fbpx
French Connections

Before contacting us please read these frequently asked questions. Find out more about how to create a special offer, how to change your email address and update your prices.

More questions are added from time to time so it is worth checking this page regularly

Special Offers | Email address queries | Updates | Photo queries | Contacting us| Adding another Property | Selling your property | Availabilty Calendar | Property Indexing

Special Offers

How do I enter a special offer?

To enter a special offer click on the Special offers link under update actions in the your properties screen. This brings up the Special offer history screen. Here click on 'Add new offer' on the property unit which you wish to place on offer.

In the offer details screen enter your Offer Title (up to 50 characters). This will be displayed both on your property advertisement and also in the search results.

Next enter the offer description (up to 150 characters) This will appear on your property advertisement.

Lastly enter the start date and the end date that you want the offer text to appear on the site (14 days max). Please note you should not enter the dates that your property is available on special offer here. These are the dates that the offer text will appear on the site. You can enter any dates in advance or start with the current date. The end date cannot be more than 14 days in advance of the start date.

Lastly tick the Visible tick box and click add special offer. Your offer will be visible on your property advertisement immediately and on the search results within one hour if the dates are current. If the dates are not current the offer will not be visable until the start date. If you wish to remove the offer during your period just click on edit offer in the Special offer history screen and untick the 'Visible' tick box.

I have sold my special offer but my 14 day period is not yet up, can I get a refund on the unused days

Sorry, no. If you have sold your offer week(s) then you have achieved the objective of the offer. You can edit the offer and advertise another period if you wish but you cannot change the start date once the offer has started.

I have used my two free offers but I want to add another

Additional offers are available for £25 for 2 weeks. Use the contactus form to request this.

Emails

How do I change my email address?

Use the update invoice address link on the dashboard. These are the default contact details which are used for your advert and your invoices. If you have more than one property on the site and wish to have a different email address for each property you may do so by clicking on 'Your properties' and then on the 'Address' link. Entering an address in this form will change the email address your enquiries are sent to on that property only.
IMPORTANT. Please send youself a test email after you change it to verify that you have entered it correctly.


I have sent myself a test message via the enquiry form on my web page and I have not received it. Why is this.

Send yourself a test Email from your Email program to ensure that your ISP's Email is working correctly, if it is, check that you have entered your correct Email address in our database (see how do I change your email address).  Secondly, check your spam settings. The email might have been delivered but gone into the spam box in error. A common cause of a test email not being delivered is using your own email address in the from box on the form. Many ISP's will treat an email which has an email address which is the same in both the 'from' and 'to' address fields as spam as this is a common spammers trick. If you are using a free email address such as hotmail, try changing to a regular address. Please note we do not recommend or support the use of hotmail or other 'free' email services as they are often unreliable, slow to deliver messages and have restricted size mailboxes which fill up quickly and result in bounced emails. This then results in us getting emails from people who are trying to contact you saying your emails are bouncing, you are not responding etc.

I wish to use a different Email address for each of my web pages on your site.

This is possible. Click  'Your properties' in the dashboad and then on the 'Address' link. Entering an address in this form will change the email address your enquiries are sent to on that property only.
IMPORTANT. Please send youself a test email after you change it to verify that you have entered it correctly.

I want to display my Email address on the web page.

We do not display Email addresses on property rental web pages to stop you receiving virus infected emails via your page and also to stop your Email address falling into the hand of spammers who used to regularly collect Email addresses from the site.

Updates

How do I update my prices?

When you first login to the owners area you will see the Owners Property Information screen. Your properties are listed in the box titled your properties. Under the heading update actions you will see the word Tariffs. Click on this to take you into the update screen.

Select the property you wish to update, fill in the dates and prices and then click update. Please use the Night off format for ther dates.
ie
1 June - 13 June £240
14 June - 28 June £280 etc
Please remember to update your prices regularly as as each month passes it will dissapear from the tarrif.

I have moved and want to update my billing address or contact details on the web page.

Use the update invoice address link on the dashboard. These are the default contact details which are used for your advert and your invoices. If you have more than one property on the site and wish to have a different contact details for each property you may do so by clicking on 'Your properties' and then on the 'Address' link. Entering an address in this form will change the it on that property only.

I want to change the text or photos on my page. Is there a charge for this?

You can change your contact details and prices yourself.  Other changes are charged for depending on the amount of work involved. Your page text may be changed without charge at your annual renewal time. Photo replacements or additions are charged for at any time. Text changes must be clearly marked on a copy of the existing text. We will be enhancing our website to allow you to make text changes yourself in the future.

Will you invoice me when the changes are done?

Payment must be received before work commences. This enables us to save the time which would inevitably be spent chasing late payers and so helps to keep costs down.

