Create a New Booking


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Creating/ editing a booking 

OctopusPro enables you to:

  • Create bookings manually in the system e.g. if a booking is made over the phone.
  • Convert inquiries and quotes into bookings.
  • If you have a branded customer-facing app or have set up your Customer Portal, customers can make bookings directly through, which admins can confirm in the system.

After setting up your account, and before creating your first booking, make sure you have:

Table of contents:

How to create bookings manually?

When logged in as an admin user from the web view, from anywhere in the system, click +New at the top left of the page and select New Booking.

Or, from the sidebar menu, click on Bookings and select Create New.

You will be directed to the new booking form, fill in the information in the required fields:

First, select your booking status from the drop-down menu. The booking status is used to help you manage your bookings throughout their lifetime; from the time a quote is generated to the time a booking is scheduled, until the time it is completed. Visit the booking status page to learn more about booking status and how to add a new booking status.

Then, select the customer you wish to schedule the booking for:

  1. If the booking is to be made for an existing customer, type the customer name in the search bar to search for the customer.
  2. But, if the booking is to be made for a new customer, click on “Add new customer +” or click on the ‘+’ icon to enter the details of the new customer:

If you click on the + to add a new customer, a popup form will appear and you will be required to enter your customer details, like their name, email, phone number, billing address, and more.

Then, if your company operates under multiple trading names, you will be required to select one of the trading names for this booking, if you don’t select one, the default trading name will be automatically selected. Visit the trading names page to learn more.

After that, you can select a source, which is where you provide the communication channel that your customers used to submit the inquiry/quote. It helps you categorize your bookings based on the used channel. There are several choices that you can select from as shown below. For example: if you have received an inquiry through Facebook to create a booking on behalf of a customer, you can select Facebook from the choices. 

After selecting a customer, their address details that are saved in their account will be automatically added, and this will be the email delivery address. If you want to add a different delivery address than the one saved, you can click on “Add Address”.

  • A new address container will appear, fill in the details of the new address in the empty fields. Search for the address, type in the Unit/Lot Number, the Suburb, Postal/Zip code, the State/Region if required, and the Town/City. This address will be the delivery address for this booking. 
  • This can be used in case the delivery address is different from the booking address saved in the customer details. For example: if your booking address is in Australia and you want the delivery address of the booking to be held in a different Country, you can click on Add Address and select a new address for this booking. 
  • Click on Remove, to delete the whole address container. 

If activated from the forms & checklists settings, this container will appear when creating a new booking. It enables you to send SMS/Email reminders to customers for future bookings, and reminders to fieldworkers and admin users too. 

  1. Click on the empty field, and a calendar will appear and you can pick a follow-up date to send the SMS/Email on.
  2. You can also select the delivery method you wish to send the reminder via. You have two options: SMS and/or Email. So, the reminder can be sent as an SMS/Email, or you can select both options. 
  3. You can also add any additional notes to the reminder in the empty field for fieldworkers and admin users. 

You can activate automatic next service date reminders from Settings > Communications > Automations.

Your next step is to add a service or several services to the booking. To do this, click on “Add Service”.

A popup window will appear, viewing all the services that your business provides, if your services are put into categories, you can search by category, or search through all services, then select a service by clicking on it.

You can add a new service by clicking on “Create a new service”, you will be redirected to the Create a new service settings page to create a new service and add all its details. 

Or add a custom service for this booking by clicking on “+Add Custom Service”

By clicking on Add custom service, a new container will appear, fill in:

  1. Item Title: Insert the name of the service.
  2. Description: Write a description of the service details. 
  3. Service Manual: A service manual is only visible to your fieldworkers and your customers cannot see it. 
  4. You can also replicate this custom service. 
  5. Or delete the custom service.

If you need to replicate or delete the service from the booking, click on Replicate or Delete on the right side of the service.

If you have created custom fields for your service, they will appear in the booking and you can make selections based on your customer’s needs and preferences.

If you have set the custom field to affect the service price, a pop-up will appear asking if you want to set the new suggested price based on your settings. Click Apply recommended to update the price. 

If enabled in the settings, the products container will appear, and you can add one or more products to your booking, by clicking on “Add”.

You can enable admin users to add products to the booking when creating a new booking, from Settings > Services Settings > Products from the side menu on the left.

A popup window will appear, with a list of your existing products related to the selected service, you can select from, or you can add a new product to this service by clicking on “Add custom product”.

  • By clicking on “Add custom product” a  new container will appear for you to fill in:
  1. Description: it is a statement that gives details about customized items that are made for a specific buyer.
  2. The Cost usually offers special prices for the customers who want special products.
  3. Markup is the amount added to the cost price of the customized product and it is expressed as a percentage or dollar currency icon above the cost.
  4. Subtotal is auto-generated and calculates the cost of the product that the customer should pay added to the markup.

