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Every feature explained in plain language. What it is, why it helps, and how to use it, written by the team who built Bookatu.

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Everything, explained.

Getting started

Your booking page

The public page where clients book you, in seconds.

Why my booking page is not live yet

Publishing needs a confirmed email, and Stripe only when your page takes money online. Here is how to see what is in the way and clear it.

Connecting Stripe for payments

Connect your own Stripe account to take card payments online.

Adding your team

Give staff their own logins and bookable calendars.

Setting your opening hours

Your hours drive both the calendar and what clients can book.

Special dates and public holiday closures

Open on a day you are usually closed, close on a day you are usually open, set holiday hours, or close on every public holiday at once.

Setting up your services

Add what you offer, with a price, duration and category.

Importing your clients

Bring your existing client list with you from another tool.

Using Bookatu on your phone

Run your business, and let clients book, from a phone.

Ask the assistant

Ask about your business in plain words, and let it set changes up for you to confirm.

Installing Bookatu as an app

Add Bookatu to your home screen, with no app store.

Choosing your business type and industry wording

Pick your industry and Bookatu rewords the whole experience to match.

Your business profile, website and social links

Describe your business and link out to your website, Instagram, TikTok and more.

Your first-run setup checklist

A few honest steps from sign-up to a live, bookable storefront.

Finding your way around the admin

A quick tour of the admin navigation and where settings live.

Bookings

Set up automated reminders

Turn on confirmations and reminders to stop forgotten visits.

Fill cancellations automatically with the waitlist

Cancelled slots auto-offer to your next best client.

The calendar

Your whole day at a glance. Drag to reschedule.

Who booked it, booking history and the bookings CSV

See who made each booking or appointment and everything that happened to it, and download your bookings as a spreadsheet.

Deposits

Take a small upfront payment to protect against no-shows.

No-show shield

Charge a deposit only to clients who are a real risk.

Surcharges for public holidays and busy times

Charge more on public holidays or at busy times, shown to clients before they book.

Smart waitlist

Fill cancellations with your most valuable clients first.

Blocking off time

Stop clients booking breaks, holidays or admin time.

Automatic reminders

Cut no-shows with a confirmation and a friendly reminder before every visit.

Cancellations and your cancellation window

Set how much notice you need, and protect deposits on late cancels.

Booking terms clients accept to book online

Add your own terms that clients tick to accept before they book online, and see on each booking when they accepted which version.

Rescheduling a booking

Move an appointment in seconds, by drag or by form.

Managing staff, rooms and chairs

Keep several team members, rooms or chairs booked without clashes.

Time zones and travel

How appointment times are shown so nobody turns up at the wrong hour.

SMS text reminders and the Solo SMS add-on

Send reminders and confirmations by text, not just email, to cut no-shows hardest.

Text confirmations and your own reminder times

Text clients when a booking is made or moved, choose when reminder texts go out, and keep texts out of the night.

Recurring and standing appointments

Lock in a client's next visits at a set rhythm, all from one booking.

Run video appointments with Google Meet

Add a Google Meet link to online bookings, set per service.

Moving or reassigning a booking

Drag a booking to a new time, or move it to another staff member, in a few taps.

Share a private class or clinic link

Keep a class off your public page and share a link so only the people you send it to can book.

Book several services in one visit

Let a client book a colour then a cut as one visit, with one confirmation, one deposit and one checkout.

Set which services can be booked together

Choose which services can share a visit, which can never be booked together, and which extras go with each service.

Book a service that needs two or more people

Set how many of your team a service needs at once, like two stylists on one client or a couples massage.

Book a service that needs a room and equipment

Make one service hold two kinds of resource at once, like a treatment room and a laser.

Let a client swap out of a late cancellation

Quick swap lets a client who can't make it inside your late window offer their time to your waitlist, and leave with no fee if someone takes it.

Clients

Marketing

Add booking to your own website

Paste one line of code to put booking on Squarespace, WordPress, Wix, Shopify or any other site.

Automations that run your admin for you

Reminders, win-backs, birthdays and more, sent on autopilot.

Win back clients automatically

Bring quiet clients back on their own, no chasing.

Newsletters

Email offers and updates to clients who opted in.

Retention and win-backs

Automatically nudge clients who are due back.

Reviews and the Google flywheel

Collect reviews and send happy clients to Google.

Referrals

Turn happy clients into a source of new ones.

QR codes (sharing your booking link)

Your booking link, a QR code, and a website widget.

