Rentalbuddy

Connect and manage your smart locks

14 min read

Every physical unit you rent out is a lock in RentalBuddy, and the lock is what makes a product bookable. This is the full lifecycle: pairing, syncing, assigning, deactivating, moving, deleting.

If a customer is standing at a lock without a code right now, go to Customers aren't getting a PIN code (or the code doesn't open the lock) instead — this article is for setting locks up, not for emergencies.

Which locks work with RentalBuddy

Four kinds, matching the station types below: Igloohome smart locks, Gokaya 8E cabinet stations, Allockate units, and manual code locks (any ordinary combination lock — see The master PIN below for how those are handled). The station dialog puts it simply: "If you are not planning to use Igloohome or Gokaya locks, select the manual locker type."

For Igloohome, RentalBuddy does not keep its own list of supported models — it works with whatever locks Igloohome makes available to your account through their Igloo Connect program. Igloohome decides which models take part; support has, for example, told operators that the Padlock Lite does not. Check the Igloo Connect supported-locks list or ask Igloohome before buying hardware. Other smart-lock brands (TTLock, SALTO, Nuki and so on) are not integrated.

How locks, products and stock relate

The mental model that explains most lock questions:

  • A lock carries exactly one product, but a product can sit on many locks — one per physical unit that can be rented at the same time. The product's stock is consumed lock by lock: assigning a product to three locks uses three units of its stock.
  • Each booked unit gets its own lock and its own code. A booking for two kayaks reserves two locks and the customer receives two codes.
  • Storage / access points are extra doors, not rental units. Every booking at the location also receives the codes for its active storage and access-point locks, on top of the rental lock's code — that is how a customer gets into a shared container or gate and then to their unit.
  • Several lock rows may point at the same physical lock. If many small items live behind one door, create one lock row per rentable item and give them all the same Bluetooth id — the Copy action on Igloo locks does exactly this. Each row still counts against your plan's lock limit and uses one unit of the product's stock — by design, because each row is one item that can be rented out at the same time.
  • A single booking can therefore open several different locks; there is no one-code-per-booking restriction.

Where locks live

  1. Open Stations in the menu.
  2. Click a station row (or its gear icon, View and edit details).

Every lock belongs to exactly one station, and every station belongs to exactly one location. The station page is a plain list with a sticky Go back and Save bar at the top — there are no tabs.

Which tables you see depends on the station's Locker type:

Station type You get
IGLOO PADLOCK Igloo locks and Storage / access points
MANUAL LOCKER Manual locks and Storage / access points
ALLOCKATE Allockate units, grouped per device
GOKAYA 8E a single Locks table

Most edits on this page are not saved as you make them. Toggling a lock on or off and changing a product only changes the screen. The Save button at the top turns orange while you have unsaved changes — press it before you leave. Adding, copying and deleting a lock, by contrast, take effect immediately.

Add a lock

Above the tables you have Add lock and Add Storage/access point. Both open a dialog titled Create lock (Update lock when you are editing an existing one).

The fields depend on the station type.

On an Igloo station (Add lock):

  1. Locker number — required. This is the number you put on the physical sticker, and the one you read out to customers.
  2. Bluetooth id — required. See below.
  3. Product — optional here; you can assign it later from the table.
  4. Locker type — the options show the raw system values; leave it as IGLOO_PADLOCK unless this unit is a storage box (STORAGE_IGLOO_LOCK).
  5. Press Save. You get Locks has been saved.

There is no Master PIN field on an Igloo lock — see The master PIN below.

On a manual station (Add lock): only Locker number and Master PIN are required, plus an optional Product. There is no Bluetooth field — a manual lock has no radio to talk to.

Storage / access points (Add Storage/access point) additionally ask for a Name per language. English is mandatory — you get "English name is required." — and other languages show "Adding a translation for this language is recommended." Storage locks carry no product.

GOKAYA 8E stations have no add button; those locks come from the hardware.

Adding several identical units? Igloo padlocks have a Copy action: it creates a second lock with the same settings, no product, and Copy appended to the locker number.

The Bluetooth id field

Bluetooth id is the lock's identifier from Igloohome, and it is the single most error-prone field in the whole product.

  • Copy and paste it from your Igloohome app. Do not type it.
  • A stray leading or trailing space is enough to break code generation with no visible error.
  • Without it, the per-lock sync refuses to run: Bluetooth ID is required to sync from Igloo.

If a lock behaves as though it does not exist — no codes, sync failing — re-paste this field before anything else.