You can also remove the new product added by clicking on “Remove”.

The next step is to schedule your booking. 

  • Pick a start and end date from the calendar popup for the booking.
  • Then, pick a preferable start and end time for the booking, or click on “No specified time” if a specific time has not been set for the booking. 
  • You can add extra comments regarding the timing of the booking or any specific additional requirements.

To proceed, you will need to assign the service to a fieldworker by selecting them from the Fieldworker drop-down. You can also:

  • Click on Nearby bookings to view all nearby bookings to this booking address, viewing the bookings and their details including the assigned fieldworker. 
  • Click on Find availability to check all available fieldworkers that can be assigned to the selected service, select one from them, and make the selection process easier. 

You can also schedule more than one visit per service if needed, or assign different and more fieldworkers to the same service. To do this, click on “Add Appointment”.

A new container will appear, if you need to add a future visit, select the date and time you wish, you can also assign the same fieldworker or a different one for the service. Add any extra comments or requirements if needed.

But, if you need to assign a group of fieldworkers for the same service, add the same details (Date and time) of the service you have inserted previously and select a different fieldworker.

Ensure that the total price for the booking is correct. You can add an extra charge to the booking if necessary. You can also add a discount in the Discount field, and if needed, edit your tax rate (e.g. VAT, GST) by clicking on the percentage value in the tax field.

To finish creating the booking:

  1. Add any necessary private notes in the text box field, it allows you to share additional notes with your admin users and fieldworkers. This field is not visible to your customers and will not be added to the emails or attachments sent to your customers.
  2. Add a voucher code if available. 
  3. If there is a minimum charge, apply or ignore it using the toggle button.

The rest of the details are applied automatically, and cannot be edited. Finally, click “Save Changes” to create the booking.

You will then be directed to the Booking page and will see a pop-up window of an automated booking confirmation email, which you can send to your customer simply by clicking Send. You can make changes to the email content if needed.

How to edit a booking?

You can easily edit a booking after creating it from the booing list page, go to Bookings > All bookings then select the booking you want to edit, click on actions and Edit booking. You will be redirected to the booking form where you can edit all the details.       

Or from the booking view page, click on Actions > Edit from the top right of the page.

You will be redirected to the booking form where you can edit all booking details such as

  • Booking status.
  • Customer information.
  • Edit trading name.
  • Appointment date and time.
  • Booking address.
  • Add or remove services.
  • Add reminders.
  • Change selected or add fieldworkers and subworkers.
  • Edit service pricing.
  • Add voucher codes.

And much more as explained above.

How to convert an inquiry into a booking?

From the inquiries list page, select the inquiry you wish to convert to a booking. Click on the Actions button, and select Convert to booking.

Or

From the actions button, select View inquiry.

You will be redirected to the inquiry view page, on the top right side of the page, from the actions button, select Covert To Booking.

How to convert a quote into a booking?

From the quotes list page, select the quote you wish to convert to a booking. Click on the Actions button, and select Convert to booking.

Or

From the actions button, select View quote.

You will be redirected to the quote view page, on the top right side of the page, from the actions button, select Convert To Booking.

How to add a Google map address when creating a new booking?

When creating a new booking, you will be required to add a customer, select a trading name and choose your preferred booking location, based on the locations you have enabled for your business.

If you have enabled mobile location for your business, then you will be required to add a booking address.

To add a Google map address to the booking address field on OctopusPro, simply copy the URL of the Google Map page, and paste it into your address field when creating a new booking, and all the location field details will automatically fill and you won’t have to manually add it. 

First, after detecting the location on Google Maps, click on the page URL, and copy it.

After copying the page URL, simply paste it into your address field when creating a new booking on your OctopusPro account. 

After pasting the URL, all the location details will be filled in automatically in the empty fields. 

You can also copy the Google Map address link by clicking on Share, then COPY LINK on the popup window. 

After copying the link address, simply paste it into your address field when creating a new booking on your OctopusPro account. 

After pasting the link address, all the location details will be filled in automatically in the empty fields. 

How to add multiple addresses when creating a new booking?

To create a new booking, from your sidebar menu click on Bookings > Create New

You will be redirected to the new booking form page, to add a customer, select a trading name and choose your preferred booking location, based on the locations you have enabled for your business.

In the case that you select Mobile location, then you will be required to enter your booking address. 

After adding your booking address, you can then add multiple addresses by clicking on +Add Address.

A new section will appear, where you can add your second address, click on Remove to delete it, or click on +Add Address to add multiple other addresses.

