Check people in when they arrive

Mark a customer as arrived at the desk, and whoever is seeing them sees it on their own diary within half a minute.

Somebody walks in, says their name at the counter, and takes a seat. Check-in is how the desk tells the rest of the building. One press on the appointment and it is marked as arrived; the pharmacist or clinician who is seeing them sees it on their own diary, on their own screen, without reloading anything. No more walking through to say "your ten forty-five is here".

It is a mark on the appointment, nothing more: the time they arrived and who pressed the button. It does not change the booking’s status, and it sends the customer nothing.

Switch it on

1. Open FeaturesIt is under System. Check-in is in the Appointments group: "Mark a customer as arrived from the diary or their booking, so whoever is seeing them can see they are here."
2. Flip its switchIt saves at once and the pill changes from Off to On. There is nothing to set up, so the card has no Set up button: only the switch.

• 1Check-in — off until you switch it on. It is not an add-on, and it has nothing to set up.
• 2The switch — on. The Check in buttons appear in the Diary and on bookings when those screens next load, so reload the page if they are missing.

Only people allowed to change Features can flip the switch. Switching it off takes the buttons and the Diary’s Checked in key away, and Booked refuses a check-in with "Check-in is switched off. Turn it on in Features." Anybody marked as here stops showing as here until it is switched back on.

Check someone in from the Diary

The Diary is where reception usually lives, so this is the quick way.

1. Click their appointmentThe pop-over opens with their name, the service and the time.
2. Press Check inIt is the green button at the front of the row (after Confirm on a pending booking). The pop-over closes and the block changes at once.

• 1The checked-in block — a green edge down its left and a green tick before the name, whatever colour the block already is. Hovering the tick says Checked in.
• 2Here since 10:32 — the time they were checked in, in the pop-over’s row of tags. The appointment’s own time is unchanged.
• 3Undo check-in — takes the mark off again. It replaces Check in once they are marked; see Undoing it below.
• 4Checked in — joins the key above the grid while Check-in is switched on.

Before the button is pressed, the pop-over shows Check in in green, first in its row, with no tag. The button is not offered on a cancelled appointment.

What the other screens see

Whoever is seeing the customer does not need to do anything. Every Diary that is open checks for changes every 30 seconds, quietly, and draws the green edge and tick when they appear, so a check-in made at the desk reaches the consulting room within half a minute. There is no flash and no sound; the block just changes. The Diary only checks while its tab is in front, and holds off while you are in Quick edit, have a booking open or have a bill open, so nothing moves under your hands. It catches up when you are done.

The same goes for the Bookings list and the booking editor, except that those refresh when they next load rather than on a timer.

From the booking

Open the booking, from the Bookings list or from Open booking in the Diary, and Check in sits in Quick actions on the right, under Mark completed. It saves straight away, like every quick action.

• 1Check in — in green, under Mark completed. One click; nothing else on the page needs saving first.
• 2Here since 10:32 · undo — what the same button becomes. Press it again to take the mark off.
• 3The confirmation — "Checked in. Their diary shows they are here." under the buttons. Undoing says "Check-in undone."

The button is only there on a saved booking that is not cancelled. The booking’s status pill in the header does not change, because the status has not.

Undoing it

Pressed it on the wrong person, or they left again? In the Diary, open the appointment and press Undo check-in; on the booking, press Here since 10:32 · undo. The mark comes off everywhere within the same half minute, and the block goes back to its usual colour. Then check in the right person. Nothing is sent to the customer either way, and both the check-in and the undo are kept in the booking’s Activity log, so a wrong press is no more than two lines in the history.

What it changes, and what it does not

• The status stays as it was. A Confirmed booking is still Confirmed after check-in. Being here is not the same as being seen: when they have been, press Mark completed as you do now.
• A no-show who turns up is a no-show no longer. Checking in an appointment marked No-show sets it back to Confirmed at the same time. The customer is not emailed about it, unlike Not a no-show in the Diary, which sends Booking approved.
• A cancelled appointment cannot be checked in. Booked refuses with "This appointment is cancelled. Reinstate it first if they are here." Set the status back to Confirmed and save, then check them in.
• Nothing is sent. No email, no text, to the customer or to your team. It is a mark for the people in the building.
• The time is when the button was pressed, in your site’s time zone, not the appointment’s start. Somebody who is early reads Here since 10:32 for a 10:45 appointment.
• The Activity log keeps it. On the booking, under Activity log, a check-in is "Checked in: they have arrived" and an undo is "Check-in undone", each with the name of whoever pressed it and the time.
• Connected calendars are not told. A Google or Microsoft calendar event carries the appointment, not the arrival.

Where else it shows

• The Diary, on every view that draws blocks: the green edge and the tick in Day and Week view, and Here since 10:32 in the pop-over.
• The Bookings list. A green Here tag under the service name, beside Walk-in or Video when the row has those too. It is a tag, not a filter: you cannot list only the people who are in.
• Payments › Take payment. With Take payment switched on as well, each bill that still owes money carries the same Here tag after the customer’s name, so the desk can see at a glance who is in the building and still has something to pay, and press Check out while they are there. See Take payment at the desk.

Who can check people in

Owners always can. For everyone else, it is anyone whose Bookings access or whose Diary access is set to Edit under Team (see Give your team their own logins). Either will do, because checking in is a front-desk job as much as a diary one.

• Front desk and Manager presets have both at Edit, so they get the buttons.
• Practitioner has the Diary at Edit but is held to their own appointments, so a pharmacist can check in their own patient from their own column, and nobody else’s.
• Somebody with View on both still sees the green edge, the tags and Here since, but has no button to press.
• Without the feature switched on, nobody has the button, whatever their access.

Common questions

• Does the customer get a message? No. Check-in sends nothing, to anybody, and switching it on changes none of your emails or texts.
• Can I see who checked them in? Yes. Open the booking and read the Activity log: "Checked in: they have arrived", with the name of the person who pressed it and the time.
• What if I pressed it on the wrong person? Open that appointment again and press Undo check-in (or Here since … · undo on the booking), then check in the right one. The undo is logged too.
• Will it mark them completed? No. The status does not move. Mark completed is still the way to say they have been seen, and Mark no-show the way to say they never came.
• Do I need to check in a walk-in? No. A walk-in is standing at the desk, so Booked checks them in as it books them, and their block carries the mark from the start.
• Does the mark clear at the end of the day? Yes. Here means here today: from the next day the green edge, the tag and Here since are gone, and the booking offers Check in again. The time they arrived stays in the activity log.
• Why can I not see a Check in button? Either the feature is off in Features, your access to Bookings and the Diary is at View, the appointment is cancelled, or the page loaded before the feature was switched on. Reload it.

Related: Using the Diary, Find and manage bookings, Booking statuses explained, Take payment at the desk, Switching features on and off.