Calendar view enhancement requests (reminders, delete prompts, persistent view)

[Dean_Toland]

I would love to see some kind of reminder or alert system for items that are setup to display on Calendar views. One of my bases has a table that is used to keep track of follow-up calls to potential customers. If they’re called once and we schedule a follow-up, I have a column with a date/time format and a calendar based on that field. Without alerts, users are advised to check their calendar each morning and afternoon for upcoming scheduled follow-ups, but it would be great when adding a date/time to a column that is tied to a calendar if there could also be an option for reminders or alerts. Maybe something like Outlook reminders, 15 minutes before the time and the option to snooze for 5 minutes or dismiss completely.

Additionally, I’ve noticed that the view of records in the Calendar doesn’t persist when you leave and come back in. For instance, this table has over 1200 records but only some are going to have follow-up times on them. I change the view in the top right corner from “all records” to “records with dates” but it doesn’t stay that way if I leave and return. Due to the nature of the table and its size, displaying all records will never be useful so I’d like to avoid having to change it each time.

And finally, something I just noticed and am very concerned about, is the “delete” option when viewing an item from the Calendar. I just tested it and it doesn’t just delete/clear the info in the relevant date/time field, it deletes the entire record. There’s no prompt to confirm anything, so a simple misclick could completely remove a record from the table and this is a bit scary. I would think it would be far more often needed to simply clear the date field than to delete an entire record, especially from the Calendar view, but maybe it could be solved by asking which they’d like when clicking delete? I think any kind of data removal could benefit from a bit of an extra step to be sure that removal is intended.

Thanks!

[Paul_Johnson]

I came here looking for this exact feature. I figured I was just missing how to do it. Since Katherine asked for examples above, here is what I’m looking for:

I’m a builder. I need to keep a database of all my subcontractors. Each subcontractor has insurance forms I have to make sure are up to date. I have a column for attachments (PDF files of their insurance certificates) and a date column for when their policy expires. Ideally, I would love to have an alert sent – either just a pop-up on the computer/phone/tablet or an email to my insurance manager, say two weeks or so before their policy is due to expire, so we can make sure to contact them to update their info. And even if having a reminder prior to the date set in the expiry column would be too difficult, an alert on the actual expiration date would be fine, too.

I’m not sure how difficult it would be to incorporate this sort of feature, but it would be great!

[Aaron_Rittmaste]

I tried using Zapier to create events in Google Calendar as an alternative. The problem I had is that one of the most important fields that the calendar event needs to contain is the “Client Name.” But because Client Name is a field in a separarate, linked, table, the created event won’t display the contents of the Client Name field. Instead I get the (relatively useless) unique identifier key field for that record.

[Christoff]

@Aaron_Rittmaster
There’s a way of having the “Client Name” in the primary field and it will show up in the Calendar.
Take a look at this: Using a formula in the primary field.

[Chais_Meyer]

When we click on the calendar view record entry, the delete button is just too easy to press. We need a confirmation prompt on this and all record deletions to avoid erasing records that we’re unable to easily retrieve.

Can we make this happen sooner than later?

[Jim_Hitch]

Hi @Katherine_Duh. +1 on reminders here too. It seems a no-brainer to me. I have been using SmartSheets, but in so many ways AirTable is better for me. BUT SmartSheets reminds me of things I need to know, when I need to know them.

In the example below I set a reminder 12 months from the date of a grant (we’re a grant-giving charity) so that I remember to prompt the grantee in question to send their annual update.

[Tomas_Baranek]

I really think that native (due) date notifications are pretty neccessary feature for Airtable. As I see around (myself included), people are using AT as a to-do list and checklist and kind of project-management. But what is project management without notification?

Using Zapier or other integrations is really user-unfriendly for that – you have to create a calendar + zaps. And it does not work well either.

I just imagine the simple way how it could work. 1. every base/calendar should contain some general option „receive notifications“; 1. date field definition should contain „notify me“ option; 2. whenever the time/date of the field reaches now() / today(), it would send an e-mail to an e-mail address of the users who subscribed to receiving.

Thanks in advance!
Tomáš

[Neeraj_Baghel]

Team Airtable,

You have done an awesome job on Airtable. We love it at our company. However, it just lacks reminders which are very important as part of any business project.

I hope you get that done soon.

Please do respond.

Thanks

[Neeraj_Baghel]

I could just do a workaround for this problem, not a great one but works for me.
I could create a zap which triggers for a new record in an airtable view and acts to send an email. This new record appears on a particular date, using below formula
IF(DATETIME_DIFF(TODAY(),{Reminder Date},‘days’)=0,Client,‘NO’)
The view is set to filter records which do NOT have a NO in the cell columns.

Hope this helps.
Cheers

[Jonathan_Lee]

Reminders would be make or break for Airtable in regards to usage at my company.

[Frederico_Mulle]

This feature should be a top priority for the develop team.

In my company we use a follow up collum, but we can’t receive notifications abou this dates.

This would help me a lot, because I’ve tried to make the flow with zapier, but I’ll need to open a new record each time for a single client…