A property often has people tied to it who aren't your customer: the tenant who's actually in the flat, a letting agent, the landlord next door. You can log them straight on the property, with their name and contact details, without turning each one into a client. They stay on the property and never clutter your clients list.
Where it lives
Open a property (from Properties, or from a client's profile) and look at the People section. That's where everyone tied to the property shows: the owner or landlord if they're one of your clients, plus anyone you add here.
Add a person
- In the People section, tap Add person.
- Pick their relationship: Tenant, Owner, Landlord, Agent or Other. It defaults to Tenant. A letting agent or factor is an Agent — not an owner.
- Type their name, and their phone and email if you have them.
- Tap Add person.
That's it. They now show in the People section with their role. Add as many as you like, so a property can have several tenants, an agent and a landlord all at once.
Ask Mucka to do it
Quicker when you're on the move. Open Mucka and say:
"Add tenant Sam Okafor, 07700 900123, to 14 Oak Drive."
"Log the letting agent for Flat 2, The Old Mill: Priya at Newcastle Lettings, priya@example.com."
Mucka finds the property, adds the person against it, and shows you the result. It never creates a client for them.
A whole list at once
Got a spreadsheet from a landlord or letting agent with a batch of addresses and tenants? Send it to Mucka instead of typing them in one by one.
- Open Mucka and tap + beside the message box, then Document.
- Pick the file. CSV and Excel (.xlsx or .xls) both work, as well as PDFs.
- Tell Mucka what it is, and how to time any jobs: "These are all for Example Lettings. Add the properties and tenants, and pencil an EPC at each on the day in the sheet, an hour each from 9am."
Mucka reads every row from the file itself, tells you how many it found, and checks the plan with you before it adds anything. Then it adds the whole list in one go: each address under that customer, the tenant's name, phone and email on the property, and the jobs pencilled in on their days, one after another from the time you gave. Pencilled means nobody is texted until you confirm each job in the diary. Mucka then tells you anything it couldn't add, such as an address you already have.
If a phone number in the sheet lost its leading 0 in Excel, Mucka adds it back and tells you. If the sheet has no postcodes, the addresses still go in, and Mucka lists the ones without a postcode and offers to find them for you to check. A list of more than a few hundred rows is better brought in through Settings → Connections → Import data, or ask Mucka and the team will do it for you.
Edit or remove someone
Tap the pencil next to any person you've added to change their details, switch their role, or remove them. If a tenant moves out, remove them. The property keeps its job and certificate history regardless.
Seeing them on the job
You don't have to open the property to find out who's at an address. Open any job and, under the Client card, there's a People at this address section listing everyone tied to it: the landlord, the tenant, the agent, each with their role and phone number. On a phone, tapping a tenant's row calls them, which is what you want when you're stood outside.
The Call button at the top of the job on a phone goes to the tenant when there's one with a number on the property, and to whoever pays when there isn't. So whoever's going to the job can ring ahead about access without hunting for the number first.
The Client card itself now says what that customer is to the address, so it reads Client · Landlord on a rental and plain Client on an owner's own home. The client is who gets the bill; the tenant is who lets you in. On a rented property those are different people, and the job shows both.
To change any of it, tap Manage on the People section — that takes you to the property, where it's all edited.
Messaging the tenant instead of the landlord
On a rental, the person who lets your engineer in usually isn't the person you invoice. If you want the messages about the visit to go to the tenant, you can switch that on.
Head to Settings → Customer messages and you'll find two switches:
- Text the tenant, not the landlord
- Email the tenant too
They're separate on purpose. Agreeing to text somebody isn't the same as agreeing to email them, so turning one on doesn't turn the other on. Or just ask Mucka: "text the tenant, not the landlord".
With them on, these go to the tenant:
- the booking confirmation
- the appointment reminder
- the on-my-way text
- the running-late text
- the bulk Arrange access message (see below)
These always go to whoever you invoice, whatever you switch on:
- anything about money — quotes, invoices, payment chasers, service plan cover
- review requests
- certificates
Everyone gets it. If you've got five tenants recorded at an HMO and they've all left a number, all five get the text. That's the point on a house share — five people have to know an engineer is coming. It also means five texts on your bill for that one visit, so it's worth keeping the list tidy: mark anyone who's moved out as past on the property.
If nobody's recorded at the address, or nobody's left a number, the message goes to the client on the job, the same as it always did.
