Taking bookings

If you take appointments, your receptionist can book them straight into your calendar while on the call. This is optional, and off until you connect a calendar.

There's no save button on the Bookings page: a switch or a pick saves the moment you change it, and a time or a postcode saves when you move on from it. The top of the page says Saved once it has.

Connecting your calendar

1. Go to Settings, then Bookings.
2. Under Calendar, tap Connect beside Google Calendar (bookings land in the calendar you already use) or cal.com (bookings go through your cal.com event types). You'll be sent to sign in with that provider and come straight back. Dealers on MotorDesk can book into MotorDesk instead; see Connecting MotorDesk.
3. Add what callers can book (see below).
4. Turn on Offer bookings on calls under Taking bookings. You need at least one appointment type first. Once you've added your first one it turns on for you.

Setting up Google Calendar

The Bookings page has three parts:

• Taking bookings: Offer bookings on calls turns booking on and off; with it off, your receptionist takes a message instead. Below it is On-site appointments, for jobs at the customer's address (see below). Then, under Calendar, your Google account with Disconnect, and Book into, which of your Google calendars appointments land in.
• Appointment types: what callers can book. Each one opens over the list (see below), and Add appointment type adds another, up to ten.
• Booking hours: tick the days callers can book and set the times for each. Untick a day to keep it clear.

Appointment types

Tap an appointment type to open it over the list, or Add appointment type for a new one. One you've already added saves itself as you change it, like the rest of the page.

• Name and Length: what the appointment is called and how long it takes.
• When to offer it: optional. With more than one type, this is how your receptionist tells them apart, so make each one say what the caller is asking for.
• Callers per time: One for a normal appointment. Choose Several for things like an open house, a group viewing or a class. Your receptionist offers one time per slot (a 60-minute type is offered at 12:00, 13:00 and so on) and keeps booking callers into it. Set Max people to stop at a number, or leave it empty for no limit. These bookings show as Free in Google Calendar so they don't block each other. If you also put your own event in Google for that time, such as "Open house", set it to show as Free too, or it blocks the bookings. Your receptionist won't offer a time that already has shared bookings for a different appointment type. Bookings taken before you chose Several still block the time: open them in Google Calendar and set them to show as Free.
• Times: Booking hours offers the appointment whenever you take bookings. Choose Own times for an appointment that only happens at certain times, like viewings of one property on Tuesday mornings. Your booking hours are filled in to start from; tick the days and set the times, and your receptionist offers that appointment only then, telling callers when it's available rather than asking them to name a day. Those times replace your booking hours for that appointment alone, so the rest of your week is unaffected. If a caller can't make any of the times, your receptionist takes their details and tells them the team will be in touch. Each day's times must be long enough for one appointment. (This is being switched on for businesses one at a time; if you don't see Times yet, ask us.)

A new one has one button, Add type, which adds it and takes you back to the list; close it without adding it to drop it. To take one away, open it and tap Remove appointment type. You always keep at least one; to stop taking bookings, turn Offer bookings on calls off instead.

On-site appointments

Turn on On-site appointments if your jobs happen at the customer's address rather than your own premises. Your receptionist then asks the caller for the postcode before offering any times, and takes the first line of the address before booking; the address shows as the location on the calendar event, so it opens in Maps.

Times are offered to keep your driving down: your receptionist leaves enough time to get from the appointment before to the appointment after and, within a day, offers the times that add the least driving first. Your receptionist keeps to the day the caller asks for when a time on that day works, and otherwise says so plainly and offers the nearest days that do. Appointments you put in your own calendar count too, as long as they have a start and end time and their location includes a full postcode (an all-day entry isn't used, since it doesn't say where you are at any particular hour). An appointment type with Several callers per time keeps its own place, so no address is added to those.

Where you set off from is where your day starts and ends, for working out the driving. The first time you turn on-site on, we fill it in from your business address, so change it if you set off from somewhere else. If we don't have your business address, add the postcode: on-site turns on once it saves. It stays saved if you turn on-site off again.

We estimate the drive between appointments from road data, rounded up to the next 15 minutes. This is available for Google Calendar only, for Great Britain postcodes, and it's an estimate rather than live traffic.

Setting up cal.com

Your cal.com event types are the appointment types. Under Appointment types, switch on each one callers can book; it takes effect straight away. Add a note under When to offer it if you like; it saves when you move on from it. A type with no phone-number question in cal.com can't be offered until it has one: tap Add it for me and we add it. Refresh from cal.com picks up event types you've added or changed there.

If you see Booking updates under Calendar, cal.com isn't yet telling Sayora about bookings made or changed there. Tap Set it up and we connect it for you.

How a booking goes

Your receptionist offers to book the caller in, checks your live availability, and reads back a couple of options. The caller picks one, your receptionist checks that day and time with them, and then books the slot into your calendar under their name. The caller then gets a text confirming the appointment. With cal.com, that text includes cal.com's link to reschedule or cancel. With Google Calendar there's no link: to move or cancel it, the caller rings back from the number the appointment is booked under, with their caller ID showing, and your receptionist changes it on that call. If their number is withheld, your receptionist can't change the appointment on that call, so they need to call back with their number showing. If your calls are forwarded in a way that shows your own number instead of the caller's, your receptionist can't change an earlier appointment on the phone and takes a message for you instead. If they change their mind straight away, say they want to check with someone first, your receptionist tells them it's already booked and cancels it on the call, so nothing is left in your calendar that nobody wanted. They then get a second text saying it's cancelled.

Booked appointments show up on the lead in your portal under In your calendar, so you can see they're already booked in. Booked callers skip any caller text, since the confirmation already covers it.

Managing the connection

Back on Bookings you can Disconnect your calendar, or turn Offer bookings on calls off for a while without disconnecting, for example over a holiday.

Updated on: 29/10/2026