Hello everyone,
January and February have started off at quite a pace and so this is our second product update of the year so far. In terms of growth, those of you using the support processes may have seen a few new names appearing as we strengthen our operational teams, and behind the scenes we have had a number of new joiners too that have helped to accelerate a number of our projects.
Below are a few more details about the key updates this month, and we encourage you to read the links to the updated guides - where available, and of course, as always, do reach out to your Account Manager if you have any questions on this or the product in general. If you are not sure who your account manager is then just contact the general account management mailbox.
WHAT'S IN THIS UPDATE
Priority booking for groups and teams
We have today launched a new feature referred to as 'Priority booking for groups and teams'. There is often a requirement to provide specific teams or departments with access to a location or area, however the challenge has always been around what happens if they are not using it or don't need it on a specific day. Limiting to a specific group means others simply cannot book even when not used. This new feature allows you to prioritise teams and mark groups of resources to be available to a specific team, and then offer these resources to others, nearer the time. So, the Finance area can be booked by the Finance team a month in advance as usual, but then one week before, if the resources are still free then they can be opened up and offered to the Marketing team, and then one day before they can be offered to everyone. These rules are completely configurable by yourselves and we believe this will give you a huge amount of flexibility in ensuring teams get the space they need and your workplace is fully optimised. Below is an image of the rules in place.
This feature is now enabled for all customers and is accessible by visiting the SETTINGS tab when editing a resource or location. To find out more about how to use it to get the best from your workspaces then please refer to the administrators guide where we cover this in much more detail.
Full launch of Frictionless check-in
Last month we gave some previews of our Frictionless check-in, and we are pleased to say this feature is now fully launched.
It allows you to link QR codes & NFC tags to individual resources so your teams can walk up to the resources and scan to book them, check in to them or end a booking early to make the resource available for someone else to use.
Frictionless check-in takes resource management to a new level of simplicity with no need to download a mobile app, just scan and go!
If you are interested in adding this feature to your account then please contact your account manager, or raise a support ticket to discuss setting this up.
As part of our future development of this we will adding the ability to restrict check-in support to only these types of ‘on-site’ methods, if you have them, so you can then be 100% sure teams checking in are actually on-site. There will be more about these enhancements in future product updates.
Zooming in on floor plans
This latest update also sees some improvements to the floor plan booking screen to help your teams find the area they are looking for more easily. When you search for available resources and the resources are shown on a floor plan, clicking the location filters in the left hand menu will now zoom to the selected area, zone or desk bank. De-selecting them will return to the full screen floor plan view. This is now live for all customers and is demonstrated in the image below.
NOTE: The zoom and pan for areas, zones or desk banks are automatically calculated based on the desks, rooms etc. within that area. If these are located in different parts of the floor plan the floor plan will only zoom and pan to point where all resources are visible.
Showing names on floor plans
As we were working on the floor plan area of the product we also added another feature that we think you will find really useful. When looking at a floorplan, any resources with bookings will now show the name of the person that has it booked. Previously it showed just an icon and you needed to click the icon to see the person - now this is shown on the main floor plan reducing the clicks needed to see where your team might be sitting. Due to the size of floor plans and also length of names, when you zoom out on the floor plan the names will disappear and reappear when you zoom back in a little.
Fixes and new releases
Since the last product update, there have been the following fixes applied to the system
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Location text overflow
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Security Group Padlock tooltip scrolling off screen
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Reverse Logo not showing for admin users on logos/branding screen
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User Groups - Removal of a user causes the user focus to drop to the bottom of the list
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Ensure default end-date of a repeat defaults to the start date of the booking
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Booking Option request email sometimes not sent when an extra booking options are added/removed
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Shared Networks - Adding a location “Location” field input issue
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Admin Menu text overlap when using long booking category names
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O365: Matrix out-of-sync when standard user books beyond the Office 365 booking window
In addition we have also released a new version of the Outlook add in so we are now on version 3.2.4 - for details of the latest releases of all of our products please check this Frequently Asked Question that lists these for you.
Finally, we have also now released a new version of our Floor Plan Kiosks that will see two main improvements:
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Find Someone will now find all bookings regardless of state (previously only bookings that matched certain criteria were shown and we had customer feedback on widening this, so that has been improved.
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Support for Cost Codes - if making bookings in resources that had mandatory cost codes then this prevented you making the booking. We have now extended cost codes to work fully on the Floor Plan Kiosk.
Please raise a support ticket should you need any assistance in downloading the latest versions - or reach out to your account manager if these are things you are interested in or would like a demonstration of.
Meet the team
January and February are traditionally quiet months in terms of FM conferences and so the next conference we are planning to attend is The Workplace Event (details below). This is a very large event and so if you are joining then you will be able to meet a number of the team http://there.In addition to conferences over the next two months we will also be joining a couple of CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) events to lend a hand to local charities and good causes - these will be mostly focused around the South Wales and Bristol area and we will post more details about these events on our website .
Upcoming events: The Workplace event - 30th April to 2nd May 2004 (Birmingham)
If you can attend any of the above events, please do reach out to your account manager to arrange a meeting while you are there so we can talk to you about some of the new and exciting features we have coming soon.
Also, if you would like us to present or facilitate at any of your events, please do let us know and we would be happy to send a representative along to support you.
Additional support
As we continually rollout new functions and features, you may find it useful to refresh your knowledge of our product and how it can help your business - especially as everyone's journey in to hybrid working is different.
For this reason it might be helpful to ensure you and your fellow Matrix Booking Administrators arrange some refresher training. This can be in dedicated sessions or it could be just using the eLearning modules we have available in our free to use 'Training Hub'. Some of the eLearning modules below may be useful for your wider teams so please feel free to link to these from your internal knoweledge bases / sharepoint / intranet etc. The training hub can be found using this link:
https://training.matrixbooking.com
If you would like to arrange any refresher training for your teams then please just reach out to your account manager who will arrange this for you.
Supporting information
Please do ensure all of your administrators have access to our support portal to allow them to raise issues and in addition the following links may also be helpful:
Link to our Support Portal to raise issues
Link to our Administrators guide
Why am I getting this email?
Finally, you are receiving this operational email because you are an Administrator of Matrix Booking or you are registered with us a key contact involved with Matrix Booking – if this is not the case or you no longer wish to receive these updates, then please click the 'update your preferences' link at the bottom of this email. Please remember that this is also the same contact list we use to advise of any system issues or service updates, so fully unsubscribing from this will unsubscribe you from both types of email.
As always though, if you are updating your workplace processes and rules or if you would like more information about anything in this email or our other products, then do contact us to see how we can provide help or support with those plans and using Matrix Booking in general!
Regards from everyone here at Matrix Booking,
Ian Jones
Director of Operations