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Use Out of Office when someone is on leave, a room is being serviced, or the clinic is closed.

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What Out of Office does

An Out of Office block marks time when a person, a room or piece of equipment, all staff or the whole clinic is unavailable. While it is in place:
  • Clients cannot book it. The booking page, the client portal and the booking assistant do not offer those times, and a booking sent anyway is refused. Group class sessions taught in that time, or held in that room, are not offered either, and nobody can join their waitlist.
  • Staff are warned, not stopped. If you book an appointment, schedule a class or move a visit into a blocked time or room, you are asked Book anyway? first.
  • The block always wins over working hours. Changing someone’s weekly hours never reopens a blocked day.
  • Sending forms and documents asks first. When you send a form, a document or a signature request to a client, or resend one, you choose Send when you’re back (already selected) or Send now for anything urgent. Send intakes asks once for everything you picked. A held send goes out automatically when the time ends, within sending hours. Intake documents sent automatically when a client books are held the same way, keeping any subject and message.

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Add an Out of Office

1

Open the sheet

Select Create on the calendar, or an empty slot, then the Out of office tab.
2

Choose when

Leave All day on and pick the first and last day, or turn it off and pick a start and end time. Times are in the clinic’s time zone, shown under the fields.
3

Choose who or what

In Who or what is out of office, choose Whole clinic, All staff, one or more staff members, or rooms and equipment. Whole clinic covers everyone and every room. All staff covers every staff member but leaves rooms bookable. Only an owner or manager can add Out of Office for other people, rooms or the clinic; anyone can add it for themselves.
4

Add a memo

The Memo is for staff. Clients never see it, and it is never included in an email.
5

Decide what happens to existing bookings

Already booked in this time counts the appointments, classes and waitlist entries the block covers. Turn on Cancel appointments and classes in this time to cancel them (owners and managers only). Tick Email clients whose appointments are cancelled if they should receive the usual cancellation email. With it off, cancelled clients are not emailed, so contact them yourself. Cancelling never refunds deposits or payments automatically; settle those from each visit.
6

Choose who to tell

Notify staff emails the people the block covers, with a calendar invite. For a room or equipment block, it emails the staff whose visits are affected.Notify contacts: choose one saved CRM segment. We show how many contacts it reaches before you save. Contacts who opted out, unsubscribed, bounced or complained, or who are now clients, are skipped. Each email gives the away dates in your clinic’s time zone, an urgent-care line and an unsubscribe link. It never includes your memo.
7

Set messages, forms and reminders

Client messages during this time: Allow, with away notice and automatic reply (the default) or Pause messaging. Staff-scoped blocks affect client messages only in conversations assigned to that staff member; clinic-wide blocks affect every conversation.Online forms during this time: Keep accepting responses, with an away notice (the default) or Close online forms. Only a whole-clinic or all-staff block can close them.Pause automated reminders lists each kind of reminder, all paused by default. Held messages send shortly after you’re back, within sending hours, and are skipped if they no longer apply — for example, the appointment was cancelled or the invoice was paid. Medication refill reminders are paused by default too: Patients won’t be reminded to refill their medication until you’re back. Turn this off if anyone may run out during this time.
8

Repeat it if you need to

Tick Repeats to add it every day, week, month or year, ending after 1 to 50 times or on a date. Every occurrence is added, or none is.
9

Save

Select Add out of office. If cancelling is on and something is booked, you confirm the counts first.

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Change or remove it

Select the block’s label on the calendar. The details show who it applies to, when (in the clinic’s time zone), its repeat, the memo and who added it. Edit Mode changes the time or memo. Deleting a repeating block asks whether to delete only this one or every one in the repeat. Deleting a block does not restore appointments it cancelled. An Out of Office that came from a connected Google or Outlook calendar shows From Google Calendar/Outlook, and its times follow that calendar. To apply your clinic’s full Out of Office settings to it, open it on the calendar and select Adopt. An adopted Out of Office still follows your calendar’s times and is never copied back to it.

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Working hours

Availability schedules and Business hours list upcoming Out of Office beside the hours. If you change a weekday that has a block, you see: “Out of Office on (the date) still applies — no bookings will be offered then.”

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Check it worked

  • The block shows on the calendar as a grey, striped band labelled Out of office.
  • The booking page offers no times inside it for the people or rooms it covers.

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Common issues

Only an owner or manager can cancel appointments. Ask one to add the block, or add it without cancelling.
Staff can add Out of Office for themselves only. Choose just your own name, or ask an owner or manager.
Closing online forms applies to the whole clinic. Choose Whole clinic or All staff.
Existing bookings stay unless you turned on cancelling. The appointment shows with a grey outline so you can deal with it.

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FAQ

No. Clients see only that times are unavailable. The memo is never shown to them or put in an email.
Yes. Staff are asked to confirm, then the booking goes ahead. Clients cannot.
With Email clients whose appointments are cancelled on, the usual cancellation email with a link to book a new time. With it off, nothing.
No. Cancellations work the same as cancelling from the calendar: deposits and payments are settled from each visit.