How can I avoid double-booked appointments?

Only free times are offered, and a request holds its time from the moment it is sent.

Running your business

Overlapping appointments are one of the most common headaches when a schedule is kept by hand. 4appointments reduces them by offering clients only free times and by holding a time as soon as a request arrives.

The public booking page works out free times from each provider’s weekly schedule, exceptions and blocks, and from the bookings that already exist. A time that is taken by the same provider is not offered, although different providers can of course be booked at the same time. A request holds its time even while it is pending, so a second client cannot take the same slot while you are still deciding. If two people try at the same moment, only one succeeds and the other sees a message that the slot was just taken.

In the service settings you can set a pause, labelled “Interval (min)”, which is added after bookings, for example for cleaning or preparation. It is taken from the service being booked and applies to the public page, not to bookings entered by your team.

When your team creates a booking in the panel, the system checks the provider’s availability and any overlaps, and also the busy blocks imported from external calendars. Those blocks come from calendar links in ICS format that you subscribe to, refreshed about every 15 minutes. There is no two-way synchronisation with Google Calendar or Outlook.

To take yourself off the calendar, add a block or an exception under “Availability”. A pending request that nobody confirms or rejects is cancelled automatically about an hour after the end of the requested time, which frees the slot again, so it pays to check your pending list regularly.

Quick takeaways

  • ✓Only free times are shown to clients on the public page
  • ✓A pending request holds its time until it is confirmed, rejected or expires
  • ✓Busy blocks can be imported from an external calendar by ICS link

Common questions

What if two clients try to book at the very same moment?+

Only one request gets the slot. The other client sees a message that the slot was just taken and can choose another time.

Can I block off a time slot myself?+

Yes. Under “Availability” you can mark a provider as blocked for a period, for example a break, a holiday or an internal meeting, and it will no longer be offered to clients. Group sessions with a capacity are not supported: each booking takes one slot with one provider.

More guides

Finding clashes in the schedule you have now?

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