Warranties, policies, obligations and reminders

Owndom keeps track of deadlines: when a warranty or a policy runs out, when something needs paying, servicing or renewing. The app calls warranties, policies, claims and obligations items. This page explains how they fit together.

How it fits together

• Property
• Warranties
• Policies
• Claims
• Obligations
• Reminders

• Property: a flat, a house, a holiday home, a car, or anything else you keep track of separately. Each property holds:
  • Warranties: for something you paid for, such as an item you bought, a repair or a service
    • with them go obligations: the ones you created yourself and the ones Owndom created for you
  • Policies: any insurance policy (car, home, pension, life…)
    • with them go obligations: the ones you created yourself and the ones Owndom created for you
  • Claims: always linked to one warranty (a complaint, a return…) or one policy (damage, a payout…)
    • with them go obligations: the ones you created yourself and the ones Owndom created for you
    • this is also where you keep all your communication about the claim
  • Obligations on their own, which you create yourself: a passport, ID card or driving licence running out, paying tax, servicing the boiler, clearing the gutters; anything that repeats, has a deadline or is easy to overlook

Property

Every item belongs to one property. You choose the property in the “Property” field when you add an item; if you have only one property, the field isn't shown. An obligation or a claim linked to a warranty or a policy belongs to the same property as that warranty or policy. In the free version you can have two properties and at most 10 items.

Warranty, policy and claim

Warranties, policies and claims don't have reminders of their own. The reminding is done by an obligation linked to them: one that Owndom creates when you tick a box, or one you add yourself.

You create a claim from the warranty's or the policy's screen, with the “New claim” button. With a claim you keep a “Communication log”: entry by entry, who you spoke to and when. You can link a contact to a warranty, a policy and an obligation, and attachments to any item.

When you delete a warranty or a policy, its claims are deleted too, along with all the obligations linked to them, including the ones you added yourself, and all their attachments.

Obligations Owndom creates for you, if you want

• Warranty expiry: The “Remind me 15 days before it expires” box turns on by itself as soon as you enter the expiry date. It creates the obligation “Warranty expiring: …”, which reminds you 15 days before the expiry and on the day.
• Return deadline: Turn on “Track a return deadline” and “Remind me”. It creates the obligation “Return window closes: …”, which reminds you 3 days before the deadline and on the day.
• Product registration: Turn on “Track a product registration deadline” and “Remind me”. It creates the obligation “Register product: …”, which reminds you 7 days before the deadline and on the day.
• Policy expiry: The “Remind me 15 days before the end date” box is on from the start, if the policy has an end date. It creates the obligation “Policy expiring: …”, which reminds you 15 days before the end date and on the day.
• Payments: Turn on “Create payment obligations automatically” and set the interval in “Payment every”. It creates the obligation “Payment: …”, which repeats from the policy's start date and reminds you on the day of each payment.
• Claim follow-up: Turn on “Create a follow-up obligation to check on the claim” and set the interval in “Follow up every”. It creates the obligation “Follow-up: …”, which repeats and reminds you on each follow-up day. Once you resolve the claim with “Resolve claim”, the follow-up stops reminding you.

With Premium, instead of the reminder 15 days before the expiry you can turn on “Use expiry cascade”: reminders then arrive 30, 14, 7 and 1 day before the expiry. If you don't want an automatic obligation, turn its box off.

Renewing a policy or warranty. There's no separate renew button: you enter the new expiry date on the policy or warranty. The expiry obligation moves to the new date, and its reminders move with it. If you had already marked it “Done”, it becomes active again for the new deadline, and the earlier “Done” stays on record.

Obligations you add yourself

An obligation can stand on its own, for example a passport, ID card or driving licence running out, or a boiler service. It can also belong to a warranty, a policy or a claim. In “Obligation schedule” you choose how it repeats:

• “On a specific date”: once.
• “On certain days of the week”, “On certain days of the month” or “At regular intervals”: it repeats, with no end date.

When you mark a one-off obligation “Done”, it stays on the list as done; “Undo” brings it back. In the free version a done obligation still counts toward the 10 items until you delete it.

When you mark a repeating obligation “Done”, its deadline moves to the next occurrence, and the reminders move with it. A repeating obligation only stops when you delete it.

Reminders

Every obligation has a deadline and reminders. A reminder is a notification that arrives on your device. Every obligation gets a reminder on its due date. You add more with “Add new reminder”: “Remind me on the due date”, or “Remind me” a number of days, weeks or months before. You can have as many reminders as you like, in the free version too.

Time

In “Reminder time” you choose what time a reminder arrives, one time or several. If you don't choose, it arrives at the time set in “My day starts at” (10:00 unless you change it). Reminders don't arrive outside your day: one set for earlier arrives at the start of the day, and one set for after “My day ends at” (22:00 unless you change it) arrives at the start of the next day.

Buttons in the notification

The notification has “Done” and “Snooze” buttons. “Done” marks the obligation as done, just as in the app. “Snooze” puts the reminder off for 10 minutes; with Premium you choose how long in “Snooze time”, from 10 to 480 minutes. A snoozed reminder arrives by the end of the day at the latest.

Nag reminders

A nag reminder keeps coming back until you respond to it. You turn it on in the reminder window, with “Nag me until I mark it done”. After the last reminder of the day, Owndom reminds you again until you tap “Done” or “Snooze”, up to 10 times. You choose the interval in Settings, under “Nag reminder interval”: 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour or 3 hours.

Digest reminders

When a day has seven or more reminders, you get one notification instead. With Premium you set that number in “Digest reminders”, from 2 to 30, or switch that notification off.

Missed items

• “Missed obligations”: obligations whose deadline has passed and that you haven't done. They stay there until you do them or delete them.
• “Missed notifications”: reminders you haven't answered with “Done” or “Snooze”. Just opening the notification doesn't count. In the free version they're kept for 7 days, with Premium for 30.

The bell in the app only appears when you've missed something.

Views

• “Digest”: one day at a time, with that day's obligations and reminders. In the free version yesterday, today and tomorrow; with Premium 30 days back and 30 ahead.
• “Calendar” (with Premium): the whole month at a glance, with obligations, expiries and claims.
• “Expiry timeline” (with Premium): what runs out, warranties and policies, over the period you choose.
• “Search”: finds warranties, policies, claims and obligations by name and text, within the selected property.
• “Weekly summary”: a notification on Monday morning with what's coming up that week; tapping it opens “Digest”. With Premium it's replaced by “Periodic summary”: daily, weekly, every two weeks or monthly, on the day and at the time you choose, or off.

How many items and properties the free version takes is on Plans. If reminders don't arrive, see When reminders do not arrive.