Enabling online appointment requests

The online appointment requests feature is integrated with your Availability schedule, which allows you to set specific times of the day when clients can request appointments. All appointment requests will need to be either approved or declined by you.

In this guide, we'll cover:

• Enabling online appointment requests for your practice
• Configuring your online appointment request settings
• Collecting information from new clients

Enabling online appointment requests for your practice

After setting up your Client Portal, you're ready to enable online appointment requests for your practice. To do this:

1. Navigate to Settings > Scheduling and inquiries > Client portal permissions
2. Toggle Online appointment requests on

3. After selecting your preferences, click Save changes

Important: If you granted clients access to the Client Portal before enabling online appointment requests, you'll need to update each client’s permissions individually to Allow online appointment requests. To learn more, see Inviting clients to the Client Portal.

Configuring your online appointment request settings

After enabling online appointment requests in Settings > Scheduling and inquiries > Client portal permissions, you’ll see additional options for customizing how clients can request appointments with your practice.

In the dropdown menu under Appointment start times, you can choose how available appointment times will appear for clients.

You'll have the following options:

• Based on service duration:
  • Clients will see available appointment times based on the duration of the service they select
  • If the service is 50 minutes and your availability block starts at 10:00 AM, they’ll see the following appointment times: 10:00 AM, 10:50 AM, 11:40 AM, etc
  • You can set your services to include buffer times before or after the appointment, which will affect the total duration of the service. For example, if a service’s Duration is 50 minutes with a 10-minute buffer after, clients will see available appointment times every 60 minutes. To learn more about managing your services, see Understanding services and products.

Important: A service's Duration and buffer time must be equal to or less than the availability block’s total duration in order for a time slot to appear for online appointment requests.

• On the hour:
  • Clients will see available appointment times on the hour
  • If your availability block starts at 11:30 AM, they’ll see the first available session at 12:00 PM
• On the half hour:
  • Clients will see available appointment times every half hour
  • If your availability block starts at 9:00 AM, they’ll see 9:00 AM, 9:30 AM, 10:00 AM, 10:30 AM, and so on
• On the quarter hour:
  • Clients will see available appointment times every quarter hour
  • If your availability block starts at 12:00 PM, they’ll see 12:00 PM, 12:15 PM, 12:30 PM, 12:45 PM, 1:00 PM, and so on

Next, under Requests can be made, you can choose how early and how far in advance clients can request appointments. 

If you'd like to allow clients to view potential appointments earlier than [X] hours before start time under Requests can be made, you can check Show short-notice slots and prompt clients to call the practice. 

When checked, clients will be able to view these potential appointments, but won't be able to select them. Instead, they'll be prompted to call your practice to set up the appointment.  

As you scroll down the page, you can also customize these other appointment request settings from the Client portal permissions page:

• Limiting how far in advance clients can request appointments
  • Clients will only see available appointments within the time period indicated
• Allowing new clients to request appointments online
• Allowing requests from new individual clients, couple clients, or contacts (on behalf of someone else)
• Choosing to have new clients complete a prescreener
• Asking new clients if they’re self-pay or insurance
• Requiring a credit card from new clients

Tip: Make sure to click Save changes when you’re done updating your appointment request settings.

To learn more about the Accepting new clients status, see How do I manage my Accepting new clients status?

Collecting information from new clients

By default, new clients are required to provide basic information when they request an appointment, including their:

• Name
• Date of birth
• Email address
• Phone number

You can also choose to collect additional information from new clients. To do this:

1. Navigate to Settings > Scheduling and inquiries > Client portal permissions
2. Make sure that Yes is selected under Allow requests from new clients
3. Under Information collected from new clients, choose Yes or No to Require credit card to request appointment

Note: If you haven’t set up your online payments account, you won’t be able to request a credit card when new clients are booking appointments. For more information, see Getting started with online payments.

4. Click Save changes

If this option is turned on for your practice, prospective clients will be required to enter their credit card details to hold their appointment.

Note: For more information on the prescreener, see Setting up and managing your prescreener.