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So; I have a zap that reminds attendees 10days before an event in my google calender (= a reservation) starts. This by using the “event starts” trigger of Google calendar.

Now I also want to send a reminder 1 day before the event ends (with some practical information of the checkout). But I can’t get this done by using the “event ends” trigger. Since that trigger fires too late & there is no “x-days before” option.

The only workaround that I found, is to add a “delay” after the “event start” trigger. The only disadvantage of that is that the delay can’t be longer than one month.

Anyone knows a better solution?

Thanks in advace!

Hey @Hexmans ,

Great question. What you could possibly do is the following (it’s a workaround for the delay step): 
You would have 2 zaps running this. For the first:

  • Trigger: when a new event is in google calendar
  • Check the end time of the event
  • Add this event with the end time in the “Storage by zapier” store
  • You can use the “Push value onto a list” to make a list with values

This way, you have all the data you need in a store which you can use later.
The second zap would be checking this data and sending notifications like you want:

  • Trigger: Schedule
  • Action: “Storage by Zapier” → Get List values 
  • Action: Filter → If the end date is within X days then continue
  • Action: Send notification in any way you like
  • Action: “Storage by Zapier” → pop value from list 

With these 2 zaps you can bascially make your own delay system, and send out notifications when you like.
Hope this helps! Let me know if it worked or if you have any questions.

~Bjorn from Wemakefuture

Thanks @Wemakefuture 

Will try this out really soon and I’ll keep you posted!
Did not know the “storage by zapier” functionality. A door full of new oportunities open up :-)

Okay - trying to figure this one out.
Where I’m at right now: 

ZAP 1

  • Trigger: Event Starts
  • Action - formatter : get the phone number out of the description field 
  • Action - formatter : get the end date minus 1 day
  • Action - storage by zapier: since I need the combination of “end date” and “phone number”, I’m using the “Set Child Value” and using a (not unique) key: ex: endDatesCal

ZAP 2

  • Trigger - schedule : triggers every day at 11am
  •  

=> Here’s I’m having a bit of a struggle. Now I’ve multiple child-entries in the “storage list”; and I can retrieve them all with the “get list values”.
To apply the action - filter based on the date. Should I loop the list? But that’s not really handy to do in Zapier. 
Can you point me into the right direction?

And what I was thinking. Probably in ZAP 2, I’ll need to remove the entry on the storage as well.

 

Thanks for the support!

Okay - trying to figure this one out.
Where I’m at right now: 

...

Just a quick follow up;
I’ve ditched the idea of using the storage by zapier. I didn’t got it to work.

So I’ve just used a post/get webhook functionality. And I do use the delay function. Which is fine for now.

 

Hi @Hexmans!

You said: “The only disadvantage of that is that the delay can’t be longer than one month.”

How long are the events themselves? Maybe I’m misunderstanding but it seems like you remind people 10 days before an event and you want to send something 1 day before it ends. Under what circumstance would you need more than a month between the event start and event end. Just trying to make sure I understand what the desired workflow is :)

Great workaround, using webhooks, by the way! That’s a trick that lots of people use.

Hi @Hexmans!

You said: “The only disadvantage of that is that the delay can’t be longer than one month.”

How long are the events themselves? Maybe I’m misunderstanding but it seems like you remind people 10 days before an event and you want to send something 1 day before it ends. Under what circumstance would you need more than a month between the event start and event end. Just trying to make sure I understand what the desired workflow is :)

Great workaround, using webhooks, by the way! That’s a trick that lots of people use.

Exactly; Probably it will never occur.
But nevertheless it would have been cool if I’d got it to work. You never know what customers will do, right :-) 

So yeah, it was more out of curiosity and maybe something to use in the future (on a different workflow). Because the current workflow is exactly what you described.

Still figuring out my way here with ZAP’s as former IT guy.

 

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