[Arubis]

Several years ago, facing the problem that Reclaim.ai started off solving (cross-calendar sync), I started exploring Google's Calendar API and MS's O365 API for the same. Pretty quickly figured out this wasn't side project-sized and dropped it, so I've been happy to give Reclaim my money in the years past!

[dewski]

A few weeks ago I got the chance to check out the Google Calendar API for the first time and was very impressed how thorough it is.

- Very easy to retrieve incremental changes to events on a calendar

- Webhooks to be notified when calendars are created, updated, or removed

- Webhooks to be notified when events are added, updated, or removed on a calendar

- Bulk requests

- Select only the fields you need from the event

- Querying events in a calendar with custom properties (I use this so I don’t need to store anything on my side)

Funnily enough to build a sync between my personal calendar and work calendar, and for my wife and I to have a combined calendar for our own personal commitments. I also feed in a few calendars I subscribe to for sporting events to our shared calendar. $100 a year was a bit much for a feature that should be in Google Calendar already. I named it Don’t Double Book Me, felt appropriate.

I only started exploring the Google Calendar API recently after realizing that Reclaim’s policy allows Enterprise customers to take over other individual paying accounts associated with the Enterprise, effectively making it not really my Reclaim account anymore. Didn’t help I wasn’t notified of this either.

[Lightbody]

Firstly, I want to offer my sincere apologies for how we mishandled this. You are absolutely right: we should have done a better job communicating how this change was rolling out.

For background (and for anyone else reading): what is being referenced here is that Reclaim is, by definition, a product that can straddle two or more Google or Microsoft accounts. It can do things like block out your work calendar when your personal calendar gets busy.

The issue is: some companies have come to us and told us they will no longer approve of Reclaim's access to their calendars unless we enforce certain restrictions, such as only allowing authentication to an account that contains their calendar data (ex: Reclaim!) via their SSO provider, and no other authentication is allowed.

It isn't quite accurate that they have "taken over" your account. In fact: if you disconnect their corporate Google/Microsoft account from your Reclaim account, you are free to use it how you want. For example, their regular calendar sharing allows you to connect to your work account via your personal Google calendar, you could do that and not avoid any disruption in service. But most companies don't permit more than "free/busy" level of sharing, which isn't quite enough for this workaround.

If you need help disconnecting your company's account from your Reclaim account, we can walk you through how to do that.

We are exploring more sophisticated (but much more expensive) solutions, such as allowing you to authenticate with your non-company credential but not show you any information that is associated with your company calendar (ex: data masked). But it's unclear if your employer (and similar) would accept this. It's also still a degraded experience for the end-user, so it's tough to say if this is ultimately better or worse than the current situation.

That all said: I am sorry we didn't roll out this change to you. I hope you will give us the benefit of the doubt and consider working with us on ways to meet your employer's requirements as well as yours. You are welcome to email me directly at [e-mail] if you'd like to discuss this further.

[mlloyd]

Seriously! I've tried a few times off and on and it just isn't something to tackle without having a ton of time and effort and stamina and stubbornness. And then still likely failing.