Zapier to Pipedream Migration

Challenge

Marq was standardizing automation tooling on Pipedream, and a Director of AI & Automation needed his Zapier "call me 1 minute before meeting" workflow migrated over. A previous Pipedream attempt had been built but was silently failing, not triggering calls at all, and no one knew why.

Approach

• Documented the full Zapier workflow logic before touching anything (trigger, Python filter, conditions, Twilio call)
• Systematically investigated the Pipedream failure rather than rebuilding from scratch
• Identified two distinct root causes and fixed them independently
• Reviewed security posture and moved hardcoded credentials to environment variables
• Coordinated with the account owner on Bird API dashboard access (required mobile verification)

Root Causes Found

Issue 1: OOO filter killing all events. The out-of-office filter step was checking a string that came back empty or null when no OOO events existed. Because the null check wasn't handled, every single calendar event failed the filter and no calls were ever triggered.

Issue 2: Blocklist logic mismatch. Zapier was silently filtering personal calendar blocks (Deep Work, Busy, Lunch) via an attendees check, not title matching as assumed. The Pipedream version was using title matching, which was less robust and missed some cases. Updated to match Zapier's attendees-based approach, and added a missing "The Marqade" block that existed in Zapier but not Pipedream.

Deliverables

• Full documentation of the original Zapier workflow
• Root cause analysis for both Pipedream failures
• Fixed Pipedream workflow with correct OOO handling and blocklist logic
• Credentials migrated from hardcoded values to Pipedream environment variables
• Parallel running setup (Zapier + Pipedream) for stability monitoring

Results

• Workflow deployed and running live in production
• Both Zapier and Pipedream running in parallel for reliability while monitoring for edge cases
• More robust blocklist logic than the original, future-proof against new calendar block types
• Improved security posture with credentials stored as environment variables

Tools Used

Pipedream, Zapier, Google Calendar API, Bird API (voice calls via TTS), Twilio