How to Create a Microsoft Bookings Service

Summary

This article contains steps to create a Microsoft Bookings service.

Body

Purpose

Bookings can be customized for faculty and staff to manage their office hours by allowing others to book appointments or timeslots.

Video Tutorial

Explanation 

Screen to add a new service.

  • Enter the name and description of your service.
    • Both will be visible on your Bookings site.
  • Enter a default location and choose whether you would like a Teams meeting to be generated by selecting Add online meeting.
  • Choose the default duration, and then choose if you want to add buffer time before or after each booking slot as shown below.

Different default options for adding a new service.

  • Scroll down and set the following:
  1. Choose the number of attendees that can book each appointment slot. Generally, this will be set to 1 for Office Hours appointments.
  2. Price – skip this option.
  3. Notes (internal only) – these are internal notes for you on this service. Generally, this will be blank for Office Hours appointments.
Note: "Let customers manage their appointment when you booked it…" applies only when you book someone in your Bookings calendar (not the self-service tool). Unless you are doing this, you can leave it.

 

Different options for adding a new service.

  • "Custom fields" allow you to collect information when someone is booking this service.
    • Click the Modify button to edit these fields: Customer Information fields show in dark gray if selected/shown and can be marked "required" by selecting the slider.
  • It is recommended you keep the email required and enable the phone number, as shown below.

Custom fields option while adding a new service.

  • If you want to collect additional information or ask questions, you can use the "+ Add a custom field" option.
    • Enter your question and then use the arrows to determine the order of the questions.

Screen to collect additional information or ask questions.

  • Click on Save Changes.
  • Enable text message notifications by selecting notification and checking the option.
    • This is currently included in our Bookings plan and only works if you enable the "phone number" field above.
  • Slide the box for "Show this service on the booking page".
  • Email Notifications:
    • We recommend unchecking the "Notify the business via email…" option when only one user is assigned to the Bookings Calendar (generally true during Office Hours).
    • We recommend enabling "Send a meeting invite to the customer, in addition to the confirmation email".
  • Next, set what reminders you want enabled for your service. Select Add an email reminder.

Notification settings while editing the service.

  • You can add as many of these by selecting the time, setting reminders, and customizing the text in your reminders.
  • You can also add reminders to the staff member who is assigned the booking.

Reminder options for the service.

  • Add any additional information you would like included in the service email confirmation.
  • To set custom scheduling policies, uncheck the box that states, "Use the default scheduling policy".

Option to set custom scheduling policies.

  • Navigate to "Assign Staff". 
    • This box can be left unchecked since only one Staff member is assigned to the service.

Screen to assign staff to the service.

  • Next, select the following by navigating to "Availability options":
    • Time increments: Determines the available times displayed.
      • For example, if you choose 5 minutes, all available times will appear on 5-minute marks: 1:00, 1:05, 1:10, etc.
    • Minimum lead time (hours): How far in advance can someone book time on your calendar.
    • Maximum lead time (days): How far into the future can someone book this service.
    • Availability: You have three options here:
      • Bookable when staff is free: This will keep your Bookings service open indefinitely, subject to the lead time settings you have set above.
      • Not bookable: This keeps your Bookings service unavailable. You can add a specific date range below under "+ Set different availability for a date range".
      • Custom hours (recurring weekly): This allows you to set specific available hours for this service. Helpful for office hours that repeat at the same time every week.
    • Below is a sample of the scheduling policy options for reference:

Scheduling policy options for the service.

  • Click on Save Changes.
  • Change to the "Booking Page" tab in Bookings, then set the following:
    • Select Business Page Access Control > choose the triangle dropdown > select available to people in your organization (this allows anyone at UTD, including students, to book).
    • Check the "Disable Direct search engine indexing of booking page", as shown below.
  • Your Bookings link will appear. Copy and paste into eLearning, email, or other communication tools.
  • Click Save.

Screen to manage your booking page.

Details

Details

Article ID: 376
Created
Mon 11/22/21 1:52 PM
Modified
Thu 6/13/24 12:53 PM

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Microsoft Bookings makes scheduling and managing appointments easy. It allows for users to schedule 1:1 or many:1 meetings, training, and office hours appointments and is a part of the Microsoft 365 suite.