Making sure emails arrive
Why messages land in spam, and the settings that fix it.
Booked writes your confirmations; WordPress sends them. That hand-off is where messages go missing, and the settings that control it sit under Settings › Emails & texts.
How your site sends email
Out of the box, Send emails via is set to WordPress default: Booked hands each message to WordPress, which posts it out from your web server without signing in to any mailbox. To Gmail or Outlook that looks like a message claiming to be from your pharmacy with nothing to back the claim up, so plenty of it is filed as junk and some is dropped with no bounce. Either way, nothing appears in your admin.
The alternative is SMTP (Gmail, Outlook, custom). Your site signs in to a mailbox you already own — Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, or one at your hosting company — and sends through it, as if a member of staff had typed the email.
- Booked's emails are HTML only, with no plain-text version, which some strict filters mark down.
- There is no separate reply-to address — replies go to whatever is in From email.
- These settings apply to all mail from your site, not only Booked's.
Set the name and address customers see
Settings
Configure how Booked works.
Settings › Emails & texts › Email delivery, on the default setting.
- 1Emails & texts — fourth tab down the rail. Everything about how mail leaves your site sits here.
- 2Send emails via — WordPress default hands the message to your web host; SMTP sends it through a mailbox you own.
- 3From name — the sender name customers see, taken from your company name on Settings › Company.
- 4From email — the address mail is sent as, and where every reply lands. Use one on your own domain that somebody monitors.
- 5Save settings — one button saves every tab at once. Navigate away without pressing it and your changes are gone.
Both fields are filled in from Settings › Company. If you never completed that tab they fall back to your WordPress site name and admin email — which is how confirmations end up arriving from "My WordPress Site".
Two similar fields do different jobs. The Email on Settings › Company is your public contact address, shown on your booking form and available in any template as the merge tag {company_email}. From email here is who the message is sent as. They start identical and drift apart the moment you edit one.
From name and From email apply to all WordPress mail, including password resets and your contact form. Point them at an address that exists and that somebody reads, because every reply lands there. If what you type is not a valid email address it is ignored and WordPress uses its own sender instead.
Send through your own mailbox
Have the mailbox you want to send from, and its login, to hand before you start.
- Set Send emails via to SMTP (Gmail, Outlook, custom)The SMTP fields only appear once you choose it.
- Pick a Provider presetIt fills host, port and encryption, then snaps back to "Choose…" — a one-shot shortcut, not a saved choice.
- Enter the UsernameThe mailbox login, usually the full address. Leave it blank and Booked switches SMTP authentication off altogether.
- Enter the PasswordFor Gmail or Outlook, an app password generated inside that account — not your normal account password.
- Press Save settingsThen send yourself a test, as below.
For Gmail or Outlook, use an app password — not your normal account password.
The same card with SMTP chosen — the extra fields only appear at that point.
- 1SMTP (Gmail, Outlook, custom) — choosing this reveals everything below it. Switching back hides the fields but does not erase what you typed.
- 2Provider preset — fills host, port and encryption in one click, then resets to "Choose…". It always looks unset; that is not a fault.
- 3SMTP host, Port and Encryption — leave SMTP host empty and the whole section is ignored, with mail quietly falling back to the default route. Keep Encryption on TLS; None also turns off automatic TLS.
- 4Username and Password — the mailbox login. As the note under the fields says, for Gmail or Outlook this must be an app password, not your normal account password.
| Field | Gmail preset | Outlook / Office 365 preset |
|---|---|---|
| SMTP host | smtp.gmail.com | smtp.office365.com |
| Port | 587 | 587 |
| Encryption | TLS | TLS |
| Username | Not filled by the preset — type the mailbox login yourself | |
Check that a message really sent
There is no test button in Settings, so getting SMTP wrong is silent. Test from the template editor instead.
Emails and texts sent to customers across the booking lifecycle.
{service_name} — {booking_date} at {booking_time}
{location_name}
Notifications › Templates, with the Booking approved email open.
- 1Email / SMS — the channel switch. Testing exists only on Email; there is no test for a text message.
- 2The seven events — every moment Booked can message a customer. Each event holds one saved email and one saved text, and the list opens on Booking pending. Test the one customers actually receive: Booking pending if bookings wait for review, Booking approved if Auto-approve new bookings is on.
- 3Send this email to the customer — a message switched off here is skipped entirely. All seven email templates ship switched on, so if one is off, somebody turned it off.
- 4Save template — saves this one event and channel. Click another event, or flip to SMS, before pressing it and your edits are discarded without warning.
- 5Send test — mails whatever is on screen, saved or not, to any address you type.
Send a test to a Gmail address and an Outlook one, and check both junk folders. It uses fixed sample details — Alex Sample, a Yellow Fever Vaccination with Priya Sharma at 10:30 — so no real booking is touched.
"Test email sent." means WordPress accepted the message, so if nothing turns up the problem is at the receiving end. "Could not send — check the site can send mail." means WordPress refused it: fix that on Settings › Emails & texts, not in the template.
Settings › Activity log records changes made in Booked, not messages sent to customers. No booking history will ever show "confirmation emailed", so a successful test is your only proof that sending works.
When a customer says nothing arrived
First work out whether a message was ever meant to go. Booked's emails are reactive: they fire when somebody books, pays, or a booking is edited.
| They say | What is usually happening |
|---|---|
| "I never got my confirmation" | Check the junk folder, check that template is switched on, then switch to SMTP and send yourself a test. |
| "I got two emails" | Normal after an online payment: one when the booking is created, then Booking approved once the card clears. |
| "You never reminded me" | Booked sends nothing before an appointment. Every email is triggered by an action, never by a clock. |
| "Nobody told me it was cancelled" | Deleting a booking sends no email. Set the status to Cancelled first, then delete. |
| "You marked me as a no-show" | Completed and No-show send nothing — neither status has a message. |
| "My refund went through, no email" | Refunding updates the booking but sends nothing. Booking refunded and Payment received are editable and switched on, yet nothing in Booked fires them — tell the customer yourself. |
| "It said {customer_firstname}" | A mistyped tag prints as written. Insert tags with the chips under the editor. |
| "Only one of us got it" | A group booking sends one email to whoever booked, covering the party. |
| "I expected a text" | SMS templates ship switched off, and texting is not live yet — the SMS by Booked card reads "Not connected". |
The business never gets an email either: no new-booking alert for staff, no copy of the confirmation. The only message Booked sends you is the daily digest, switched on under Notifications › Daily digest.
When Booked ships a new email design it replaces the subject and body of all seven default email templates the next time an admin page loads. Your on/off switches and every text message survive; customised email wording does not.