Online Booking Calendar

Your digital reception desk: pet owners open your booking page, choose a treatment and an available appointment – and you receive all the data including a new contact and patient directly in TheraTap. No phone calls, no email back-and-forth, around the clock.

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At a Glance

3-Step Booking

Choose a treatment, pick an appointment, enter your details – done. That is how simple it is for your clients.

Intelligent Availability

Working hours, buffer times, vacations, rooms, equipment, and therapist skills – everything is automatically factored into the available time slots.

Automatic Contact Creation

With every booking, the contact and patient are automatically created or recognized. No manual data entry.

Embeddable Anywhere

Your own booking page, a widget on your website, or an iFrame – the calendar works on every device and in every setup.

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What the Online Booking Calendar Can Do

Feature	Description
Online Appointment Booking	Pet owners book appointments through your personal booking page or an embedded widget – 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Automatic Availability	Only actually available time slots are displayed. Working hours, exceptions, booked appointments, buffer times, and resources are calculated in real time.
Contact & Patient Creation	Name, email, address, animal species, breed, date of birth – everything is automatically saved as a contact and patient in TheraTap. Existing contacts are recognized.
Two Booking Modes	Either as an appointment request (you confirm manually) or as automatic confirmation (the appointment is set immediately).
Resource Management	Rooms, equipment, and therapists are automatically assigned. Double bookings are ruled out.
Reminders	Automatic appointment reminders via email and optionally via SMS – 24 hours before the appointment.
Messages	Through the integrated message history, you communicate directly with pet owners about their request.
Embeddable	Embed the calendar as a widget, custom element, or iFrame on your own website.

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How Pet Owners Book an Appointment

The booking process is intentionally kept simple – three steps, no registration, no login:

1. Select a Treatment

   All active treatment types are clearly displayed – with name, description, duration, and price. Pet owners select the appropriate service.

2. Choose a Preferred Appointment

   A clear calendar shows only the actually available days and time slots. Past days, fully booked slots, and times outside your working hours are automatically hidden. On desktop, two months are displayed side by side; on smartphones, one – always optimized for the respective device.

   Tip

   The displayed time slots automatically take into account your working hours, entered exceptions (vacations, holidays), already booked appointments, buffer times between appointments, and the availability of rooms, equipment, and therapists.

3. Enter Contact and Animal Details

   In the last step, pet owners enter their details:

   • Contact details: First name, last name, email, phone, address
   • Animal details: Name, species (dog, horse, cat, other), breed, gender, date of birth
   • Message: Space for concerns, symptoms, or questions

   A clear summary shows the treatment, date, time, and duration at a glance before submission. After submission, pet owners immediately receive a confirmation on screen and by email.

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What Happens Automatically After a Booking

As soon as a booking comes in, TheraTap handles a whole series of tasks in the background – you do not need to worry about any of them:

What happens	Detail
Create contact	A new contact is created with all submitted data. If the email address is recognized, the existing contact is linked.
Create patient	The animal data is saved as a new patient under the contact – including species, breed, and date of birth.
Create appointment	An appointment is added to the calendar – depending on the mode, as confirmed or as an open request.
Reserve resources	If the treatment type requires a room or equipment, an available resource is automatically reserved.
Assign therapist	With multiple therapists, an available therapist with the matching skill is automatically assigned.
Send notifications	The pet owner receives a confirmation (or request acknowledgment); you receive a notification about the new booking.
Schedule reminder	24 hours before the appointment, a reminder is automatically sent via email (and optionally via SMS) – including an ICS calendar file.

Note

TheraTap prevents double bookings through a final check at the moment of booking. Even if two people simultaneously book the last available slot, only one booking is accepted.

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Appointment Request or Automatic Confirmation

You decide how bookings are handled:

Mode	Behavior	Ideal for
Appointment Request (default)	Bookings appear as open requests. You review, communicate via the message history if needed, and confirm or decline.	Practices that want to individually review each booking
Automatic Confirmation	Appointments are immediately confirmed and added to the calendar. Pet owners receive the appointment confirmation directly.	Practices with clearly defined working hours and capacities

You set the mode under Settings → Booking Settings.

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Setup

1. Check Prerequisites

   Before clients can book online with you, three areas should be set up:

   Area	Where	Purpose
   Treatment Types	Settings → Treatment Types	Defines which services are bookable – with name, duration, and price
   Working Hours	Settings → Working Hours	Determines on which days and at what times appointments are possible
   Public Profile	Settings → Public Profile	Your practice details, description, and logo for the booking page

2. Activate Online Booking

   Navigate to Settings → Booking Settings and activate the Online Booking Calendar. After that, the following happens automatically:

   • Your personal booking page is enabled
   • The “Book appointment now” button appears on your public profile
   • Incoming requests appear under Appointment Requests

3. Adjust Booking Settings

   Under Settings → Booking Settings, you customize the booking to your needs:

   Setting	What it does	Default
   Buffer Time	Time gap before and after each appointment – ideal for travel and follow-up work (0–180 minutes)	0 minutes
   Lead Time	How last-minute bookings can be made – prevents overly spontaneous bookings (0–120 hours)	1 hour
   Advance Booking	How far in advance appointments can be booked (1–365 days)	60 days
   Booking Note	Custom text for pet owners during booking – e.g., directions or preparation instructions	–
   Booking Mode	Appointment request (manual confirmation) or automatic confirmation	Appointment request
   Currency	EUR, CHF, DKK, or USD – for the price display of your treatment types	EUR

4. Share Your Booking Link

   You can find your personal booking link under Settings → Public Profile. Recommended places to share:

   • Your own website and social media (e.g., Instagram link in bio)
   • WhatsApp status and email signature
   • Google Maps listing
   • QR code on business cards, flyers, or in the waiting room

   Tip

   Already have your own website? Then embed the booking calendar directly – as a custom element, div element, or iFrame. Pet owners do not have to leave your site.

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How the Settings Work Together

All building blocks seamlessly interconnect – creating a complete booking system:

Building Block	What it controls
Working Hours	Base framework for when appointments are bookable – per weekday with flexible time windows
Availability Exceptions	Vacations, sick days, holidays – override working hours for individual days or recurring periods
Treatment Types	Bookable services with duration, price, and description – optionally with room or equipment requirements
Resources & Rooms	Prevents double bookings of treatment rooms and specialized equipment
Therapist Resources	With multiple therapists: skill-based assignment – each therapist only receives matching treatments
Appointment Reminders	Automatic reminders via email and SMS – individually customizable templates
Public Booking Page	Professional profile page with calendar – also embeddable as a widget

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Related Topics

• Public Booking Page – Profile page, widget embedding, and everything pet owners see
• Managing Appointment Requests – Review, confirm, or decline incoming bookings
• Messages – Direct communication about appointment requests
• Contact Form – Direct messages through your public page
• Profile & Directory – Your public profile and the therapist directory
• Calendar & Appointment Overview – All appointments at a glance