Understanding the Stale Task Detector agent

The Stale Task Detector agent helps you identify and clean up automated tasks that are frequently created but rarely completed, reducing clutter in your team's workflow.

It is a read-only agent, meaning it only provides recommendations and doesn't close, edit, or reassign a task on its own.

Limitations

• The report identifies tasks by their title only. It doesn't name or link to the automation, template, or setup that created them.
• The agent doesn't name or link to individual properties. Properties appear only as a count. For example, "across 4 properties".
• Two types of tasks are excluded from the scan:
  • Tasks within an open flexible time frame.
  • Tasks tied to an upcoming reservation.
• The scan covers open tasks up to a page limit. If the scan reaches the limit, the report states that the ranking is based on a sample of the board. If the report doesn't mention this, the scan is complete.

Understand the Stale Task Detector agent

The agent runs automatically once a week, every Monday at 08:00. You can also trigger it manually at any time.

During each run, the agent:

1. Scans all open tasks across your properties.
2. Groups tasks by title, excluding any within an open flexible time frame or tied to an upcoming reservation.
3. Ranks the task titles by the number of unfinished tasks under each one. If two titles tie, the one with the most overdue tasks ranks higher.
4. Delivers a report of the flagged task titles. Each title includes a link to one representative task, taken from the property where it has been open the longest.

Run the Stale Task Detector manually

In addition to the scheduled run, you can trigger the agent manually at any time from the Agents hub.

Step by step:

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the side navigation menu, select Agents hub.
3. At the top, select the Operations tab.
4. Click the Stale Task Detector tile.
5. Under "When it runs", click Run now.

Review the activity feed

Follow the steps below to review your activity feed.

Step by step:

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the side navigation menu, select Agents hub.
3. In the left submenu, click Agent activity.
4. Click the relevant row with the agent's name to review the report details in the right-side panel. 

Understand the report status and details

Each run ends in one of four outcomes:

• "Findings": One or more task titles are flagged. The summary shows how many titles are flagged and highlights the worst offender. The detailed view lists up to 25 flagged titles. For each one, you see:

  • The task title. For example, "Monthly inspection".
  • The number of unfinished tasks under that title.
  • The number of affected properties as a count.
  • The number of days past due for the oldest task.

  This outcome is marked "Needs attention" if one title accounts for 40% or more of all flagged unfinished tasks, or a flagged task is more than 30 days past due. Otherwise, it is marked "Done".

• "Reviewed, nothing qualified": The agent checked the tasks, but none met the threshold to be flagged.
• "No open tasks at all": There are no open tasks on the board this run, so there is nothing to review.
• "Task list could not be read": The run can't access the task list. This usually means task permissions are missing or revoked.

Only the "Findings" and "Task list could not be read" outcomes can be marked "Needs attention".

Review and act on flagged tasks

There is only one recommended action: review the flagged titles. The agent never closes, reassigns, reschedules, retires, or deletes anything on your behalf.

Step by step:

1. Identify a task title that is generating a high number of unfinished tasks.
2. Click the link in the report to open the representative task. To find what's creating these tasks, review your automated task rules.
3. Once you've found the source, edit or deactivate the automation to stop it from creating unnecessary tasks in the future.