reply cards, and conversation search.

A big mobile release. The Dashboard you use on the web is now in the app, you can start a group thread from your phone, and attaching a photo or file got a lot more natural.

Requires app version 1.2.9. This one needs a fresh install from the App Store rather than an automatic update, so grab the latest version to get everything below.

New: The Dashboard on your phone

The Dashboard is now a real screen in the mobile app — the same at-a-glance view of what needs attention that you get on the web.

• See what’s waiting — missed calls, unresolved voicemails, and messages awaiting a reply, right when you open the app.

• Get tagged, get told — when a teammate @-mentions you in an internal note, you get a push notification on your phone, not just a card you have to go find.

• Tap through to the full list — open any section to see everything, then get back to the Dashboard with a proper back button.

New: Start a group thread from your phone

You could already take part in a group conversation from the app. Now you can start one.

• Pick your people and go — create a group thread from mobile without opening the web app.

• Name it so your team knows at a glance who’s in the conversation.

• Send photos too — attachments now work in group threads, on mobile and web alike.

New: Guest notes from Mews, editable on mobile

Reservation notes from Mews are no longer read-only on your phone.

• Open a stay’s notes from a chip on the reservation card, without leaving the app.

• Add, edit, and delete notes — the same access your whole team has on the web.

• Changes go straight to Mews, so the front desk sees them wherever they’re working.

Attaching things got easier

• A dedicated attach menu — tap attach and pick your source, instead of hunting through the tools sheet.

• Sent files look like files — attachments you send now render as a clean card with the name and size, and the size reads the same before and after you hit send.

• Fixed a bug where an attachment on a message you sent could be tinted as though the guest had sent it.

Two big ones this week: you can now text with more than one person in a single thread, and you can send photos and files over SMS. Plus Mews guest notes now sync into Hello Hotel, and a handful of voicemail and web chat improvements.

Group messaging

• Group threads — start a conversation with multiple people and keep the whole exchange in one place, on web and iOS

• Create and rename groups from mobile — set up a group right from the app, and name it so your team knows who's in it

• Smarter duplicates handling — conversations with the same people merge instead of splitting into duplicate threads

• Your other Hello Hotel numbers can join — group threads can include your property's other lines, so the front desk and manager can be in the same conversation with a guest

Message attachments

• Send photos and files over text — attach images to any SMS conversation from the web app

• From mobile: photos, camera, and PDFs — snap a picture or attach a file right from your phone

• Attachments aren't available in group threads quite yet — that's coming shortly

Mews guest notes

• Guest notes from Mews now appear in Hello Hotel — account notes on a guest profile sync in automatically, so context from your PMS is right there in the conversation, on web and mobile

Voicemail

• Jump to the conversation — open the guest's full conversation straight from a voicemail

• More reliable voicemail recordings, especially with call forwarding

Web chat

• Human handoff you can see — when the AI agent hands a web chat to your team, it's now visible on mobile and someone actually gets notified

• More reliable inbound message handling

Smaller improvements

• AI-drafted replies can include the guest's check-in link — Generate Reply now resolves the right online check-in link for the guest

• New merge field: add payment card — send guests a secure link to add a payment card to their reservation

• Automations — email actions now create a conversation for the guest if one doesn't exist, and you can choose whether an email action changes the conversation's status

• Fixed an issue where switching threads could carry over an unsent draft

• Fixed call handling when a guest's number matches one of your property's lines

Internal notes grew up: tag a teammate, get alerted, and reply right on the note. Plus reservation notes you can edit without leaving Hello Hotel.

New: Tag a teammate in a note

Loop the right person in without leaving the conversation.

• @-mention a coworker in an internal note and they get a "Tagged for you" card on their dashboard — and a push notification on mobile.

• Resolve or reply right on the note — the tagged person can mark it done or respond where it appears, no hunting required.

• Internal notes are now labeled "Internal team note" across web and mobile, so it's always clear who a note is for.

New: Notes surface in the inbox

• When a note is the newest thing in a conversation, it now shows in that conversation's inbox preview, clearly labeled with a lock icon so it never reads as a message sent to the guest.

New: Reservation notes you can edit

• View, add, edit, and delete a reservation's notes directly from the guest detail panel.

