# Set up appointments, services and booking pages Source: https://docs.meetscarlet.com/appointments/ Updated: 2026-11-05 Appointments are one-to-one or small-group bookings with a person: a haircut, a tan, a consultation. Set them up in three parts: who can be booked and when, what they offer, and where clients book it. [Screenshot: The Appointments day view: a column per person with the day's appointments in their time slots.] ## 1. Make people bookable and set their hours In Schedule, choose Appointments, then People. Only bookable people appear when clients book. 1. **Make them bookable** Choose a team member and Make bookable. Add the Name members see and, if you like, a few words About them. The person must be on your team first; see [Invite your team](https://docs.meetscarlet.com/invite-your-team/). 1. **Set weekly hours** Under Weekly hours, use Add hours for each day they work, and Add break for a lunch break. Then choose Save hours; nothing is kept until you do. 1. **Add time off** Under Time off, pick the First day and Last day from the calendar that opens when you select each one. Leave Last day empty for a single day; the × beside it empties it again. For part of one day, add From time and To time; leave them empty for the whole day. Choose Add time off. If they already have appointments then, Scarlet lists them and asks; with Add time off anyway those appointments stay booked, so move or cancel them yourself. [Screenshot: A bookable person's profile with their weekly hours and time off.] Staff who aren't owners or managers see My time off here instead, and ask an owner or manager to change it, unless an owner or manager turns on Let staff edit their own time off in Settings. ## When someone leaves or stops taking bookings Owners and managers open People, open the person, turn off Bookable (members can book them) and choose Save profile. If they still have appointments coming up, Scarlet lists them first and asks before switching them off. Choose Switch off anyway and those appointments stay booked, marked Needs a new staff member. Nothing is moved, cancelled or charged. Someone with more than 400 upcoming appointments can't be switched off until some are moved or cancelled. On the Day view, a day with such appointments shows a Show needs staff filter with how many there are, like **Show needs staff (2)**: select it to see only those, each marked Needs a new staff member, and check the following days too. Owners, managers and the front desk open each one and choose Move… to give it to someone else, or Cancel appointment. Turn Bookable back on any time to take new bookings again. ## 2. Add your services Under Services, choose New service for each service and fill in: - **The service**: Name, Length in minutes, Price, a Description (shown when booking), and optional Set-up time before and Clean-up time after, which block the diary around each booking. - **Member discount**: a percent taken off the price for members with a plan. - **Deposit**, **No-show fee** and **Pay when booking**: what a client pays and when. See [below](#money). - **Groups and quantity**: choose Change to set Seats per time for a small group, or a quantity if clients book several at once. Most services leave this alone. - **Who does it**: the bookable people who offer it, and **When a client picks "any person"**: the order Scarlet tries them in. A client who picks a person is never moved to someone else. - **Rooms** if it needs one. [Screenshot: The service form, with the name, length, price, people, deposit, no-show fee and approval settings.] ## Where it happens: in person, phone or video Once a service is saved, its Where it happens card says where clients go. Until you pick one, clients are told nothing about the place. - **In person**: type the Address. It shows in the app, and goes in the confirmation, the reminders and the calendar invite once email delivery is switched on for Scarlet. - **Phone**: choose We call them, and you call the client at the time of the appointment on the phone number in their profile, or They call a number, and add the Number to call. - **Video**: paste a Meeting link: Zoom, Google Meet, Teams or any https link. Everyone who books gets it. Under Their own link (optional), a person with their own meeting room can have their link used instead. Scarlet can't make a new link for each booking yet. Choose Save location. Bookings already made keep what they were told. ## Ask questions when clients book A service can ask a few questions while the client books, such as "What would you like done?" or "Is this your first visit?". Open the service and find Booking questions, then choose Add question. Owners and managers can do this; the front desk can't. - **Kind of answer**: Short answer, Long answer, Email address, Phone number, Number, Pick one, Pick several or Yes or no. - **Limits**: the shortest and longest answer for text (up to 200 characters for a short answer, 2,000 for a long one), the smallest and largest value for a number (and Whole numbers only), and two to twenty choices, one per line, for the pick