The master PIN

Master PINs work completely differently on the two lock kinds:

  • Igloo locks: the master PIN is not in RentalBuddy at all. The station page tells you where it lives: "Master PINs are managed in the Igloohome app, not in Rentalbuddy. You can find them for each lock under Home → select lock → Access → Master PIN Code." There is no Master PIN field or column in any Igloo lock view.
  • Manual locks: the Master PIN field is the customer's code. A manual lock has no electronics, so every booking on it receives the same code — the one you typed into Master PIN. In the table it is masked; the eye button beside it is Show Master PIN / Hide Master PIN.

For manual locks, treat the field as semi-public: every past customer has seen it. To change it, set the new code on the physical lock and update the field at the same time — the code page reads this field live, so even customers mid-rental see the new code the moment you save. Past customers still remember the old code from their own rental, which is why a natural break such as season start is the right moment to change it.

Pair locks from Igloohome and connect them to a station

New Igloohome locks do not appear by themselves. The panel for this sits at the bottom of the Stations list page, not on a station.

  1. Pair the lock in the Igloohome app first, and give it its sticker number.
  2. Go to Stations and scroll to the Igloohome panel. If you have not linked your accounts yet, use Connect with igloohome app; once linked it shows Connected.
  3. Press Fetch latest info from igloo home. Your locks are pulled in from Igloohome.
  4. Untick Show connected locks to see only the ones not yet on a station.
  5. For each new lock, pick a station in the Use on station column and press Connect to station. It then reads Connected with station.
  6. Open that station and finish the lock: product and active state.

If the sync brings nothing back, watch for Payment method required — "Payment method required. Please add a valid payment method in the Igloo Connect portal to sync your locks." Use Open Igloo Connect portal and settle it there; syncing stays blocked until you do.

What the lock's light is telling you

Three hardware behaviours worth knowing, according to the lock vendor's support — they come from the vendor, not from RentalBuddy, so double-check with them if in doubt:

  • A red light blinking 1-2-3 on the charger is normal. That pattern is charging behaviour, not a fault.
  • A lock that looks completely dead may just be hibernating. A padlock that has sat unpaired and off the charger goes into a deep power-saving sleep. Put it on the charger and keep it there while you pair it, rather than concluding it is broken.
  • A constant blue light on older padlocks is a hardware fault. It cannot be fixed in the field and is handled as a warranty replacement — contact support about a warranty claim instead of troubleshooting further.

Fetch the latest info for one lock

You do not have to re-sync everything to fix one lock. On the station page, the row actions of each Igloo lock have Sync this lock from Igloo.

  • Success: Lock synced from Igloo.
  • Bluetooth ID is required to sync from Igloo — the Bluetooth id field is empty.
  • Could not sync lock from Igloo — the lock is not reachable in Igloohome; check the account-wide sync and your payment method there.

After a sync you can inspect what came back: open the lock for editing and expand Igloo sync metadata. It shows Last synced, Device list (Igloo API) and Device detail (Igloo API), or "No Igloo metadata stored yet." if the lock has never synced. It is read-only, but it settles the question of whether a lock is really talking to Igloohome.

Assign a product to a lock

The Product column is a dropdown on each lock row.

  1. Open the station.
  2. In the Product column of the lock, pick the product.
  3. Press Save at the top of the page. You get Lock has been saved.

Things worth knowing:

  • An unassigned lock shows No product assigned and is highlighted. It can never be booked.
  • Each option shows the product name with the number still available in brackets, for example Kayak (3). That number is the product's stock minus the locks already carrying it.
  • A product at zero is greyed out and cannot be selected. This is the answer to "why can I see the product in the list but not pick it?" — every unit of it is already on another lock. Raise the product's stock, or free up a lock.
  • None at the bottom clears the assignment. Picking the product that is already selected also clears it.
  • Storage locks and access points have no Product column at all. They are doors, not rental units.

If nothing at a station is assigned you get the banner "Warning: No product is assigned to any lock at this station." with "Customers cannot book these locks until each has a product. Add unmanned products for this location if needed, then assign them in the table below."

Take a broken unit out of service

This is the one operators most often say they looked for and could not find. It is the Active status column on the lock's own row.

  1. Open Stations, then the station.
  2. Find the lock and switch Active status off.
  3. Press Save.

The help icon on that column states the effect exactly: "When a lock is active, customers can book the product on that lock. When it is inactive, that product is hidden and cannot be booked." An inactive row also gets a warning icon: "This lock is inactive. The connected product will not be bookable."

Storage locks behave differently, and the page says so: "Storage locks work a little differently from your other locks. When this one is on, customers see it during booking when products and PIN codes are shown. When it is off, customers will not see it during those steps."

Deactivating is the right tool for a damaged kayak, a flat battery or a lock away for repair. It leaves the lock, its number, its QR code and its history intact, and you switch it back on when the unit returns.