• Every change writes back to Mews instantly, so your team and your PMS stay in sync no matter where the note was made.

The composer where you write to guests got a big upgrade: reusable replies, one-tap merge fields, and a resizable box.

New: Snippets

Stop retyping the same messages. Create reusable replies your whole team can pull into any conversation.

• Insert from the picker or by typing a trigger — grab a snippet from the composer toolbar, or start typing to find it.

• Personalized automatically — snippets support variables with fallbacks, resolved against the guest you're talking to, so you always see the final text before you send.

• Managed in one place — create, edit, and delete replies for the whole team.

New: Message variables

Drop live guest and reservation details straight into a message you're writing.

• Click the { } picker to insert first name, room number, stay dates, check-in and payment links, and more.

• Values resolve immediately for the guest in front of you, with fallbacks for anything missing so messages always read cleanly.

Resize the composer

Drag the message box taller or shorter to fit what you're writing — double-click to reset. Your chosen height is remembered.

A big round of calling improvements across mobile and web — smoother outbound calls, fewer dropped connections, and less "please reload" friction.

Mobile calling

• Ringback tone and a proper "Ringing" state on outbound calls, so you can hear and see that a call is connecting.

• No more silent gap between the ringback and live call audio when the other side picks up.

• Steadier connections — answer-drop fixes, prevention and detection for the iOS audio-wedge issue, and automatic cleanup of stale connections when you bring the app back to the foreground.

• Outbound calls reconnect on demand instead of refusing when the connection had gone idle.

• A second incoming call no longer drops the call you're already on.

• A short grace window so a call that's answered right as it times out no longer gets logged as missed.

• Conversation timeline restored to newest-at-the-bottom order.

Web calling

• The softphone recovers on its own instead of prompting you to reload the page.

• Calling a guest reopens a closed conversation automatically, so your outbound call lands in the right place.

• A clear prompt to reload if the real-time connection ever drops, so you're never unknowingly disconnected.

You can now see the photos guests text you, and your dashboard does more of the watching for you — with a Missed Calls card and a real Voicemails list that tell you exactly who still needs a callback.

New: See guest photos in the conversation

When a guest texts you a picture, it now shows up right in the conversation — on both web and mobile.

• Photos render inline in the message timeline. Tap to enlarge on web, or pinch-to-zoom on mobile.

• Photo-only texts show a 📷 Photo preview in your inbox list, so you know at a glance a message came in.

• Non-image attachments show a clean fallback instead of a broken image.

Before this, a guest could send you a photo and you had no way to see it. Now you do.

New: Missed Calls card on the dashboard

The old "Conversations" card is now a Missed Calls card that lists every caller a human hasn't gotten back to yet — one row per caller, with guest name, room, and stay status where we have it.

• Only a real human callback clears a caller. An auto-text on a missed call or an AI reply does not count as "returned" — so the list reflects who genuinely still needs a person.

• Mark handled or Dismiss any row (with Undo) when you've taken care of it off-system.

• The card updates live across your team and shows a red badge for new misses.

New: Voicemails list on the dashboard

The Voicemails card is no longer just a number — it's a list of unresolved voicemails, one row each with caller name, guest status, room/stay, and duration, so you can triage without digging.

Call summaries on the call detail view

Open a call and you'll now see a generated call summary front and center, prioritized above the older AI summary, with clearer styling so you can catch up on what a call was about at a glance.

A round of AI improvements plus a batch of reliability and polish fixes across calls, automations, and the mobile app.

AI

• Voicemail-aware AI replies. When you ask the AI agent to draft a reply, it now takes the guest's most recent voicemail into account — so the draft responds to what they actually just said, instead of an older message in the thread.

• Cleaner AI reply emails. Improved the styling of AI-drafted email replies so they render more consistently.

Automations

• Date/time condition fix. Corrected the logic for date and time conditions when they're used to evaluate bookings, so those automations branch the way you'd expect.

Calls and mobile

• Mobile performance and reliability. A round of under-the-hood improvements to the iOS app — steadier call state, faster loading of your conversation list and detail views, and fewer unread-badge glitches.

Team

• Fixed deleted users lingering in Team Routing. Removing a team member now cleanly removes them from any routing they were part of, so calls don't try to reach someone who's gone.