Calendar sync for Canadian salon owners who live in Google or iCloud
Your kid's hockey practice, the dentist, a course in Toronto: if it is in your own Google or iPhone calendar, Slotora stops offering that time to clients. And your Slotora appointments appear in that same calendar, so one screen shows the whole day.
Connect your calendar — 14-day trialConnecting it, calendar by calendar
Each person connects her own; nobody can connect a colleague's calendar for her.
Google
Sign in with Google
Choose Google Calendar in Slotora's calendar settings and approve the request on Google's own screen. That screen is also where you decide whether Slotora may read the names of your events or only when you are busy.
iPhone
Make an app-specific password at Apple
Apple offers other apps no sign-in button, so you create a password just for Slotora at account.apple.com and paste it in once. It is stored encrypted, and you can revoke it at Apple whenever you like.
Other
Another CalDAV calendar
If your calendar lives on a CalDAV server such as Fastmail or Nextcloud, give Slotora its address and a password and it connects the same way iCloud does.
Outlook
Subscribe to a private feed
Outlook can subscribe to a private iCal link that lists your Slotora bookings. Nothing travels back from Outlook to Slotora.
What travels in each direction
From your calendar to Slotora: the times you are busy. Slotora checks every fifteen minutes and closes those hours on your booking page, so something you add now disappears from the page within about a quarter of an hour, not instantly. With Google you can allow event names too, so your Slotora diary reads “Dentist, 2 pm” rather than “busy”; descriptions, locations and guest lists are never sent. From iCloud, Slotora works out the busy times and keeps only the times.
From Slotora to your calendar: your appointments, written into a separate calendar called Slotora that it creates in your Google account or iCloud. Each shows the client's name and the treatment, never her phone number, and Slotora writes nowhere else in your account. Hide it, recolour it or remove it like any other calendar.
Because a client's name now sits in your Google or Apple account as well as in Slotora, think of that account as part of your client records: keep it to yourself, protect it with two-step sign-in, and disconnect the sync if you hand the phone on.
The Canadian parts of keeping two calendars in step
Nothing exotic, but the things that go wrong when a salon and a calendar disagree about time.
Time zones agree
Slotora stores every appointment as an exact moment and shows it in your salon's zone. If you travel from Halifax to Calgary for a course, your calendar shows the same appointment at the local hour wherever you are, and the booking does not move.
Holidays belong on the hours screen
Closing for Victoria Day or B.C. Day is a tick on Slotora's opening-hours screen, from your province's list. Do not rely on a holidays calendar in your Google account to close the salon; Slotora's own list does that job.
Each colleague, her own calendar
A stylist's personal calendar closes only her column. Your evening plans do not block your colleague's clients.
Your account, your choice
You can disconnect at any time from Slotora's settings, and for iCloud you can also revoke the password at Apple.
What calendar sync does not do
Three limits, all deliberate or waiting on someone else.
- Outlook is one-way for now
- Two-way sync with Microsoft 365 and Outlook.com is built but not switched on, so Outlook only receives your bookings through the feed. Events in Outlook do not close slots.
- Up to fifteen minutes behind
- A personal appointment added in a hurry can still be booked by a client in the minutes before the next check.
- Not a way to manage the diary
- Drag one of your Slotora appointments to another hour in Google Calendar and Slotora puts it back where the booking is, because moving a client means telling her and checking her deposit. Change bookings in Slotora.
Questions about calendar sync
Will my clients see my personal events?
No. Your booking page shows only that a time is taken. Event names, if you allow them, appear only in your own Slotora diary.
Does it work with an iPhone calendar?
Yes, two ways, through iCloud and an app-specific password you create at Apple.
Can my whole team connect their calendars?
Yes. Each colleague connects her own from her login, and each calendar closes only her own hours.
Is calendar sync an extra charge?
No. It is part of the Canadian subscription, for every bookable person on it.
What if I move an appointment in Google Calendar?
Slotora puts the event back at the booked time; the booking does not move and the client is not told. Move appointments in Slotora, and the calendar follows.
One calendar for your whole day
Connect Google or iCloud, add a test event and watch that hour disappear from your booking page.