Appointment management software

[DavePa]

Has anybody experience of using appointment management software? At present when we have events visitors need to phone and make an appointment which is far from the most efficient way of doing things. I've been asked to look at how to automate this so we can give visitors a web page to log into that then allocates bookings on a 1st come, 1st served basis and ideally sends an outlook meeting invitation so we are aware of the volume and times of bookings.

 

A quick Google gives me a bunch of programmes that may work but I would rather use something that is tried and tested by the EduGeek community

 

Free would be great but low-cost may be acceptable. We are not talking tens of thousands of bookings over hundreds of events - maybe a dozen events a year and maybe a couple thousand bookings at most.

 

http://www.sagenda.com

http://www.simplybook.me

http://www.bookingbug.co.uk

[fiza]

Has anybody experience of using appointment management software? At present when we have events visitors need to phone and make an appointment which is far from the most efficient way of doing things. I've been asked to look at how to automate this so we can give visitors a web page to log into that then allocates bookings on a 1st come, 1st served basis and ideally sends an outlook meeting invitation so we are aware of the volume and times of bookings.

 

A quick Google gives me a bunch of programmes that may work but I would rather use something that is tried and tested by the EduGeek community

 

Free would be great but low-cost may be acceptable. We are not talking tens of thousands of bookings over hundreds of events - maybe a dozen events a year and maybe a couple thousand bookings at most.

 

http://www.sagenda.com

http://www.simplybook.me

http://www.bookingbug.co.uk

 

Would something like https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/ or https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/ work for you? As far as I know these are free to use if you dont charge for your event. We use Ticketsource for our Drama productions but pay a fee as we charge for tickets.

 

Edit: Just read your post again and it looks like you want timed appointments like Parents Evening. We use TASC for Parents Evenings but that is part of our Parent Portal so does have a cost.

Edited January 12, 2017 by fiza

[DavePa]

Thanks @fiza, not sure if they would work or not but I'll certainly have a look at them both. We're not selling/issuing tickets though - probably parents evening would be closer to the mark. It would be something like having 6 members of staff here between (for example) 4pm and 8pm and each of those staff members having 16 available time slots - once a slot is booked it cannot be booked by anybody else but visitors can go to the website and see what timeslots are available and who they are with before booking them. Edited January 12, 2017 by DavePa
Typical...typo!

[fiza]

Thanks @fiza, not sure if they would work or not but I'll certainly have a look at them both. We're not selling/issuing tickets though - probably parents evening would be closer to the mark. It would be something like having 6 members of staff here between (for example) 4pm and 8pm and each of those staff members having 16 available time slots - once a slot is booked it cannot be booked by anybody else but visitors can go to the website and see what timeslots are available and who they are with before booking them.

 

They won't be suitable as they are more ticketing for events. You need appt scheduling. Take a look at this Parents Evening Booking System | Mr Caffrey

[TechMonkey]

Take a look at Parents Evening System - Online Parents Evening Booking Software £200 for up to 250 pupils. It links to certain MIS systems to cut down on Admin which is where I think you would save money. A free event to try it out. Not used it yet but I intend to get it next year for our school as they currently do it manually using Excel, pupil post and lots and lots of to-ing and fro-ing.

[Bev]

They won't be suitable as they are more ticketing for events. You need appt scheduling. Take a look at this Parents Evening Booking System | Mr Caffrey

 

This looks great, but they no longer offer the upgrade to teams for free.

 

The other stumbling block is I can't seem to set it for 5 minute appointments. I could manage without the teams option but the minimum of 10 minutes is a big problem.

[DavePa]

We managed to provide a basic system by following the Mr Caffrey link kindly provided by @fiza and naturally the requirements have now grown to encompass the commercial courses we offer. I've now been asked to look into an online booking system that could not only process online bookings but also perform the back function of room bookings, timetabling, catering etc. Does such a thing exist or is this likely to be custom development? I suspect that the list of requirements will grow to include things such as sending SMS reminders, invoicing, follow up surveys and so on which makes me think custom development is the most likely outcome but if anybody has come across anything similar I'd appreciate hearing about it.

 

I suspect the primary requirement will be to take bookings for the x places we have on a course rather than manage appointments with the remainder of the functionality being added on after the booking has been taken.