To help you set booking rules for your appointments, there are three important options that determine how early and how late customers can book an appointment, as well as what lead time is required.

Lead times for appointment bookings can be set for the entire organization or individually in the settings of each appointment template.

Imagine running a wellness center. With these settings, you can allow customers to book appointments from 3 days up to 30 days in advance, and set a lead time of 2 hours to ensure there is enough preparation time for each appointment.

Adjust these settings to suit your business needs to make appointment management smooth and effective for you and your customers.

Effect of Settings

Earliest appointment date

This setting defines the earliest date customers can book an appointment. For example, if you set the value to "3", it means that customers can only book appointments starting three days from today.

Example: Today is Tuesday. The earliest available booking is on Friday.

This ensures that you have enough time to prepare for upcoming appointments, without allowing last-minute bookings.

• If the value is set to "0": Appointments can be booked on the same day.
• If the value is set to "1": Appointments can only be booked starting tomorrow.
• If the value is set to "2": Appointments can only be booked starting the day after tomorrow.

Latest appointment date

This setting determines how far in advance a customer can book an appointment. For example, if you set the value to "30", customers can only book up to 30 days in advance. This helps you manage your calendar and prevents appointments from being scheduled too far ahead, saving resources.

Example: Today is January 2, 2024. The latest bookable appointment is on February 1, 2024.

- If the value is set to "7": Appointments can be booked up to one week in advance.
- If the value is set to "14": Appointments can be booked up to two weeks in advance.
- If the value is set to "60": Appointments can be booked for the next two months.

Booking lead time

This setting specifies how many minutes or hours in advance a booking must be made. For example, if the value is set to "120", customers can only book appointments that begin at least two hours in advance. This lead time ensures that you won’t be caught off guard by sudden bookings and have enough time to prepare.

Example: Today is Tuesday 2:05 PM. The earliest bookable appointment is Tuesday 4:05 PM.

- If the value is set to "330": The earliest bookable appointment is in 5 hours and 30 minutes.
- If the value is set to "600": The earliest bookable appointment is in 10 hours.
- If the value is set to "920": The earliest bookable appointment is in 15 hours and 20 minutes.

The settings "Earliest Appointment" and "Lead Time for Appointment Booking" can be combined.

In this case, the value from the "Earliest Appointment" setting is always the next day, counted from the current day. The value from the "Lead Time for Appointment Booking" setting is added afterwards.

Example 1: Today is Tuesday 2:00 PM.

- "Earliest Appointment" is set to "1".
- "Lead Time for Appointment Booking" is set to "120".

The earliest possible appointment is Wednesday 2:00 AM.

Example 2: Today is Tuesday 2:00 PM.

- "Earliest Appointment" is set to "1".
- "Lead Time for Appointment Booking" is set to "480".

The earliest possible appointment is Wednesday 8:00 AM.

Example 3: Today is Tuesday 2:00 PM.

- "Earliest Appointment" is set to "2".
- "Lead Time for Appointment Booking" is set to "540".

The earliest possible appointment is Thursday 9:00 AM.