Appointments from the chat

Book an appointment in a free time from your calendar, right from the chat: the confirmation is a draft, and sending it adds the appointment to your calendar. Trades & services.

With Trades & services chosen under What I use ChatPilot for, a customer who asks when you can come gets an answer in two taps: ChatPilot shows the times your calendar has free, you pick one, and the confirmation goes into the chat. Nothing is sent and nothing is added to your calendar until you send that confirmation.

What you need

Your calendar connected under Settings → Calendars, with Free/busy on for the calendars that say when you're busy, and May add events on for the calendar the appointments go into. See Connect your calendars.
When you work, under Settings → Meeting times: the hours, the days, how soon at the earliest and how far ahead. Time between jobs keeps that many minutes free before and after every other appointment, for travel. These also count for auto-answer's meeting times.

Book an appointment

Open the customer's chat and press ⋯ More → Book an appointment.
Choose How long the job takes. Free time lists the free times for that length in the coming days, worked out from your calendar; only whether a time is busy is read, never what's in it. Pick a time yourself takes any date and start time instead.
Choose the calendar, and a place if you like (the customer's address). The title is what the appointment is called in your calendar.
Press Write the confirmation. It is a draft in the chat, like "Your appointment is on Tue 3 Nov, 10:00, until 11:00. See you then!". Change the words if you like, then send it.

Sending it adds the appointment to your calendar. A discarded draft books nothing.

Above the chat, Appointments shows the ones still ahead: Not sent yet while the draft waits, In your calendar once it went. If the calendar didn't take it (it was disconnected, or May add events was switched off), it says Not in your calendar with the reason; press it and then Try again.

The reminder the day before

On the day before an appointment, from the start of your hours under Settings → Meeting times, ChatPilot writes a reminder for the customer into the chat, like "A reminder: your appointment is tomorrow, Tue 3 Nov, 10:00, until 11:00. See you then!". It is a draft: nothing is sent until you send it. It reaches you like any other draft, so you can send it from your phone, change the words first or discard it.

It comes once for each appointment, and once more for the new time when you moved it.
No reminder when the customer already heard about the time that day (you booked or moved it on the day before).
Moving or cancelling an appointment throws away a reminder of the old time that is still a draft.
Press the appointment above the chat to see whether its reminder is waiting or was sent.

Move or cancel an appointment

Press the appointment under Appointments above the chat:

Move opens the same free times (and Pick a time yourself) with the appointment's length. Pick the new time and press Write the confirmation: a draft like "Your appointment of Tue 3 Nov, 10:00 is moved to Wed 4 Nov, 14:00, until 15:00. See you then!".
Cancel writes a draft like "I'm sorry, I have to cancel your appointment of Tue 3 Nov, 10:00. Shall we find another time?".

Change the words if you like, then send it. Only sending it moves the appointment in your calendar or takes it out; until then the appointment shows move … not sent yet or cancel not sent yet, and discarding the draft leaves the appointment as it was. One change at a time: send or discard the first before you move it again.

ChatPilot only changes the appointment it added to your calendar itself. If you deleted it in your calendar in the meantime, a move adds it again at the new time. If the calendar refuses a change (May add events was switched off, or the Mac only lets ChatPilot add events), the appointment says so: Not in your calendar or Cancelled, still in your calendar, with the reason; press it and then Try again, or change it in your calendar app.

On my way

On the day, ⋯ More → On my way in the customer's chat and pick how long until you are there (15, 30 or 45 minutes, an hour). "On my way, I'll be there in about 30 minutes." goes in the reply box; change it if you like and send it. It is never sent by itself.

Your own words: make a template named on-my-way on the Templates page and put {eta} where the time goes, for example "Hi {name}, I'm on my way, there in about {eta}." On my way then uses that one. Picked as a template with /on-my-way, {eta} is your Settings → Meeting times → Time between jobs; without one it stays selected for you to type over.

Good to know

No calendar connected yet: the menu offers Connect your calendar instead.
No free time in the coming days: pick a time yourself, or widen the hours or days under Settings → Meeting times.
Only you as the owner books appointments; a team member doesn't see Book an appointment, since the calendar is yours.
Auto-answer never sends the confirmation for you: it is a draft like any other.

Checked against ChatPilot 0.1.0b10.dev0. Report a problem with this page