questions. Pick several can also set how many to pick at least and at most. - **Hint under the question (optional)** and **Required**: a required question must be answered before the booking goes through. A service can ask up to 20 questions. Clients see them in your app and on your booking page, including people booking without an account. When staff book for someone, the questions are skipped. In the list of services, a service with questions says how many it asks. Open the appointment to read the answers, under Their answers. Each answer sits under the question as it was asked, so changing a question later doesn't change past answers. Owners, managers and the front desk see every appointment's answers; an instructor sees only their own appointments. Answers stay with you: they aren't in the client's confirmation email or in webhooks. ## Deposits, no-show fees and paying when booking - **Deposit**: No deposit, A set amount or A percent of the price. - **No-show fee**: owed when your team marks a no-show and nothing was paid online, not even a deposit. A paid deposit is kept instead, and a booking paid in full gets no fee. A no-show closed automatically is never charged. - A fee owed is charged to the client's saved card only if an owner turns on Charge late-cancel and no-show fees automatically in Settings. Otherwise, or with no saved card, it waits as owed for the desk. Leave the fee empty for none. - **Pay when booking**: Full price by card, or Pay later, where nothing is charged when booking and the client pays at the studio. In Settings, under appointments, the Free-cancel window (24 hours unless you change it; a service can set its own) decides when a cancel counts as late. Keep the deposit on a late cancel and Keep the deposit on a no-show are on unless you turn them off. When a deposit was paid and nobody checked in, it's held for the Time to mark a no-show when a deposit is paid (24 hours) so you can mark the no-show; if nobody does, it's given back. > Not yet: Card payments go to your own Stripe account, which you connect in Settings . They're built, but no live card payment has been run yet, so check with us before you rely on deposits or fees. ## Approval and private links Turn on Needs approval and a booking becomes a request: the time is held, and you approve or decline it under Requests. With Ask for approval on, you can ask only on certain days. If the service takes a deposit or the full price, the client pays it by card once you approve. 1. **Open the request** Under Schedule, then Appointments, then Requests, the soonest request is first. A request from the booking link without an account says so. Choose Review. Owners, managers and the front desk can answer requests, and Requests shows how many are waiting. A request on the Day view can be answered from there too. 1. **Approve** Choose Approve. The person is told you said yes. If the service charges at booking and card payments are on, they're asked to pay to confirm, and the time is held for 24 hours, or until the appointment starts if that's sooner. Nothing is taken until they pay. Otherwise the appointment is booked straight away. 1. **Or decline** Choose Decline and, if you like, add a reason the person will read (up to 300 characters). The time is free again and they're told. If nobody answers in time, or the start time comes first, the request is declined as expired, the time is freed and the person is told. A request waits 48 hours unless you change it in Settings, under Answer a booking request within (1 to 168 hours). > Not yet: People who booked without an account hear about an approval, a decline or an expiry by email only. Until email delivery is switched on for Scarlet, call or message them yourself. Their phone and email show on the appointment and on its request, for owners, managers and the front desk, and a first-time guest is in Members with the lead tag and the details they gave. Private links only hides a service from the public list. Only a single-use link you make for a person can book it, and that link skips approval. Make one in the service's Private links card with Create link, then Copy link and send it yourself. The link is shown only once. To stop it working, choose Revoke. The card works once the service is on, bookable online and not for members only. ## Appointment waitlists When a service is often full, turn on Let people join a waitlist in the service. It's off until you turn it on. - When no time suits, the booking page offers No time that suits you?. Clients and guests choose how many days to watch, up to 14, a time of day (any, morning, afternoon or evening) and, if they like, one person. - When a time opens that fits, everyone waiting for it is told at once, and whoever books first gets it. Nobody is booked automatically. - Members get a push notification. Every notice has a link to leave the waitlist. - In the service, Who is waiting shows the list, and the desk can remove someone. > Not yet: Waitlist emails, for guests and members, start once email delivery is switched on for Scarlet. There are no text alerts