Your waitlist now hears about more than cancellations

A gap in your day can come from more than a cancellation. A client moves their booking to Thursday. Someone books online and never pays the deposit. A client rings to say they cannot make it this afternoon, and you mark a no-show. Until now, only a cancellation sent offers to your waitlist by itself. Now all of these do.

Four ways a freed time reaches your list

Bookatu offers the time to your waitlist when:

• A booking is cancelled, by you, your team or the client.
• A booking is moved, by you or by the client online. Moving it to another team member at the same time counts too.
• An online booking's deposit is never paid. Once a day, Bookatu releases these unpaid holds.
• You tap Mark no-show before the appointment starts.

For each opening, Bookatu looks for waiting clients who asked for that service, or for any service. If they gave dates, the day has to fall inside them. It ranks them by what they have spent with you, longest waiting first when two are level. Up to five of them are sent the opening by email, with a one-tap claim link. Clients who have agreed to texts get it by text too, when texting is set up and your plan includes it. The link works for up to six hours, and the first to claim the time gets it.

Only openings a client can really book

Before anything goes out, Bookatu checks the freed time the way your booking page would. It has to be still ahead, inside your opening hours and fully free. It also has to fit your Minimum notice and Book up to settings, under Settings, Booking rules. A booking nudged fifteen minutes later still covers part of its old time, so nobody is told.

So an opening inside your Minimum notice is not offered, since nobody could book it on your page either. Automatic offers also cover one-to-one services only, not seats in a group class.

More than one chance for each client

A client who does not take an opening now stays on the list for the next one. So does a client who tapped a moment after someone else claimed it. Each client gets at most 3 automatic offers, and never the same opening twice.

On the Waitlist page, their card shows a badge such as Offered 1 of 3 and when the last opening was sent. After the third, it says automatic offers used up. You can still tap Offer a slot to message them yourself, and those messages do not count towards the 3.

Automatic offer emails and texts now give the time as well as the date, with your time zone.

A list that tidies itself

A client stays on the list until they book or their last date passes. After that date they leave the Waitlist page and get no more offers.

Bookatu also matches each waiting client to your client list, by email and then by phone number. So regulars who join from your public form now show their lifetime badge, and what they have spent counts when an opening is offered.

Once a matched client has a confirmed booking for the service they asked for, inside their dates, they come off the list as booked. Any booking counts if they asked for any service, and it does not matter who made it. A booking still waiting on its deposit does not count until it is paid. Mark booked and Remove work as before.

Repeat bookings that check your diary

A standing series books several visits at once, so a clash is easy to miss. You set one up from the See you again? card on a booking, or by ticking Repeat this appointment on the New booking page. Both now check each repeat visit against your opening hours and breaks, closed days, the team member's days off, blocked-out time, other bookings and the gap you keep between them, and free rooms.

Then you choose what a clash means, under If a visit clashes on the card or If a repeat clashes on the form:

• Book it anyway and flag it. This is the default, since you are choosing these times on purpose. The visit shows Booked, clashes, with the reason. The one exception is a visit that starts at the very same time as another booking with the same team member. That date is skipped.
• Skip it. The date is left out, and the list says why.

Reasons are plain, such as Closed that day or No free room then. The summary also asks you to check any flagged visits on the calendar.

Change a whole series in one go

Each visit the series booked has a Part of a standing series card. It now offers:

• End the series after this appointment. Later visits are cancelled and the series ends.
• Cancel all remaining appointments. Every visit still to come is cancelled, even when you start from a past booking.
• Change the time of upcoming appointments. Pick a New time and either This appointment and the later ones or Every upcoming appointment. Dates stay the same, and the client is told each new time.

For a move, the clash choice reads Move it anyway and flag it or Leave it where it is. Ending or cancelling asks you to confirm first. Every freed time goes to your waitlist under the same rules as any other opening.

The wording follows your business type, so you may see session, class or reservation instead of appointment. Only roles with Edit the calendar turned on, under Team, Role permissions, see these buttons.

A gap in the diary is only lost if nobody hears about it.

What to do now

There is nothing new to switch on. Some clients who were sent an offer before this change may reappear on your Waitlist page. They can be offered openings again, because an offer no longer takes anyone off. Tap Remove for anyone who no longer needs a place.