Inbox
Every enquiry as a thread, grouped by what needs doing next.
Fifteen enquiries, each as a full card stacked below the last, add up to 16,821 pixels of scroll height on a desktop and 21,209 on a phone. That is why the inbox is an inbox: list on the left, thread on the right, and only the enquiry open that you are working on.
The address is /anfragen. Why the row is nevertheless called Inbox is explained under your workspace.
The layout
A 340px list on the left, the thread on the right, stacked on a phone with a way back. Two separate scroll boxes, so the list does not travel with you while you read a long thread.
Grouping follows stages, collapsible, in this order:
| Group | Who is in it |
|---|---|
| Owners | People seeking contact through your website. Not an enquirer, no property, no thread |
| Unanswered | They have written, you have not |
| Viewing offered | Times are available, nothing booked |
| Viewing booked | The appointment stands |
| In conversation | Running |
| Decided | Accepted or declined. Starts collapsed |
We sort work, not people
A landlord with fifty enquiries per flat does not have a knowledge problem, they have a throughput problem. They do not want to know who is best, they want to know who they have not answered yet.
Then there is the law: whoever takes on pre-selection and scheduling is liable for it themselves (sections 19(2) and 21(2) AGG). A list that orders people by ability to pay is a pre-selection, and it orders along an attribute that correlates with protected ones. A category with a reason can be explained; a ranking cannot.
The stage is not stored, it is computed from three fields, and the order of the checks is the statement:
- Accepted or declined means Decided, even if a viewing is still in the calendar.
- Otherwise: unanswered means Unanswered, whatever else is attached to it. That is the work that comes next.
- Otherwise the viewing decides: a booked one beats an offered one.
- Otherwise In conversation.
Within a stage the newest sits on top, because speed is the whole value here.
To the right of the thread, from 1280px, sits the profile panel with four groups: Overview, Details (with a count, such as 2 of 6), Remembered and Note. Above it, the property as a card.
What you can do here
Reply straight in the field with Send reply. Attach adds documents belonging to the property, up to five.
You set the status from the menu in the header: New, In conversation, Viewing, Accepted, Declined. Decline and Remove sit separately below.
Plus Request details (then Ask again), Add as contact, Schedule viewing (leads into the calendar with this property already set) and Save note.
Search covers the name, the property, the town and every message in the thread. Nothing is collapsed while searching: a hit you first have to unfold is not a hit.
What the agent does here
The draft is already in the field. There is no button that generates a reply. Above it sits the mark Draft by Athaus, and below it, as text rather than a tooltip, the reasoning: that is what you check it against.
Sending means accepting, including your own version. If you type, nothing is overwritten; instead it says Your text stays with Insert draft beside it. The mark's menu holds Rewrite and Discard draft.
Five kinds land here: Reply, Follow-up, News, Decline and After the viewing.
Between the messages sit quiet notes: what Athaus did on this enquiry by itself. A reply that went out without your yes carries its own bubble in the thread. It is not collapsed, because a thread is open.
Under Remembered sits what the agent picked up from the messages along the way, by kind: Wish, Open question, Objection, Other. Each entry can be Confirmed or Removed, and on request it shows its evidence.
Keyboard
J and K move to the next and previous enquiry, I shows the profile panel, R puts the cursor in the reply, Esc closes. All only while focus is inside the enquiries.
Worth knowing
You see the name and the town, not the full contact details. The enquirer gave those for the enquiry, not for onward sharing. Your reply reaches them through us.
A decline names no reason, and there is no field for one. A stated reason can become evidence in court, and then the landlord has to prove the opposite (section 22 AGG).
Qualification never asks for income figures. Before a viewing, German data protection authorities allow only general information.
There is no sorting by ability to pay, and that is not a missing feature. How a person is categorised sits on their row, as a category with its reasons. Anyone who wants to sort by it clicks it on deliberately, and then knows that they are doing it.
The 200 most recent enquiries are shown here; older ones stay in the archive. That appears as a footnote under the list, not as an empty state.