Appointments

Quotes > Appointments is the estimators’ calendar. Office staff use it to see who is where, move appointments by dragging, add personal appointments and block out time so the website does not book over it. Every entry on the calendar is an appointment on a quote.

What you see

Week view

The page opens on the current working week, Monday to Friday, from 6:00 am to 7:00 pm in 30-minute slots. Use the arrows and today button above the calendar to move between weeks.

Each block shows the estimator’s initials and the suburb of the site. Personal appointments show the initials followed by the description. Blocks are coloured:

Colour	Meaning
The estimator’s own colour	A normal on-site quote appointment for that estimator.
Plum	A Remote quote (done by phone or video rather than a site visit).
Slate blue	The customer chose Pick Up Keys for access.
Grey	An Anytime appointment. These are placed at 6:00 to 7:00 am as a marker only; the estimator can attend any time that day.
Black	A personal appointment, a recurring personal appointment or blocked-out time.
Orange	An appointment with no estimator assigned. These need attention.

Cancelled and declined quotes do not appear.

Controls

• Filter narrows the calendar to one estimator. Choose All to reset.
• Go to jumps to a date.
• Appointments dropdown:
  • Personal appointment opens the form for adding estimator personal time (see below).
  • Block out times opens the unavailability picker.
  • Create appointment opens Create Quote.
  • All Recurring appointments opens the recurring appointments list.

Day view

Click the map icon on any day heading to open that day. The left half is the day’s agenda, 6:00 am to 5:30 pm; the right half is a map of Brisbane with a pin at every appointment address. Pins use the estimator’s avatar where one is set. Click a pin to see the appointment details, or click an appointment in the agenda to centre the map on it. Create appointment on this page also opens Create Quote.

What you can do

Move or resize an appointment

1. Drag the block to a new time or day, or drag its bottom edge to change the length.
2. Confirm Are sure you want to edit this appointment? with Yes, change it!

The appointment on the quote is updated and the quote’s Last contacted date is stamped. To tell the customer, open the quote’s Appointments tab and click Resend Appointment.

Edit an appointment from the calendar

Click a block to open the Appointment dialog. You can change the date, start and end time and the estimator, then click Save. Recurring personal appointments cannot be opened this way; edit them on the recurring appointments page instead.

Add a personal appointment

Use Appointments > Personal appointment. Personal appointments block the estimator’s time on the website booking form and on the calendar.

1. Choose the User (defaults to you), Date, Start Time and End Time.
2. Enter a Description. It appears on the calendar block after the initials.
3. Fill in the address fields if the appointment is somewhere specific; the office address is used otherwise.
4. Tick Recurring to repeat it. Set Repeat every to a number and choose WEEK, MONTH or YEAR.
5. Leave Don’t auto-assign me in the booking form for this appointment ticked if the website should not give you bookings during this time.
6. Click Save.

A one-off personal appointment is stored as a quote under the internal Rochele Painting customer with the Rochele Business type and a Confirmed status, which is why it can show up in quote lists. A recurring one creates the first occurrence straight away and future occurrences are generated weekly.

Block out time for everyone

Use Appointments > Block out times to open the Unavailability Picker.

1. Pick one or more Dates.
2. Set the Range start and end time.
3. Click Set as Unavailabile.

Each date gets a “Blocked out quote” entry with no estimator. The website booking form treats those times as unavailable for every estimator, so use this for public holidays, team days and office closures. Use a personal appointment instead when only one estimator is away.

Manage recurring appointments

Appointments > All Recurring appointments lists standing appointments. Switch between Estimators (quote appointments) and Supervisors (project manager visits, see Project Manager Visits; the toggle uses the system’s internal name for the role). Columns are User, Comments, Interval, Frequency, Start Date, Start Time and End Time, with edit and delete actions and an Add Recurring Appointment button.

Editing a recurring appointment also updates its next upcoming occurrence. Deleting it stops future occurrences from being generated; occurrences already on the calendar remain until removed.

Add extra appointments to a quote

A quote can have several appointments, for example a second visit to measure an extra building. Open the quote and use Add Appointment in the Appointments tab. See Quotes.