It only changes messages that were already switched on. If you don't have booking confirmations turned on, turning this on doesn't start sending them.
If a tenant replies STOP, Mucka stops texting that number, the same as it would for one of your own customers. Every email to a tenant carries an unsubscribe link, and if they use it Mucka stops emailing them about access.
Arranging access on a lot of jobs at once
If you do managed rentals you'll get a batch of jobs in at once and then lose a morning ringing round to arrange access. There's a screen for that.
Go to Jobs and hit Arrange access. It lists every visit at a property over the next three weeks where there's somebody recorded at the address to tell, and shows you all of them — tenants and the billed client, with the number and email you hold for each.
The list comes in three groups, and which group a job is in decides what the message says:
- No date yet — nothing is booked. The message asks what suits.
- Pencilled in — you've held a slot but not confirmed it. The message puts that day and time forward — "We are looking at Thursday 15 October, 2pm to 2.30pm" — and asks whether it works, rather than telling them to be in.
- Booked in — the visit is agreed. The message tells them when the engineer is coming.
One agency at a time
If you work for several letting agents or landlords, use the All customers picker above the list to show just one of them. It lists whoever each job is billed to, with how many jobs are theirs, so you can deal with one agency's properties, send their batch, and then move on to the next. On a phone it's at the top of the list, under Show jobs for.
What you can see is what gets sent. Pick a different customer and any ticks on jobs that are no longer showing are cleared, so a message never goes to somebody you can't see on the screen.
Sending the batch
- Tick who you want. Nothing is ticked when the page opens, so nothing goes out by accident. Tick everyone does the lot, or every job showing if you've picked one customer. On a phone, the card at the top of the list can also offer Tick everyone not asked yet, which leaves alone the jobs somebody has already been asked about.
- Set AM or PM on each booked job. That goes in the message as a time — "8am to 12pm" — and leave it alone and the message gives whatever time is in the diary. If your diary works in half-days (Settings → Diary), it moves the job to match as well — unless that would double-book the engineer, in which case it leaves the job where it is and tells you which ones. Jobs with no date, and pencilled ones, have no AM/PM: there's no slot to promise yet.
- Choose text, email, or both, and write the message once. It's the same wording for the whole batch; the fields fill in the differences. If any of the jobs you've ticked are pencilled or undated, a second box appears for the wording those get — the one that asks. On a phone, the button at the foot of the list opens the message, and you can tap a field's name to drop it into the wording where your cursor is.
- Read the preview, then hit Send. The preview tells you which of the two wordings you're looking at, and it shows the whole message the tenant gets: your business name at the start of the text, the "Call us on" line at the end, and your email signature under the email.
Letting the tenant pick the time
Instead of waiting for replies, you can send each tenant a link to pick the time themselves. Put the booking link field in the wording for jobs that are not booked yet, for example:
{{greeting}}, we need to get into {{address}} for your {{job_type}}. Pick a time that suits: {{booking_link}}
Each job gets its own link. When the tenant opens it they see:
- The time you have pencilled in, first, with a button to say it suits.
- Every other free time in your diary, leaving out any your van cannot get to from the jobs either side.
- Will someone be in? They can say someone will be home, or that you need to collect a key.
The page shows your business, what the visit is for and the first line of the address. It never shows who pays or a price.
Nothing is booked on the tenant's word. What they pick comes to you as a card in your Actions, saying what they chose and what they said about getting in. Tap to approve and the job is booked at that time, stays under the letting agent, has its Access box set, and the usual confirmation goes out. If they pick again before you approve, the card changes rather than a second one appearing.
Booked jobs get no link, even if the field is in the wording, because there is nothing left to choose. To change a booked visit, the tenant rings you.
Booking them once they've answered
Pencilled jobs on the list have a Book it button, which opens the same booking form as the job itself: the status, the access answer, the key safe notes and who will get the confirmation. Once a few replies are in, the list offers Book the ones that have replied (on a phone it can be the next step in the card at the top of the list). That books every pencilled job where you've recorded Someone will be home or Key collect, in one go, and shows you who each confirmation goes to first. If one of them clashes with something already in the diary, it's left pencilled and named so you can sort it on its own.
Keeping your own wording
Change the text or the email and a Save as my wording button appears under the boxes. Press it and that's the wording the screen opens with from then on, every batch. Use Mucka's wording puts ours back (press Save afterwards to make that stick too). Once it's saved the button goes away and the screen says This is your saved wording, so you can see it kept.