for the appointment waitlist. ## 3. Share a booking page Before you share a page: - To let people book without an account, an owner or manager turns on Let people book without an account in Settings. It's off to start with. - Your main page needs a booking link name, which you choose in Your app. - Under Booking pages, choose New page, give it a link name and pick its services, then switch it to On (guests can open it). A new page starts off. A page can also have its own hours, how many days ahead clients can book, and a buffer between bookings. A personal page shows only what one person does and books only them. Share each page from its share options: - Copy the link for your website, social profiles or messages. - Save QR code (PNG) to print it on a card, a poster or a window. - Copy the Embed code to put the booking page on your website. With Ask for a code, a guest types a 6-digit code we email them before they can book. Signed-in members are never asked. The code goes by email, so leave this off until email delivery is switched on for Scarlet: without it, guests never get a code and can't book. ## On the day The Day view shows each person's appointments. Open one to see who it's for and where they came from, to cancel it, to mark a no-show, or to choose Mark attended. A no-show can be marked once the No-show grace in Settings has passed after the start, 15 minutes unless you change it; the appointment says the time. Cancelling inside the Free-cancel window counts as a late cancel ([see above](#money)). Appointments can show Waiting for approval, Awaiting payment, Checked in or Cancelled. An appointment nobody marks counts as a visit, unless an owner or manager turns on Close unattended appointments as no-shows in Settings. [Screenshot: An appointment opened from the day view, with the client, the service, where the booking came from and the cancel and no-show actions.] ## Run a walk-in line A walk-in line lets people queue for the next free chair instead of booking a time. Members join from the Book tab in your app, and the desk adds people who walk in. It's on by default for barbershops. To turn it on or off, open Settings and find Walk-in line; owners and managers can change it. 1. **Open the line** In Schedule, open Appointments and choose Walk-in line. You'll see whether the line is open, how many people are waiting, and when it closes to new people. 1. **Add someone who walks in** Choose Add walk-in, type their name, and pick a service and a person if they know them. Someone added at the desk has no account, so they can't tip in the app. 1. **Call the next person** Under Chairs, a free chair has Call next. It calls the first person in line who is here (or due any minute) and whom that chair can serve, so someone marked Not here yet is passed over. To choose someone yourself, use Call on them in the waiting list. Their Line screen in the app changes to say they're called and how long you'll hold the chair. There's no push notification, so they need the app open. 1. **Seat, skip or mark a no-show** When they reach the chair, choose Seat. If they don't come, Skip moves them back one place (or as many as you set) and gives them a short time to say they're on their way; a second missed call ends their place as a no-show. No-show takes them out of the line once you confirm with Mark no-show, or Keep in line to back out. 1. **Finish** Choose Done. If they didn't pick a service, you'll be asked what was done, so the visit is recorded with the right service and price. The waiting list shows each person's place, what they asked for and whether they're Here, On the way or Not here yet. Choose Arrived when someone turns up, or Remove to take them out of the line. Owners, managers and front desk staff run the whole line: they add people, mark them arrived, call anyone to any free chair and remove people. Other staff on shift work their own chair only: Call next, Seat and Done, plus Skip or No-show once the time to reach the chair has passed. The board refreshes by itself while it is open. Someone who joined from the app and never says they're on their way, or never turns up, loses their place on their own. In Settings, under Walk-in line, you can also set: - the most people in the line at once (25 unless you change it); - how long before the last shift ends the line stops taking people (30 minutes); - how long a called person has to reach the chair (5 minutes); - how many places someone moves back after a missed call (1), and how long they then have to say they're on their way (15 minutes); - how long a place joined from the app is held for someone who hasn't said they're on their way (15 minutes), and the furthest away they can be (45 minutes); - how long to plan for someone who didn't pick a service (30 minutes). ## Follow-up emails Each service can send a thank-you after a visit and a note after a no-show you marked yourself, each with a Book again button. Write the words under Settings › Booking emails. > Not yet: Email sending isn't switched on yet. These emails start once email delivery is switched on for Scarlet.