How website bookings become appointments

Most appointments are created by customers on the website booking form. See Website Booking Form for the customer’s side. The steps are:

1. Contact details. First name, last name, email, mobile, customer type (residential, body corporate, commercial and so on) and, for strata, the management company.
2. Site. Building name, address (validated against the map), unit number, service type (interior, exterior or both) and a description of the areas to be quoted, with optional photos.
3. Project details. Number of units or lots, the customer’s role, asset type, occupancy type and desired project start.
4. Date and time. A calendar of available slots, optionally with an estimator chosen from the ones who cover that address, and “How did you hear about us?”.

The available slots come from the web app and are worked out as follows:

• Only estimators whose estimator zone covers the address, on the days that zone is active, are considered. Zones are drawn on a map under Settings > Entities > Estimator Zones as rectangles, polygons or circles and each zone has a set of weekdays. See Estimator Zones. If no zone covers the address the customer sees an out-of-area message asking them to phone the office.
• Slots run from 7:30 am to 4:30 pm on weekdays in 30-minute steps. The length of the slot is the quote type’s appointment length (30 or 60 minutes).
• Same-day bookings are not offered. Bookings made after 4:00 pm or on the weekend cannot take the 7:30 to 10:30 am slots on the next working day.
• An estimator’s existing quote appointments block their time, with 30 minutes of travel buffer added either side. Personal appointments, recurring personal appointments and blocked-out time also block. Blocked-out time with no estimator blocks everyone.
• If the customer did not choose an estimator, the system assigns the one who is free at that time, choosing the estimator with the fewest upcoming quotes when several are free. If nobody is free the booking is still saved with no estimator and the service inbox is emailed Unassigned estimator for booking appointment so staff can reassign or reschedule it.

The booking then creates or matches the customer, creates the quote in Pending with its first version and appointment, stores the customer’s description as a sticky Booking notes note, records the marketing sources, and links a lead if one exists. Customers with notifications on receive Your appointment: #reference has been booked, which includes links to cancel or reschedule. Returning customers are recorded with the Repeat Customer source.

From the customer’s cancel link they must give a reason, the quote becomes Cancelled and the estimator (or the service inbox if unassigned) is emailed. From the reschedule link they pick a new slot, the quote returns to Pending and the estimator is emailed that it has been rescheduled. A customer can also cancel an individual appointment from its link; when the last appointment is cancelled the service inbox is notified.

Booking reminders and other emails

• Quote appointment reminder goes to the customer by email at midday the day before a scheduled appointment (Quote appointment tomorrow email), provided the customer has notifications on and an estimator is assigned. Anytime appointments are included, without a time. The SMS version of this reminder exists in the code but is switched off.
• Your appointment has been booked / updated goes when an appointment is created or resent from the quote page. Anytime appointments are not emailed automatically because the placeholder time would confuse the customer; send them manually if needed.
• The estimator is on the way goes by email and SMS when the estimator taps the button on the iPad.
• Recurring appointments are generated every Sunday for the coming week by the Create recurring estimator appointments task.
• An appointment disregard email exists for one-off use. It apologises for a historical appointment email being resent after a system upgrade and asks the customer to ignore it. It is only sent by the developers when needed and is not part of normal operations.

Timings are listed under Scheduled Tasks: Quotes and Leads.

Tips and gotchas

• Orange blocks mean an unassigned estimator. Check the calendar each morning and assign someone before the customer’s reminder goes out at midday the day before.
• Dragging an appointment does not email the customer. Resend from the quote page if the customer needs to know.
• Anytime appointments sit at 6:00 am. They are not really at 6:00 am; the estimator fits them in during the day.
• A personal appointment with no estimator selected behaves like a block-out for everyone.
• The web calendar and the iPad show the same appointments, including cancelled and declined ones on the iPad, so estimators can see changes made by the office.
• If the booking form appears to allow bookings over an estimator’s leave, check that the leave was entered as a personal appointment or block-out and not just noted somewhere else.