How to remind customers and admin users of future bookings?

When creating a new booking as an admin user, after adding your customer, and selecting your business trading name and booking address, you can set up a next service date reminder, once activated from the forms & checklists settings page.

The service date reminder enables you to send SMS/Email reminders to customers for future bookings, and reminders to fieldworkers and admin users too. 

The next service date reminder helps you generate repeat work from existing customers that have already tried your service, and can greatly help improve your customer retention rate. If you provide a service that might be required again by your customers, whether that’s in a week, a month, or a year after job completion, then it’s a great idea to set a follow-up date to remind your customers to book your service again just before they might require them in the future.

The intent of setting up a follow-up date is for your customers and admin users to be reminded that your customer’s next service is due soon. You can also encourage customers to rebook your service by including a special offer or suggesting scheduling a recurring booking in your email or SMS templates.

The next service date reminder form is enabled by default. If you don’t want this form to appear, you can disable it from your Settings > General Settings > Forms and Checklists

Your admin users can follow up on due bookings from under Bookings > Next Service Due in your left menu.

The count of bookings due again that need to be followed up will display in your menu next to the Next Service Due link. All bookings that have a past to next service date will be included in that count until they are either converted to another status or their follow-up reminder is disabled. The notes field entered in the reminder section is visible to your admin users only and can be used to add notes that can help your admin users when following up with your customers.

If you have the next service date reminder automated email activated, your customer will also receive a reminder on this date via email or SMS to book your services again, depending on which delivery method you have enabled for the reminder.

  • You can activate automatic next service date reminders from Settings > Communications > Automations.
  • You can edit your next service date reminder email and SMS templates from Settings > Communications > Templates & Canned Responses.
  1. Select a follow-up date from the date picker.
  2. Select the delivery method you wish to send the reminder via. You have two options: SMS and/or Email. So, the reminder can be sent as an SMS/Email, or you can select both options. 
  3. You can add any additional notes to the reminder in the empty field for fieldworkers and admin users. 

You can activate automatic next service date reminders from Settings > Communications > Automations.

How to add a customer property when creating a new booking?

To create a new booking, from your sidebar menu click on Bookings > Create New.

You will be redirected to the new booking form page, to add a customer, select a trading name and choose your preferred booking location, based on the locations you have enabled for your business.

After selecting your customer, a new field will appear which is the customer property you have set up for your business. Visit the customer properties page to learn more.

If your selected customer has already added a customer property to their account, you can select it from the dropdown menu or create a new one by clicking on the + icon.

How to create recurring appointments?

After creating a new booking, selecting a customer, a trading name, and adding the booking address, select your requested service. Once created, go to the Booking drop-down under Scheduled Appointments, click on +Add Appointment and select ‘Recurring Appointment’.

A popup window will appear, 

  1. Select your preferred start date for your recurring appointments
  2. Set your recurring appointments start and end time

You then have two options to select from when setting your recurring bookings. You can either select an end date for your recurring appointments, which means that the appointment will recur every selected time, (day/week/month) until the end selected date. Or, you can recur the appointment for a significant number of Times, every number of days/ weeks/ months..etc.

For example, if you want to recur your appointment 3 times a week, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, write 3 Times, Recur every 1, select Week(s) from the dropdown, and pick the days of your appointment then click on Create appointments.

Your booking appointment will recur for a week on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, at 5 pm.

After creating the recurring appointments, you can then assign the preferred fieldworker. If you wish to assign the same fieldworker for all the appointments, after selecting the fieldworker, click on Copy to other appointments, and the fieldworker selected will be assigned to all the recurring appointments. But, if you wish to assign a different fieldworker for every appointment, then on every appointment select the preferred fieldworker. 

How to create a new booking with multiple services and different fieldworkers assigned?

You can create a booking with multiple services and different fieldworkers assigned. To create a new booking, from your sidebar menu click on Bookings > Create New.

You will be redirected to the new booking form page, to add a customer, select a trading name and choose your preferred booking location, based on the locations you have enabled for your business.

After adding your booking address, selecting your desired service, setting the date and time, and assigning a fieldworker, to add another service to your booking click on +Add Service.

Your second selected service will be added to your booking, with the same date and time you have set for your first appointment, you can then select a different fieldworker from the dropdown list and assign them to the second selected service. 

Click on Copy to other appointments to copy the date and time selected for all other appointments within the selected service only, to other appointments across all added services, or to appointments that are scheduled for the same original start and end date and time.

What is the difference between selling products and selling services?

In the case that your business offers or sells products (products that fieldworkers may additionally need when performing a job or your customers may request), you can sell products without needing to book a service and add a product to it. 

