Availability & hours
When someone can book you is decided in several places at once. If a time you expected to be bookable is not offered, the cause is one of these.
1. Booking mode
Settings > Bookings > Booking mode:
- Fixed slots - visitors pick from a calendar of real times, and everything below applies.
- Request a time - visitors ask for a time and you confirm. The booking window does not apply, because there is no calendar to constrain.
If your notice period seems to be ignored, check this first - it is almost always Request mode.
2. Your hours
Availability starts from Business hours in Settings > Business Info. Set them once there; they are also what the Opening Hours section on your site shows.
To give one person different hours, set Working hours on their record in Bookings > Staff. Per- staff hours override the business hours for that person, and can include breaks - a lunch hour is a break, not two shifts.
3. The booking window
In fixed-slot mode, Booking window decides how far out the calendar opens:
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Earliest (hours notice) | The minimum notice you need - your lead time. This is how you stop last-minute and same-day bookings: set 24 and nobody can book tomorrow morning at 11pm tonight. |
| Latest (days ahead) | How far ahead people may book. Set 60 and the calendar stops two months out. |
Notice too short and you get bookings you cannot prepare for. Too long and you lose people who wanted to come today.
4. The service itself
Each service in Bookings > Services has:
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Duration (min) | How long it takes. This is the length of the slot. |
| Buffer (min) | Padding after the appointment - cleaning up, writing notes, travelling. The gap between bookings. |
| Slot step (min) | How often a slot may start. 15 offers 9:00, 9:15, 9:30; 60 offers whole hours only. |
Duration plus buffer is what actually gets taken out of your day, so a 45-minute service with a 15-minute buffer consumes an hour.
5. Time off
Bookings > Time off blocks a staff member between two dates with a reason - holidays, training, a day out. Blocked time disappears from the calendar and cannot be booked over.
Add time off before you announce it, not after the bookings arrive.
Confirmation
Auto-confirm accepts bookings straight away. Turn it off and each one waits for you, which is safer when your real availability does not entirely live in this calendar.
Reminders
Email reminders takes hours before the appointment, comma-separated. 24, 2 sends one the day
before and one two hours before. Blank sends none. Reminders are the cheapest no-show reduction
available.
Why a slot is not showing
If a day is unavailable, greyed out, or shows no times at all, work down this list.
| Symptom | Usual cause |
|---|---|
| No slots at all on a day | Closed in Business hours, or the staff member's working hours. |
| Slots stop partway through the day | Duration plus buffer will not fit before closing. |
| Nothing bookable soon | Earliest (hours notice) is larger than you thought. |
| Nothing bookable far out | Latest (days ahead) is short. |
| A single day is empty | Time off, for that staff member. |
| Notice period ignored | Booking mode is Request a time. |
Next steps
Frequently asked questions
Why is a slot not showing?
Work down in this order: the day is outside your hours, it falls inside the notice period, it is beyond the advance limit, time off covers it, or the gap is too short for the service plus its buffer.
What does the buffer actually do?
It is held after each booking, so the next time offered starts once the appointment and its buffer have both finished. It is what stops the diary selling you a slot you cannot physically reach.
A staff member has no hours set. Are they bookable?
Yes. Empty working hours fall back to the business's own opening hours, so a new person is bookable straight away. Set hours only where they differ.
How many bookings can I hold at the same time?
One per resource. Capacity is the number of active staff members, so two people means two parallel appointments; with none, every booking competes for a single slot.
Can two people book the same time with different staff?
Yes. Availability is worked out per person and merged, so a time is offered while at least one of them is free.
Related reading
- Multi-practitioner clinic scheduling - how the same settings behave with several people on the rota.