Taking appointments and reservations
Let customers book a time from your live availability — one-on-one appointments (salon, spa, coaching) or shared seated reservations (restaurant, tasting room). You set the hours and the rules; your store generates the open times and never double-books.
Taking appointments and reservations
Bookings on Zillo are Calendly-style: you set weekly hours and a few rules on a resource (a stylist, a table, a tasting room), and your store generates the open times for customers to pick from. You never have to keep a list of dates in sync — the open times build themselves from your hours and fill up as bookings come in. Your store never double-books, and it works in two shapes:
- One-on-one appointments — salon, spa, coaching, dental, court bookings, consultations.
- Shared seated reservations — restaurants, tasting rooms, classes with a head count, anywhere several parties book into the same window until it fills.
For fixed-date events (a 7pm tasting on a set night, a class every Saturday at 10am), use Event tickets with multiple dates instead — there the customer picks one date at checkout and each attendee gets a per-seat QR.
Set up a resource first
Bookings always run against a resource — the person, table, or room being booked — and the resource is where your weekly hours live. Create your resources before you build the product, or your booking will have no open times to offer.
Appointment vs reservation
The shape is decided by the Max seated setting:
- One-on-one appointment (Max seated = 1) — the booked time belongs to one customer. A hair appointment, a massage, a 1 coaching call. Booking 2pm with a stylist takes that stylist's 2pm entirely.
- Seated reservation (Max seated greater than 1) — a single time holds several parties until it's full. A 7pm restaurant seating for 20; a party of 6 takes 6 of those seats and the rest stay open.
You can switch between the two at any time just by changing Max seated on the product.
Create a booking product
- Open Products. Go to Products and click New product → Appointment or Reservation. (The AI builder can also route you to the right form if you describe what you offer.)
- Fill in the basics. Add a title, description, photo, and price. Booking with no payment? Set the price to 0 and customers reserve a time for free.
- Assign a resource. Pick the person, table, or room this is booked against — or several, if more than one can serve it.
- Set the rules (below).
- Publish when you're ready, or save as a draft.
You'll find every booking that comes in under Bookings, and the same times laid out visually in Calendar.
The booking rules
These shape exactly which times your store offers:
- Duration — how long one appointment lasts.
- Time step — how far apart the offered start times are. Leave blank for back-to-back times (every duration minutes).
- Minimum lead time — how far ahead a customer must book. A time disappears once it's inside this window, so you're never caught by a booking five minutes out.
- Booking window — how many days into the future customers can book.
- Buffer before / after — quiet time padded around each appointment so back-to-backs aren't jammed together (cleanup, travel, notes).
- Max seated — guests per time. 1 = one-on-one; higher = a shared seating.
- Min / max booking size — the smallest and largest party a single booking can be.
For restaurant seatings, set the time step equal to the duration so seatings are clean and back-to-back — a 6
, a 7, a 9 — rather than overlapping. For appointments, a buffer of 10–15 minutes keeps your day from running over.What customers see
The booking page shows the resource (or lets the customer choose, when more than one is offered), then a date and the open times. For a seated reservation, each time shows how many seats are left, and the party-size picker won't let them book more than will fit. Sold-out times drop off automatically, and your store never double-books a one-on-one slot — even if two people try at the same instant, only one wins.
When the customer reaches checkout, their time is held for a few minutes while they fill in their details — a countdown shows how long. That stops two people racing for the last table and losing it mid-checkout. If the hold runs out, they're prompted to pick another time.
Add upgrades and required choices
Attach add-ons to a booking — a wine pairing, a photographer, a bottle on arrival — from the product editor. Optional add-ons are simple extras; group them into a required, choose-one menu (a banquet menu where every party must pick one) when you need a selection before checkout can continue. See Add-ons and upgrades.
What the customer gets
Every booking issues a confirmation email with a QR code and a calendar invite (.ics) the customer can add to their own calendar in a tap. One QR admits the whole party at the door — scan it from the Redeem tab in the mobile app or Redemptions.
You can turn on automatic reminder emails so guests don't forget their time — see Automated event reminders.
Managing bookings
- See everything under Bookings — each row shows the time, the resource, the party size, and the customer's details.
- View your day visually in Calendar. Switch between month, week, day, and a team view (one column per resource). You can drag an appointment to reschedule it and click an empty slot to create one — the customer is re-notified automatically and your store checks the new time is free first.
- Find the order for any booking under Orders to refund or resend the confirmation.
Availability comes from the hours you set on each resource — Zillo doesn't read your Google or Outlook calendar. To block a day off, add a date-specific override on the resource (see the resources article below).
Reduce no-shows
Two tools cut down on empty slots:
- Hold a card / no-show fee — keep a card on file to secure a free booking and charge a fee if the guest doesn't turn up. See Hold a card & no-show fees.
- Let customers cancel or reschedule themselves within a cutoff you set, so a freed slot can be rebooked rather than wasted. See Customer cancellations & reschedules.