You can also change it in Settings → Customers → Automatic messages, in the Arrange access row. Saving needs the owner's permission to change workspace settings; anybody else can still change the wording for one batch, it just isn't kept.
Who they ring
The "Call us on" line at the end of every access text gives your business phone from Settings, not your receptionist's number, so tenants come straight to you. The text itself still comes from your receptionist number if you have one, so a tenant who texts back still lands somewhere and the reply goes on the job (see below). The email has your email signature at the bottom, which is where your number and email address go — check it in Settings if the preview shows it without them.
If your own number is already in the wording you've written, Mucka doesn't add a second one.
The count above the Send button is how many messages will actually go out — not how many people you've ticked. Both channels on doubles it.
If the same person is on several of the jobs, Mucka tells you before you send. On managed work the letting agent is usually the billed client on every job in the batch, so ticking them everywhere would be twenty texts to one phone. Tick everyone goes for the tenants first wherever a tenant is recorded, for that reason.
There's a hard limit behind it too: nobody gets more than four texts from you in a week, whatever you tick. Anything over that is held back and listed for you afterwards with the person's name, so you can ring them or email them instead. On a phone they can stay ticked, so you can switch to email and send again. Emails have no such limit — an agent processing twenty access requests wants twenty emails, and every one carries an unsubscribe link.
Putting the job number in the subject
The subject line takes the same fields the message does, so you can write:
JOB:{{job_ref}} {{job_type}}
and a tenant gets an email headed JOB:J-014 Legionella Risk Assessment. When they reply, you know which visit they mean.
When a tenant texts back
Texts go out from your receptionist number, so a tenant's reply comes back to Mucka. The card in your Actions names the tenant, the address and the job you texted them about — "Dawn Ellis (about J-014 Gas Safety at Flat 2, 14 High Street) texted back…" — and the reply goes on that job. If you texted them about two jobs at the same address it names the address and leaves the job to you. More in When a customer texts your receptionist number.
If a tenant rings your receptionist number instead, and their phone number is on the property, the receptionist can tell them the visit you have in the diary there and take down whether it suits, rather than offering them a new one. More in Your voice receptionist.
The fields you can use anywhere in the subject or the message:
{{greeting}}— Hi plus their first name{{name}}— their name{{job_ref}}— the job number{{job_type}}— what the visit is for{{when}}— the day, written out{{time_window}}— when the engineer will be there, like "8am to 12pm". Booked jobs only; it's empty on the asking wording, which never promises a time. A pencilled job's time goes in{{proposed}}instead{{proposed}}— the day and time you're suggesting, on a pencilled job, like " We are looking at Thursday 15 October, 2pm to 2.30pm." Empty when there's no date yet, so the sentence still reads properly.{{address}}— the work address{{business_name}}— your business name{{business_phone}}— your business phone, from Settings{{business_email}}— your business email, from Settings
If you want the job numbers to read JOB:234 rather than J-234, change the prefix under Settings → Workspace, in the paperwork section.
If a job isn't on the list
Under the list there's a Not shown section. It names any job at a property in the same three weeks that Mucka left off, and why — usually because nobody is recorded at the address and the customer has no phone or email either, so there's nobody to write to. Each one links straight to the property so you can add whoever's in it.
Finished jobs aren't listed there, and neither are visits further than three weeks out — those aren't missing, they're just not due yet.
Recording what they say back
Every job on the screen has an Access box on it, and the same box is on the job itself under the people. It has five settings:
- Not asked is where every job starts.
- Asked, waiting goes on by itself when a message actually gets through, so you can see at a glance which ones you are still waiting on.
- Someone will be home when a tenant says they will be in.
- Key collect when you are picking keys up instead.
- Can't do that time when they come back and the slot does not work.
- Couldn't get in when your engineer got there and could not get in. The work still needs doing, so the job keeps its status and stays on your list.
Set it as the replies come in. It saves as you pick, so there is no Save button to hunt for on a list of twenty.
Three things worth knowing. Moving a job clears it, because whatever they agreed to was about the old time and nobody has mentioned the new one to them yet. The setting is about this visit only — if the keys always come from the agent's office, put that in the property's own Notes so the next visit already knows.
And Couldn't get in keeps the job on the Arrange access list even though the visit is in the past, however long ago it was, until you rebook it. That is deliberate: a wasted visit is the most expensive thing on this screen and it should not quietly drop off the bottom. Rebook the job and it goes back to Not asked, ready to be arranged again.
