Let Customers Reschedule Bookings Online (Customer Portal & Email Links)
OctopusPro lets your customers reschedule an existing booking online without calling your team. Customers can reschedule from their Customer Portal booking view page or by clicking the reschedule link/button in your booking confirmation and reminder emails.
This feature is ideal if you want to reduce inbound calls, minimize no-shows, and give customers the flexibility to adjust appointment times while still respecting your availability rules and business policies.
Table of contents
- What this feature does
- Benefits
- How to allow customers to reschedule bookings (Admin setup)
- How customers reschedule from the Customer Portal
- How customers reschedule from email links
- How “Minimum notice time” and “Cancel bookings” settings affect rescheduling
- How to disable rescheduling (and remove reschedule links from emails)
- FAQs
What this feature does
When enabled, customers will see an Edit / Reschedule option on their booking view page in the Customer Portal. They can pick a new date/time (based on your portal scheduling rules) and confirm the change.
Customers can also reschedule by clicking a “Reschedule or change booking details” link/button inside your booking emails, which takes them to the same booking view page.
Benefits
- Less admin workload: customers adjust their own appointments instead of calling your office.
- Better customer experience: customers can reschedule anytime, from any device.
- Fewer scheduling conflicts: you can control whether customers see real-time availability or only working hours.
- Automatic communication: customers receive a confirmation after rescheduling.
- Fewer missed appointments: customers can easily move bookings instead of no-showing.
How to allow customers to reschedule bookings (Admin setup)
- Go to Settings > Customer Portal > Flags & Permissions.
- In the Booking flags section, enable: “Allow customers to reschedule bookings through the customer portal and email links”.
Availability behaviour: When customers reschedule, you can choose how strict scheduling should be:
- Real-time availability enabled: customers can only select times that are currently available (existing bookings and blocked events are taken into account).
- Real-time availability disabled: customers can select any time within your configured working hours (availability conflicts are not checked in real time).
How customers reschedule from the Customer Portal
- Customer logs in to your Customer Portal.
- Customer opens the booking they want to change (booking view page).
- Customer clicks Edit (or Reschedule where available).
- Customer selects a new date/time and confirms the reschedule.
After clicking Edit/Reschedule, a pop-up window appears so the customer can choose their new preferred time.
How customers reschedule from email links
If rescheduling is enabled, a “Reschedule or change booking details” link/button can appear in your booking confirmation and reminder emails. When customers click it, they are redirected to their booking view page in the Customer Portal to reschedule.
After the customer reschedules, a confirmation email is sent showing the updated booking time.
The updated scheduled time will also appear in your admin portal booking details. (Go to Bookings > open the booking > Booking Details / View Booking.)
How “Minimum notice time” and “Cancel bookings” settings affect rescheduling
Your cancellation policies can also affect whether a customer can change a booking close to the appointment time. If you’ve configured a minimum notice time, customers may be prevented from making changes too close to the scheduled start time.
- Learn more about minimum notice time settings here: Allow minimum time required before canceling settings.
- Learn more about cancel booking controls here: Allow customers to cancel bookings through the customer portal and email links.
Customers can open the booking view page and hover over the Edit button (where available) to proceed with rescheduling.
Depending on your settings, the Cancel booking option may be replaced with Schedule an appointment to let customers create a new booking instead.
How to disable rescheduling (and remove reschedule links from emails)
If you don’t want customers to reschedule online, you can disable the feature and remove reschedule links from your emails.
- Go to Settings > Customer Portal > Flags & Permissions.
- In Booking flags, turn off: “Allow customers to reschedule bookings through the customer portal and email links”.
- Update your email templates to remove the reschedule link/button: go to Settings > Communications > Email Templates, then edit your Booking Confirmation and Booking Reminder templates and remove the “Reschedule or change booking details” element.
FAQs
Will customers be able to reschedule cancelled or completed bookings?
Typically, rescheduling applies to active/upcoming bookings. If a booking is already cancelled or completed, customers generally won’t be able to reschedule it from the portal.
Can customers reschedule to times that conflict with other bookings?
That depends on your availability settings. If real-time availability is enabled, customers should only see available times. If it’s disabled, customers may be able to choose any time within working hours, and you may need to resolve conflicts manually.
Do customers receive confirmation after rescheduling?
Yes. After rescheduling, customers receive a confirmation email showing the updated booking time.
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