Switching a lock off does not move or cancel the bookings already sold on it — it only takes the unit out of the booking flow from now on. Deal with those bookings yourself: move them to another lock or cancel them. See Edit, move or cancel a booking.

If you switch off every lock at a station you get "Warning: All locks at this station are inactive." and "Customers will not see any products in the booking widget." The Activate all locks button in that banner puts them all back.

Move a lock to another station

There is no station field inside the lock dialog — a lock always belongs to the station you opened it from. Reassignment happens in one place only:

  1. Go to the Stations list page.
  2. Scroll to the Igloohome panel and tick Show connected locks so already-connected locks appear.
  3. Find the lock, pick the new station in Use on station, and press Connect to station.

Two limits to be aware of:

  • Only stations of type IGLOO PADLOCK are offered, so this path works for Igloo locks. Manual, storage, Allockate and GOKAYA 8E locks have no move action in the admin — to relocate one of those, delete it and create it on the new station, which means its QR code changes.
  • If your plan is full, the dropdown is disabled and reads Locks limit reached.

Does the QR code change when you move a lock? No — the lock's QR link is tied to the lock itself and to its location, not to the station. Moving a lock between two stations at the same location keeps the printed QR code valid. Moving it to a station at a different location changes the link, and any sticker already out in the field becomes wrong.

Delete a lock

  1. Open the station.
  2. Use the delete (bin) action in the lock's row.
  3. The dialog reads Delete lock — "Are you sure to delete this lock?"
  4. Confirm with Delete lock. You get Lock has been deleted.

This is the most dangerous button on the page, and nothing stops you pressing it. Unlike deleting a station or a location, deleting a lock does not check for bookings and gives you no warning. Every existing booking pointing at that lock loses the lock it was sold against — those customers stop getting codes, and there is no undo.

Only delete a lock when it is genuinely gone for good and has no bookings. For anything temporary — damage, repair, winter storage — switch Active status off instead. If you have already deleted a lock that had bookings on it, contact support with the booking numbers rather than trying to rebuild it.

Deleting a station is safer: that dialog does check, and warns "This station has active or future bookings tied to its locks.", blocking non-admin users entirely with "You cannot delete this station while it has active or future bookings."

QR codes for your locks

Each lock row has a QR Code column with three icon buttons:

  • Show QR code — opens the code full size on screen.
  • Copy booking link — copies the link to your clipboard.
  • Download QR code (PNG) — saves a large PNG, named after your location and the locker number.

There is no print button. To put codes on your units, download the PNGs and print them from your own image or document software — that also lets you size them for the sticker you are using.

Storage locks and access points have no QR column.

The QR code points at that specific lock at that specific location, so a customer who scans it lands on the booking flow for that unit. Because the link is stable, a sticker stays valid as long as the lock exists at that location.

Changing how the QR codes look

Open a QR code and press Edit style. Note the notice at the top: "These settings apply to all QR codes for this location (booking and locks)." — this is a location-wide style, not a per-lock one.

You can set Contrast (Auto or Manual), QR color and Background color, and switch on Include account logo. If the colours you pick are too close you get "These colors have low contrast. The QR code may be hard to scan." — take that seriously; a QR code that will not scan in bright sun is worse than a plain black one. Press Save; the confirmation is Location updated! because the style is stored on the location.

When you run out of locks

Your subscription includes a maximum number of locks. When you reach it, the add and copy buttons are disabled and you see "You have reached the maximum number of locks for your subscription plan. Please upgrade your plan to add more locks.", with upgrade your plan linking to your billing settings.

The Igloohome panel is more precise about the arithmetic:

  • "{{assigned}}/{{limit}} locks in use on your account (plan limit)."
  • "You can only connect X of the Y unconnected locks below."
  • "Locks limit reached: you cannot connect any more locks to stations."

Only locks that are connected to a station count against the limit. Locks that Igloohome knows about but that you have not connected yet are free — so if you are close to the limit, disconnect or delete the units you are not actually renting out before upgrading.

A working order for a brand-new lock

  1. Pair it in the Igloohome app and give it a home there.
  2. Number it and put the sticker on the physical unit.
  3. Charge it.
  4. In RentalBuddy, go to Stations and press Fetch latest info from igloo home.
  5. Set Use on station and press Connect to station.
  6. Open the station, check Locker number and Bluetooth id.
  7. Assign the Product.
  8. Make sure Active status is on, and press Save.
  9. Download its QR code and put it where the customer will look.

Then check the location itself: Staff presence must be Unmanned, or no PIN codes are generated for any booking there.