Booking rules: shortest notice, how far ahead, start times and cancelling
The rules that decide when guests may book online: the start-time step, the shortest notice, how far ahead, the cancellation deadline, and where the late-cancellation fee lives.
Settings → Booking rules decides when guests may book on your booking page. You and your team can still book by hand outside them (see 'Overlapping bookings').
- 'Start-time step' — how far apart the offered start times are: 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 or 60 minutes, 15 unless you change it. It never adds a gap after an appointment
- 'Shortest notice (minutes)' — how soon from now the first bookable time is: 120 unless you change it. At 0, a time later today can be booked
- 'Bookable ahead (days)' — the last day guests can book, counted from today: 90 unless you change it, up to 730
- 'Cancellation deadline (hours)' — until when guests can move a booking themselves: 24 unless you change it. Cancelling stays open until the start (see 'Letting clients cancel or move their own booking')
- 'Which free times guests see' and 'Fill the days already started this week first' — see 'Which free times guests see'
The late-cancellation fee and its window are set on the Payments page. Booking rules are for owners and admins; in the app they are under Settings → Booking rules.