Tentative Online Bookings

Although It makes sense to have straight up confirmed bookings on days and times you'd like to be scheduled to work, I agree with this idea.

A lot of people prefer to do things online and while it is quicker to call and request an appointment perhaps it could be up to the business to decide if they'd like it to be online bookings or an online request. Perhaps with just an AM or PM time option on a chosen day so the business would have to call or message them back with the time they are available.

This is especially helpful for businesses that work by appointment only and are otherwise not at the business location or working if there are no pre-made appointments for the day.

I would like to use this software but have multiple locations, one of which requires me to confirm a room booking. I can do this quickly but don't want the client to presume the appt is definitely confirmed.It would be good for the client to know I know about their booking, but need to wait for final confirmation.

I would really like to have the ability to have it open for them to book and as soon as I get the notification that they have made a booking, it is me that sends the confirmation not that it is sent automatically.... this way if I need to change anything I can call them and change it. 

I have had it a few times where its a last minute booking and I can't do it and they are cranky as they had the confirmation notification.

Could you take the confirmation notification off and then once you receive the appointment, go in and manually send it?

Thanks for everyone's comments - please keep them coming. 

@Rosie the best solution for now would be update your Online bookings settings to not take last minute appts and to keep your calendar as up to date as possible to avoid bookings when you aren't free. I see you have a 4 hour delay built in already which is fab.

You can disable confirmations to be sent automatically under "Setup">"Client Notifications" but they would then need to be sent manually. Alternatively, you could simply update your confirmation message to cover you for any variations, eg  "Your appointment is confirmed, however, if your appt is booked with less than X hours notice, there maybe a chance it'll need to be rescheduled" but you'll need to judge if this provides your clients with a good experience or not :) 

I would like to drive more of my clients to book online, however, my biggest hesitation is that clients book appointments that end up creating unusable gaps in my schedule and occasionally book an appointment incorrectly. I believe that having the option to confirm an appointment that has been requested would help solve both of these problems. 

Thanks!

I would like this feature as well! Client bookings be "tentative" or having a possibility for in app communication for appointment changes. I'm getting tired of having to use other apps just to be able to communicate with clients and not being able to do it within the app

I too would like this option.  I work as a mobile therapist, so I need to take my travel time into account.  I try to block off slots around appointments as appropriate and keep my Fresha as up to date as possible. 

However, under the current system, if I'm driving (and so not online) I could find a client has booked an appointment at an unsuitable time for me (e.g. they live on other side of the city to a client I've got before them, without sufficient time to allow travel) by the time I pick up my phone again. 

It would only irritate the client when I have to contact them to change the appointment time, as they think the booking is final under the current system.  In comparison, if the appointment is "applied" for and needs my approval they know it is not a confirmed booking and so will be more patient if I need to make a change.

Finally, in-app communication with the clients if changes need to be made to their appointment would be fab!

I would like a tentative appointment where I would need to confirm or decline the appointment . I am not taking on new clients and only servicing my regular clients but at the moment I can’t stop new people from booking on the system.

Please add a setting so that only existing clients can book appointments. To work around this, I have to hide the online booking link to keep new people out.

As a hair salon and spa some services will vary in time based on the client. If a client that takes longer than average for a hair colour for example, books online for our standard 2hr time slot but needs more time than that it messes up our schedules. So having an option for us to accept a client booking request would be extremely helpful.

We would also love this feature. Having appointments immediately confirmed is making us very hesitant to enable online bookings. Clients cannot always book the right services for what they want, regardless of how clearly your services are set up, so there needs to be a mechanism to tweak settings and times before the appointment is confirmed, which gives clients the cleanest experience rather than having things changed after they've seen that it's all confirmed.

I am unsure about online bookings as i have been playing with the booking app and if someone wants a colour and cut it doesn't necessarily know to put the cut after the colour which means they shouldn't get a confirmation as we would need to amend this before hand. Do we get notifications when an online booking has been made so we can check it?

I agree this feature is great but we need to be able to confirm the appointment before. Especially when the client books for a haircut then in notes says colour too. Well if there's no time and I call them they get upset saying my appointment was confirmed

I have independent contractors that work for me so it would be great if they can accept or decline the appointment based on their availability.

PLEASEEEEE!!!! Make this feature available, especially since the sticky bookings option is not available yet. I have a lot of wasted time in my schedule because clients can book wherever they want making very inefficient use of my time!

Thanks for the feedback, folks. We'll keep tracking votes for this. 

In the meantime, you can add a note to the 'Important Info' box in your appointment confirmations template to cover you for any variations, e.g. "Your appointment is confirmed, however, if booked with less than X hours notice, there may be a chance it'll need to be rescheduled".