The Discovery network

A free 'find a business near me' page that lists you.

Getting found online

Your booking page is built to rank and to be understood by AI.

Sharing your booking link on Instagram and Google

Put your booking link where clients already are: Instagram, Google, your email signature and a printed QR code.

Get booked from Google, Instagram and Maps

Copy a tagged booking link for Google, Instagram, Facebook, Apple Maps and Bing, and see which one brought each booking.

Promo codes and discounts

Run an offer with a code, or set up a standing discount.

Keeping clients coming back

The simple habits that turn one visit into a regular.

Deals and off-peak offers

Give an automatic discount on your quietest hours.

Local discovery hubs (your city and service pages)

Get listed on shared local pages so new clients in your town find you.

Write blog posts with your own AI

Get a ready prompt for ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini or any other AI, paste its answer back, and Bookatu fills in the post for you to check.

Sales

Share photo galleries with your clients

Deliver private photo galleries, let clients pick favourites, and sell extra shots.

Put your menu online and take pickup orders

Show your food menu on your page and let guests order ahead for pickup.

Sell session packs and chase unpaid sessions

Sell blocks of sessions that tick down, and see exactly who owes you.

Gift cards

Sell gift cards online that clients redeem against any service.

Gift card promo codes, resends, reissues and history

Let a promo code take money off gift cards bought online, resend or reissue a card, see what happened to it, and download every card as a CSV.

Packages (prepaid bundles)

Sell 'pay for 5, get 6' style bundles as upfront credit.

Memberships

Recurring monthly plans for steady, predictable income.

Wallet credit and loyalty

How gift cards, packages and points are spent automatically.

Tax and accounting

Track the tax you collect and hand a clean report to your accountant.

Funding to grow

See whether you could be a fit for revenue-based funding.

Getting paid and payouts

How the money your clients pay reaches your bank.

Refunds and cancellation charges

How to give money back, and when a deposit can be kept.

Understanding your insights

The dashboard that shows how your business is really doing.

Selling retail products in your shop

Sell retail and take-home products from your booking site.

Sell and check out at the point of sale

Ring up products and check bookings out on Bookatu's own point of sale, print or email the receipt, and see which devices you can use with it.

Shipping and collect-in-store for product orders

Choose whether each product ships or is collected, and track every order.

Invoice a company that pays by bank transfer

Send a proper invoice to a business — with a reference, terms and your bank details — and tick it off when the transfer lands.

Send a client a payment link

Charge for something outside a booking — a top-up, a product you sold, a session agreed over text — with a link they pay by card.

Set tiered commission and goal bonuses

Pay a higher rate once someone sells more in a pay period, and a fixed bonus when they reach a sales target.

Set up a booth or chair renter

Mark a team member as renting a booth or chair, set their rent, and keep them apart from your employees.

Set pay periods and download payroll

Choose how often you pay your team, then download each pay period's commission, bonuses and tips for your payroll system.

Connect QuickBooks Online

Have each day's sales, tax, tips and deposits posted to QuickBooks Online for you, once Bookatu has switched it on.

Your account

Pay as you go: no monthly fee

Pay 8 dollars per team member, with a small monthly minimum, instead of a subscription.

Your subscription and billing

The free trial, how plans are priced, SMS, annual billing and how to cancel.

Exporting your data

Your data is yours. Take a copy whenever you want.

Privacy requests and data deletion

Client deletion requests in one queue, with a countdown, plus your own full-business export.

Contacting support

How to reach a human, and how to report a problem.

Securing your account: two-factor and team logins

Protect your business with a strong password, two-factor and per-person logins.

Check your security on the Security page

One page that scores how well protected your business is, says what to fix first, and links to every security setting.

Sign people out automatically after inactivity

Sign your team out of your business when they have done nothing for a while, so a screen left open does not stay open.

Sign in with a passkey

Sign in with Face ID, Touch ID, Windows Hello, your phone or a security key instead of typing a password.

Remove someone from your team and sign them out

When someone leaves, remove their login, sign them out and close what they set up at your business in one go.

Using your own domain for your booking page

Point a web address you own, like book.yoursalon.com, at your Bookatu booking page.

Set up a daily checklist for your team

Build a daily task list your staff and trainees tick off on their phones. It resets every morning.

Add a trainee who only sees the checklist

Give a junior or apprentice a login that shows only the daily checklist, and nothing else.

Troubleshooting

Developers

Still need a hand?

Every guide ends with a way to reach a human. Drop us a message and we will help.