How do I set up custom actions in my property management chat?

Custom actions turn your chat widget into a hands‑on support tool, not just a question‑and‑answer machine. Instead of linking to a generic form or telling a tenant to call the office, the agent can gather details and perform the next step right inside the conversation.

Common real‑estate use‑cases include:

• Schedule a viewing by asking for preferred date/time, then creating the appointment in your calendar.
• Handle maintenance requests by collecting unit number, description, and priority, then creating a work order in your property management tools.
• Update tenant contact details or leaseholder information directly in your PMS.
• Pre‑qualify tenant leads by asking screening questions and forwarding the results to your leasing team.

Because every action is grounded in your own business rules and knowledge‑base, responses stay accurate to your processes and brand voice.

Follow these steps to set up a custom action inside the Chatref app. You’ll need an active agent and access to your account’s playground.

1. Open the agent editor – from your dashboard, select the agent you want to add actions to.
2. Go to the Custom Actions tab – this is where you define what the agent can do, how it collects information, and what happens after.
3. Define the action trigger – write a simple description of when the agent should initiate this action (e.g., “When a tenant reports a maintenance issue”).
4. Add input fields – specify each piece of information the agent needs to collect (e.g., unit number, issue description, urgency level). You can use free‑form text, drop‑downs, or numeric fields.
5. Connect an endpoint (webhook URL) – Chatref sends the collected data to your property management tool, maintenance platform, or internal system via an outgoing webhook. Paste the URL provided by that tool, then select the HTTP method and auth token if required.
6. Test and refine – use the live playground to simulate a conversation and confirm the action fires correctly. You can also add a custom response message that the agent shows after completing the action (e.g., “Your maintenance request has been created – ticket #1234”).

All actions run in real time and appear in the shared conversation inbox, so your team can see what the AI agent did and step in if something needs a personal touch.

Chatref supports customization through webhooks, which means you can connect to most modern property management systems - whether it’s a mainstream PMS like Buildium or AppFolio, a maintenance ticketing tool, or a custom in‑house solution. As long as the tool exposes an API endpoint that accepts structured data, you can map it to a custom action.

For example:

• Maintenance requests → POST to your PMS’s work‑order creation endpoint with fields for tenant, unit, issue, and priority.
• Viewing bookings → POST to your showing‑scheduling tool (e.g., Calendly, ShowingTime) with prospect details and preferred times.
• Lead capture → POST to your CRM (e.g., Salesforce, HubSpot) to create a new lead record with qualifying answers and contact info.

If your current tool doesn’t offer webhooks, you can use a no‑code connector like Zapier or Make as a bridge. Define the action in Chatref, then point the webhook to Zapier and let it transform and relay the data to your destination app.

Once custom actions are live, Chatref’s insights engine tracks every action invocation—what users asked, which actions ran, and where they dropped off. Use these analytics to:

• Spot common requests that aren’t yet covered by a custom action, so you can create new ones and further reduce support load.
• Measure completion rates (e.g., how many maintenance requests were fully collected vs. abandoned).
• Adjust field questions if users frequently skip or misunderstand them.
• Identify times when the AI agent correctly hands off to a human, helping you understand where the action was insufficient.

Review the insights digest email weekly, then tweak your actions or knowledge‑base to keep support customization tight and your chat features working for your team, not against it.

What are custom actions in property management?
Custom actions are chat‑based tool‑calls that let your AI agent perform specific tasks inside the conversation—like scheduling viewings, logging maintenance requests, or updating tenant records—by collecting information and sending it to your property management tools via webhooks. They turn the chat widget into a do‑it‑all assistant, not just an FAQ bot.

How to set up custom actions for support?
Set them up in the Chatref agent editor. Define a trigger, add input fields for the information you need, connect the action to your support system’s webhook URL, test in the playground, and activate. No coding is required, and every plan includes unlimited custom action definitions.

Can AI agents perform custom actions?
Yes. Chatref’s AI agents natively support tool‑calling through the custom‑actions module. The agent decides when to invoke an action based on the conversation context and your trigger rules, then executes it and reports the outcome back to the user—all without human intervention.

How to use insights from custom action data?
Navigate to the Insights view in Chatref to see action‑specific analytics: completion rates, drop‑off points, and common request patterns. Use that data to improve your knowledge‑base, add new actions for frequently requested tasks, and refine existing forms so that AI agents handle more interactions successfully.