Use it rather than marking the job cancelled. Cancelled means the work is not happening, and Mucka stops chasing it.
Seeing it in the diary
Switch on Access on the diary in Settings → Work → Diary and whatever gets set here shows up on the job in your diary, so you don't have to open anything to find out who's letting you in. It reads Key collect, Someone home, Waiting, Time no good or Couldn't get in, each with its own little picture — a key, a house, an hourglass — so you can pick them out down a column.
- Day and week view on the computer: its own line on the job, under a rule below the address. A job too short for the extra line (in the day view, a one-hour job is) shows just the picture at the end of the time instead — hover over the job for the words.
- On the phone: a small tag on the diary card, next to the address.
It's off to start with, because most businesses never record access and a line that only ever says "Not asked" would just be clutter. It switches itself on the first time you record an access answer — tick Key collect on a job, send an Arrange access message, or an engineer logs a visit where they couldn't get in. If you'd rather not have it, switch it off in Settings and it stays off: Mucka never switches it back on once you've made the choice yourself.
Jobs nobody has been asked about yet show nothing at all, even with it on. That's deliberate — most jobs are sitting at Not asked most of the time, and a tag on every single one would be a tag you stop reading.
So the night before, you can run down tomorrow's list and see which ones somebody's in for and which ones you're picking keys up for, without tapping into any of them.
Setting it from the phone's diary
With the setting on, the status list on a diary card — the arrow beside the step button — has an Access section at the top. When a tenant rings back while you're looking at the diary, tap the arrow and pick Someone will be home or Key collect straight from there. It needs permission to edit jobs, the same as the Access box on the job.
The phone's diary card carries the job number as well, above the customer's name — handy if you're writing readings on a bit of paper on site and typing them up later.
After it sends
You get a line back for every message that didn't go, with the person's name and the reason — a landline, a number that's replied STOP, a tenant who's unsubscribed. Nobody is quietly left off. Jobs you've already sent for are marked Already asked, though you can send again if somebody hasn't answered.
When a tenant books work themselves
If someone recorded as a current tenant at a property rings your receptionist, or books on your online booking page, and the work is at that address, the job goes under whoever pays for the property. That is the client you marked as the main one on the property, or else whoever the last job there was billed to. The tenant isn't made a client, and the card you approve says the tenant booked it.
If Mucka can't tell who pays, because there are two clients on the property, neither is marked as the main one and there's no job history, it books it under the tenant as before. You can change the client on the job before you approve it. The same happens if they're booking at a different address, or are a client of yours in their own right.
Tenants vs clients: what's the difference?
- Clients are the people or businesses you actually work for and invoice. Owners and landlords are usually clients, so they appear in the People section as a linked Client (tap through to their full profile). To put a customer onto an address, do it when you add the property, or ask Mucka to link one that already exists.
- Property people you add here, typically tenants, are just contact details held on the property. They don't appear in Clients, can't be invoiced, and won't show up in client searches. They're there so you know who to call about access, and nothing more.
If someone you added as a tenant later becomes a paying customer, add them properly from Clients. That's the record that carries jobs, quotes and invoices.
Common gotchas
- Multiple tenants are fine. Add each one separately; there's no limit. The New Property form takes as many as you like at the point you're typing the address — hit Add another tenant — so you don't have to save the property and come back for the people.
- You can add a property without leaving what you're doing. The same form opens from a job, from any certificate, from Properties, and from a customer's own record under Properties & people → Add property. On a letting agent's record that's the quick way in: add the address, set their relationship to Agent, put the tenants in, done.
- Mucka checks the email and phone look right. If there's a typo, you'll be told when you save it rather than months later when a certificate fails to arrive. Tidy-ups like a stray space or a pasted
<name@example.com>are sorted out for you. - Messages to tenants are off until you turn them on. Out of the box, property people get nothing automatic — every text and email goes to the client on the job. You can change that for messages about the visit: see above.
- Money always goes to the client. Whatever you switch on, certificates, quotes, invoices and payment chasers go to whoever's being billed, never to a property person.
- An email address has to be on the property. Mucka will only email a tenant at an address you've recorded against that property. You can't type a different one into the box.
- Changing a client's role. For an owner or landlord that's a linked client, the pencil lets you change their role on this property or remove them from it. Their client record itself is edited from Clients.