Bookings - Getting Started

Microsoft Bookings is a meeting and appointment scheduling software available as a part of Office 365. You can use it to deliver digital scheduling solutions for your team. The Bookings app is fully integrated with calendars in Outlook and Teams and can be shared by team members.

Create a Bookings Calendar

1. Open the Booking app from the app launcher

2. If this is the first time you are opening the Booking app, a Bookings page will open, select Get it Now
3. In the dialog box that opens select the ‘plus’ sign to Add a New Bookings Calendar
4. Enter a Business Name in the ‘Tell us about your business’ dialog box

5. Choose Continue
6. The Bookings landing page will open

Business Information

You should start by describing your business.

1. Select the Business Information tab In the Business Information section, enter the relevant data. The Business Name will be the name you entered originally but enter an address, phone number and email address
   
    
2. Next, in the Business hours section, enter the hours that you will be available for bookings

Services

In this section you can manage services offered to your clients. There is quite a complex setup of the services you would like to offer, including the general description of the service, you can also setup duration of the service, maximum number of attendees and pricing.

1. Choose the Services tab
2. Select the Add a Service button at the top of the page
   
3. Enter the name of the service, the description if desired and the location.
4. Toggle the switch to add an online meeting link to your email responses.
5. Enter the default duration of each meeting
   Note: Your name will be the only one listed under Assign Staff because presently you are the only owner of this booking calendar. All bookings will by default be assigned to you.
   
    
6. Enter any buffer time if desired – this is time either before or after each appointment that can not be booked. For example, if you have a 1hr long appointments and a 15 minute buffer after each, clients will be able to book at 1 PM, 2:15 PM, 3:30 PM etc..
   
    
7. Scrolling down the page you can set the number of attendees per appointment
8. Under default price, leave the entry at price not set
9. Add any notes to the page – these will only be seen internally
   
    
10. If you choose to add custom fields, by selecting the Modify button, you will have the option of asking customers for additional information. You can add the listed questions or select Add a question to create your own questions.
    
     
11. In the Reminders and Confirmation section there will be a default reminder 1 day before the booking. You can add additional reminders by selecting ‘Add an email reminder’ or edit the existing reminder by selecting the pencil icon to the right of it.
    
     
12. Under Publishing options check the box for this service to appear on your Bookings page

Booking Page

The Booking page is the last element you will have to configure.

1. Select the Booking Page tab
2. To have the page only available to those with a cortland.edu email address, check the box in front of ‘Require a Microsoft 365 or Office 3465 account…’
3. Check boxes to use newest version, require a password, or disable search engine indexing if desired
4. Check box to collect customer data if desired
5. Check to make sure that the Scheduling policy is ok
6. Check boxes for email notifications
7. Default availability is ‘Bookable when staff are free’ check option in the dropdown to make sure this is appropriate for your page

Publish

1. At the top of the Booking Page choose Save and Publish to make your page go live
   
    
2. To view the live page, select Open Published Page on the Booking Page tab
3. To share your page, copy the link and paste it where needed