In this article, we outline the customer experience for booking a shopping slot for your retail space using the Book & Shop App. Plus, we highlight the settings that affect how your customer booking widget works.

For help setting up the app check out this article.

Article Structure:

1. Customer Booking: Widget

2. Widget and Data Field Settings that affect the Booking Process

3. Customer Booking: Confirmation

4. Customer Entry via QR Code Scan

1. Customer Booking: Widget

When a customer opens your booking widget, the services activated for online booking display. The customer can select their preferred service…

…select a time…

…and depending on the authentication options you set in your widget, the customer confirms their booking…

2. Widget and Data Field Settings that affect the Booking Process

Account Settings play a big role in the customer booking process. Go to Settings and scroll through the Bookings and Widget tabs to customise how you want your booking widget to look and function.

• To maximise the number of customers who can access your store, we recommend you select 15 min intervals for the Online Booking: Slot Frequency setting. Why? Firstly, this allows for customers to check availability and book right outside your store - 15 mins is a waitable time. Secondly, if you have activated the 'check-out' time, a customer who checks out of their slot early (say they had a 2 hr slot, and checked out in just 20 mins) creates a gap for another customer to enter. When a customer checks out, the app updates within seconds; the software runs a check for whether new slots can be created, and if so, they are displayed in your booking widget.

Data Fields are important too. Go to Customers and Data Fields and select the data fields with the information you want from customers.

We recommend the following fields are made mandatory for online booking so that customers can receive an email or phone confirmation: First Name, Last Name, Email, and/or Phone. We also recommend that you make these four fields unique identifiers: this ensures customers with the same name do not get their bookings mixed up - as they are identified in the system via email and phone numbers.

For help with booking widget settings, check out this article

And for help with data fields, check out this article

3. Customer Booking: Confirmation

If you have activated the email data field and made it mandatory, customers will only be able to schedule a booking slot if they provide a valid email. They will receive an email confirmation with an 'overview' section similar to the below, summarising their appointment:

…and if you activate QR Code Check-In in your app settings, the following section appears in the email:

4. Customer entry/exit using the QR code

When you or a team member scan(s) the customer code, one of the following messages will display…

Once successfully checked-in, the customer's code updates to a check-out code. This can be scanned to register the customer's check-out.

To check-out a customer scan their code again. You can also do this from the app, from the Live in store tab by clicking Check-out customer.