Waitlist

Pro and PremiumLite does not include this menu item.

Turn “fully booked” into a second chance: waiting guests hear by themselves when something opens up

You switch the waitlist on under Settings in the Features card (Chapter 16.6). The Waitlist menu item then appears as well.

How it works

1. A guest signs up: if their preferred time is taken, they tap the time with the bell on the booking page, or “Join the waitlist” on a fully booked day, and leave their name and email (Chapter 2.2).
2. An appointment opens up: you cancel or delete an appointment on that day, or a guest cancels themselves.
3. The first person waiting gets an email: whoever signed up for that day first receives “A slot just opened up!” with the button “Grab the slot” (Chapter 18.1). The button opens your booking page on that day. Nothing is reserved; whoever books first gets the time.

It counts by day, not by time: the email goes to the first person waiting for that day, even if they were waiting for a different time. If they chose a specific person, only cancellations with that person count. Each freed appointment sends exactly one email. Anyone who left no email address cannot be notified.

The Waitlist page

Open Waitlist in the sidebar. The list shows every entry from today on:

Column	Meaning
Date and Preferred time	What the guest is waiting for. Without a preferred time they are waiting for the whole day.
Area	The person or area, if the guest chose a specific one.
Customer	Name and contact.
Status	Waiting until an appointment opens up, then Notified. Once the person books that day, they show as Booked.

The panel sets Booked by itself. It counts any booking on the same day that was made after the entry, is not cancelled and has the same email address, or the same phone number if one was given. Capital letters in the address or spaces and dashes in the number make no difference, and it does not matter whether the booking was made online or in the panel. If the person cancels that appointment again, the entry goes back to its previous status. Anyone who has already booked for their day gets no more emails when a time opens up.

The system deletes entries for past days on the following day. Name and contact details are no longer needed after the requested day, so they are not kept.

The bin at the end of a row removes an entry, after the question “Remove entry?”. The Activity log records who removed it (Chapter 23).

A team member sees the guests waiting for them and everyone who did not choose a specific person. They can only remove those.

Tip

The waitlist pays off most on full days, at the weekend for example. If a guest books with a different email address, the panel cannot recognise them and the entry stays at Notified. In that case, check the bookings list.