Admin users can add products when creating a new booking using product sales service on the customer’s behalf. 

How to display/hide the Product Sales from the services list and why you might need it

To display or hide the product sales from the services list, navigate to Settings > Services Settings > Services.

On the services list page, you will find Product Sales listed, disable the flag to hide it from the services list, or enable the flag to display it.

Why would I need to display the product sales on the service list?

If your business offers or sells products (products that fieldworkers may additionally need when performing a job or your customers may request) you can sell products without needing to book a service and add a product to it using product sales service.

What is the difference between adding products on the booking level and on the service level?

If you have added products to your business, whether you sell them or add them to your services when booked, you can add products on a booking level and on a service level. 

When creating a new booking, and selecting a service for your booking, you can either add a product to your selected service or just purchase a product on its own, by selecting “product sales” from your services list, a new section will appear, click on Add and select your desired product/s without having to select a service and adding a product to your service. 

Adding products on the booking level 

You can add products on a booking level when you just need to purchase a product without booking service and adding a product to it.

When creating a new booking, from the admin user web view, click on Bookings > Create New.

After selecting your customer, trading name, and booking address, click on +Add Service then click on Product Sales.

A new form will appear, click on add to add your preferred products, then click on Add to add your selected products. If you want to create a custom product for this booking, click on +Create custom product.

Adding products on the service level

You can add products on a service level when you need to create a service and add a product to it.

When creating a new booking, from the admin user web view, click on Bookings > Create New.

After selecting your customer, trading name, and booking address, click on +Add Service then select your preferred service.

After adding your service, click on Add on the products field.

A new form will appear, click on add to add your preferred products, then click on Add to add your selected products. If you want to create a custom product for this booking, click on +Create custom product.

How to add a custom form when creating a new booking?

To add a custom form to the create a new booking form, you must first create it from the forms & checklists page.

From your sidebar menu, click on Settings > General Settings > Forms & Checklists.

On the Forms & Checklists settings page, click on +Create new.

When creating your form, make sure you select “Always displayed” when choosing when to display your form. Click on Save to create your new form.

When creating a new booking, on the booking form, your new custom form will appear in a new field and you can select all your desired options. 

Visit the forms & checklists page to learn more.

How to view nearby bookings when creating a new booking?

When creating a new booking, you have the ability to view bookings that have been made in the same areas so that users can assign jobs to fieldworkers who will already be in the area.

The nearby bookings feature helps minimize the travel times required, by helping you schedule bookings near other existing bookings. It helps you reach nearby fieldworkers easily, and respond efficiently to emergency calls and last-minute bookings, to improve the booking experience. Visit the nearby bookings page to learn more.

After creating a new booking, selecting the customer, adding the booking address, selecting the service, and setting the booking date and time, you will be required to select a fieldworker. Click on Nearby bookings on the right side of the page, to view all the bookings nearby the booking location, with their assigned fieldworkers, to select a preferable fieldworker for your service.

When clicking on Nearby bookings, a popup window will appear, viewing a map that includes all the scheduled bookings nearby the booking location, as pinpoints. You can select any booking to view its details.

How to view available fieldworkers when creating a new booking?

When creating a new booking, the find availability feature will list all active fieldworkers that match the requested services, selected custom fields, and the location of the booking. It also lists the distance between the fieldworkers’ home locations and the booking location, as well as their calendar for the selected date so you can view their availability. You can view the matching fieldworkers by day by selecting a date from the date field at the top of the popup. You can also send requests to matching fieldworkers and assign them to the booking directly by pressing the Send Request button.

The find availability feature can help make better scheduling decisions for individual requirements. It makes the response to the booking request faster, hence improving the customer experience. It also helps users easily find available replacements when changing the assigned fieldworker for the scheduled service. Visit the find availability page to learn more.

After creating a new booking, selecting the customer, adding the booking address, selecting the service, and setting the booking date and time, you will be required to select a fieldworker. Click on Find availability on the right side of the page, to view all the available and active fieldworkers for the selected service, and easily assign one to your service.

How to add a voucher code when creating a new booking?

After creating a voucher code, you can add it to your booking to redeem the code and get a discount on the total booking price. Visit the discount voucher code page to learn more.

When creating a new booking, after entering all your booking details, at the bottom of the page, enter your voucher code here, then click on Validate.

Your voucher will be successfully redeemed and applied to the total price of the booking.

How to add a discount when creating a new booking?

You can add a discount to bookings, to get a discounted amount on the total price of the booking.

When creating a new booking, after entering all your booking details, at the bottom of the page under service pricing, enter your discount amount, you can choose whether you want the discount to be an amount or a percentage.

After entering your discount amount or percentage, it will be deducted from the total booking price.

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