How much text can I have on my web page?

We do not specify an exact limit but an average length might run to three A4 size pages in a word document. We reserve the right to modify the text as appropriate if we feel it does not fit the general format of the site.

I want to put fully booked for August on my web page is this possible?

We cannot display 'booked' or other such items on your web page. if we did this for every property we would not have time to do anything else! Apart from that such notices quickly become out of date and if forgotten could loose you bookings for the following year.

I have asked you to make some changes to my page which you say you have made but I can still see the old version in my browser, not the changed page. Why is this?

Usually clicking your browser page refresh button (F5) will show your changes. If this does not work please see the refresh problems section

How many photos do you recommend?

We recommend a minimum of 4 good photos as these are the single most important thing that will help to sell your weeks. More is better providing they are of good quality and say something about the property or area. Having a bad photo is worse than not having one at all! Photos can be added at any time so if you do not have a good one now, wait until you do.

What is the maximum number of photos that I can have?

With our photo browser you can have as many as you want.

What type of photos should I include on my page?

Generally a picture of the outside of the house, a pool picture if you have one and a shot of the interior. If the house is not terribly photogenic outside use more interior pictures or a picture of a local attraction. The main thing is that the pictures should be good quality and present an attractive aspect of the property. Digital pictures are best if you have a digital camera. Generally pictures with people or cars in front of the house or view are not recommended. We can scan and adjust picture brightness or sharpness to a certain extent but we cannot make a good picture out of a bad one.

What size photos should I send? / Sending pictures by email.

A standard height of 235 pixels is used for all photos. Landscape photos reproduce best and are therefore preferred. There is no standard width but the maximum that be accommodated in the photo browser is 375 pixels.  Only landscape photos will be specified as the thumbnail, which, if it is in the first photo browser on the page, will also appear as the first photo on the page. The thumbnail is automatically reduced to a fixed size landscape style format (this distorts portrait photos). If larger photos are sent they will be reduced in size but we cannot increase the size of a smaller picture because it will loose resolution. Pictures sent smaller than 235 pixels high will normally be rejected.

Panoramic photos will not generally be used unless they are cropped width ways to fit in the photo browser and the file size is below 20k so that the page loads quickly. 

We will not use montages or pictures with text on them.

Please note that properties cannot be published without images.

If you are sending pictures via Email to us please send in jpg format with the compression set to its lowest level. If sending them already sized the file size for each photo must be less than 20k. If sending them oversize for us to resize or crop as appropriate please do not send them with a file size so large that it takes 30 minutes for us receive the email!! Attachments of no more than 250kb please. If you can use a program such as winzip to reduce the attachment size please do so. Under no circumstances send pictures embedded within a word document as these can often run to several megabytes in size. Emails of this size will be deleted from the server without downloading.

I want to include a house plan or a map, is this possible?

If the plan or map is sent to us ready scanned and less than 20k in file size it will be treated as a normal photograph. We are generally unable to reduce the size of large maps or plans successfully as they loose definition and become unreadable.

Contact

How do I contact you?

Please use the contact French Connections link in the owners area to email us.
Our mailing address is French Connections, Bracon House, High Street, Etchingham, East Sussex, TN19 7AJ. UK. Tel + 44 (0)1580 819303. Fax + 44 (0)20 7681 2404.

Adding another property

I wish to add another property, what do I have to do?

You can sign up to add another property by clicking on Sign up now on the For property ownerts page.

Selling your property

I wish to sell my property, can you help me?

Yes our real estate section features many private adverts and these have a high success rate for properties sold. Contact Sales for further information.

Availability calendar

How do I update my availability

When you first login to the owners area you will see the Owners Property Information screen. Your properties are listed in the box titled your properties. Under the heading update actions you will see the word Availability. Click on this to take you into the update screen.

I do not wish to display my availability

If you do not enter your availability your property will not appear in the search results when a search by availabilty is done. We therefore strongly recommend that you keep this up to date at all times.

I have entered my availability but when the page refreshes it has reverted to the previous state and not recorded my changes.

Usually clicking your browser page refresh button (F5) will show your changes. If this does not work please see the refresh problems section of how to use availability.

Property Indexing

I wish to place my property in a specialised additional index, how do I arrange this?

Listings can be added to a specialised index such as Skiing, Activity holidays, Chateaux or Boating at a nominal charge. Contact Sales for details. Please note that to be listed in Activity holidays you must run the activity yourself or have it held at your property. ie we will not list you as having a horse riding activity just because there are stables 2km down the road. To be listed as a Chateau or Manoir your property must have Chateau or Manoir as its postal address.

I am on the border of two regions or departments, can I be listed in both?

Sorry we can only list you in the region/department corresponding to your property's post code.

Related Articles