Below, you'll find detailed information about managing appointments in SimplePractice. You can learn about:
- Scheduling a new client appointment
- Creating a recurring appointment series
- Editing an appointment
- Deleting an appointment
- Creating an Other appointment
- Creating an all-day event
- Managing client information changes for future appointments
Note: To learn how to adjust your calendar view or print your schedule, see Customizing the calendar view and printing your schedule.
Scheduling a new client appointment
Here's how to add a new appointment:
- Click +Create at the top of the page, then select Create Appointment. Alternatively, you can click directly on the calendar to open the New Appointment window.
- From the New Appointment window, select an existing client or click + New Client to create a new client.
- Set the date, time, and duration for the appointment.
- You also have the option to make an appointment last All-day by checking that box. Keep in mind that if you select this option, you won't be available for Online Booking for the entire day.
- If you create an All-day appointment, you'll see the block for the event at the top of your calendar page.
- You also have the option to make an appointment last All-day by checking that box. Keep in mind that if you select this option, you won't be available for Online Booking for the entire day.
- Select a Clinician from the dropdown if you have multiple clinicians in your practice. Your appointment will default to the primary clinician assigned to this client.
- Select a Location if you have multiple locations in your practice.
- If this is a Telehealth appointment, select the Telehealth: Video Office location.
- If you want to create a recurring appointment series, check Repeats.
- Service code and rate. Use the dropdown to change the code and/or enter a new amount in the field to the right to update the rate.
- Click Done to save the appointment.
Note: The clinician assigned to this appointment will also receive payment for this appointment.
Creating a recurring appointment series
You can create a recurring appointment series that repeats every week, every 2 weeks (bi-weekly), every 3 weeks, and so on. Here's how:
- Create a new appointment
- Check Repeats
- Select how frequently the appointment repeats, the day(s) of the week it occurs, and when the recurring series will end
- Appointments can end after a certain number of appointments take place, or after a certain date
- Click Done when you're finished to save
Editing an appointment
- From the Calendar page, click the appointment to view the details
- Edit any of the appointment information and click Done
If the appointment is part of a recurring series, you will be asked if your changes should be applied to just the one appointment you're editing or to all appointments in the series.
Note: If an appointment already has an invoice attached to it and you edit the appointment fee, your client's balance will be updated to reflect that. You can either generate a new invoice manually for this appointment, or a fee adjustment invoice will automatically be created if you have automatic invoicing turned on.
If the appointment is locked, you will not be able to edit the appointment details. An appointment is considered locked if there's an invoice, superbill, progress note, and/or psychotherapy note attached to the invoice. If this is the case, you can delete the document, edit the appointment, and then recreate the document.
Deleting an appointment
To delete an appointment, select the appointment and click the trash icon.
If an appointment is locked, you'll have to first delete any attached document before deleting the appointment. An appointment is considered locked if there's a progress note, psychotherapy note, invoice, and/or superbill attached.
Note: There isn't a way to delete multiple appointments at once for different clients. Each appointment will need to be canceled individually from the calendar flyout window. A best practice we've seen clinicians use is sending a Secure Message to communicate these appointment cancelations with your clients.
Creating an Other appointment
Creating an Other appointment is a great way to block off time on your calendar that's not associated with a specific client or related to billing, such as a meeting with a colleague or a dentist appointment.
Other appointments will display as a gray calendar event to clearly differentiate from your client appointments. These appointments will also block that time slot from being available to book if you have Online Booking enabled.
To create an Other appointment on your calendar, follow these steps:
- Go to your Calendar homepage and click +Create > Create Appointment
- Select the Other appointment type
- Customize the title, date, time, duration, and location of the appointment as necessary
- Click Done to save the appointment
Setting up Recurring Other appointments
You can either set a specific end date or indicate the number of times the appointment will repeat. You can create a repeating Other appointment by following these steps:
- Click the Other appointment on your Calendar homepage
- Check the box next to Repeats
- Customize how frequently the appointment repeats, the day(s) of the week it occurs, and when the recurring series will end
- Click Done to save the appointment
Creating an all-day event
If you're planning on being out of the office for an entire day or multiple days, you can create an all-day 'other' appointment.
To create this event, click anywhere in the calendar or click + Create > Create Appointment. Then select the Other appointment type and check the All-day box. Enter the details of the event, including the title, dates, clinician, and location. You can also set it to repeat if you'd like.
After you save this event by clicking Done, it'll appear at the top of your calendar in a gray bar.
Note: An all-day event will make you unavailable for Online Booking for the entire duration of the event.
Managing client information changes for future appointments
If a client's billing or insurance information changes, updating the information in the client's Billing and Insurance tab will not automatically update the client's future appointments. To have the updated information reflected for future appointments, delete all existing appointments including all recurring appointments and recreate them on the calendar.
Note: See Appointment level billing changes to learn how to make billing-related changes to a past client appointment.