Managing appointments over the holidays: get your calendar ready for the High Holidays

The Tishrei holidays, the run of Jewish holidays that falls in early autumn, are the busiest and most confusing time of the year for businesses that work by appointment. Within a few weeks come Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot, with holiday eves, Chol HaMoed (the intermediate days of Sukkot, when many businesses work partial hours) and days when half the customers want to come in "right before the holiday" and the other half are away. Managing appointments over the holidays without early preparation almost always leads to the same result: appointments booked on a closed day, endless phone calls and disappointed customers. In this article we build an orderly work plan, holiday by holiday, so the calendar works for you during this period too.

Start early: when to prepare the calendar

The common mistake is to start thinking about the holidays a week before Rosh Hashanah. By then customers have already booked, some of them on days when the business won't be working at all. Start preparing at least a few weeks before the first holiday, and answer a few questions:

• On which days is the business completely closed?
• On which days do you work shorter hours, holiday eves for example?
• Does the whole staff work during Chol HaMoed, or only part of it?
• Which days are likely to be the busiest?

Only once the picture is clear do you move it into the calendar.

Sync the Israeli holidays to the calendar, holiday by holiday

In OverTor you can sync the Israeli holidays directly to the calendar, holiday by holiday. The advantage of syncing each holiday separately is that not every business closes the same way on every holiday. A barbershop may close on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur but work during Chol HaMoed Sukkot. A personal trainer may want to work on some of the days when others close.

Recommendations for syncing:

1. Go through each holiday separately and decide whether to add it as a closure.
2. Pay attention to holiday eves. In many cases you don't close the whole day, you just finish early. Decide in advance until what time you work on the holiday eve and make sure the calendar reflects it, so customers don't book for hours when the business is already closed.
3. Check the calendar after syncing and make sure no existing appointments fall on closed days. If there are any, contact those customers early and arrange a new time.

Staff closures and time off

The Tishrei holidays are also a time when staff members take time off. In a business with several staff members, each one has their own calendar and shifts, so you can set closures for an individual staff member and not only for the business as a whole.

Take a barbershop with two barbers: one barber is away during the week of Sukkot, and the other is working. Instead of closing the whole business, you set a closure only in the calendar of the barber who is away. Customers keep seeing available times with the other barber, and the business keeps earning. For more tips on managing shifts, read our guide to managing staff and shifts.

The busy days: the booking window and opening early

The days before Rosh Hashanah and before Sukkot are usually the most in-demand days of the year. Everyone wants a haircut, their nails done or a facial before the holiday. This is where the booking window comes in, meaning how far in advance customers can book an appointment.

There are two possible approaches:

• Open the calendar early. If your usual booking window is two weeks, consider extending it ahead of the holidays, so regular customers can reserve their appointment in time and aren't hunting for a slot at the last minute.
• Open gradually based on how full you are. Opening the calendar gradually lets you open more days only when the nearest ones fill up. That avoids a scattered calendar full of gaps, and the days fill in order.

Check your service durations as well. On the busy days every minute counts, and a service set for too long leaves small gaps no one can book.

A waitlist for the fully booked days

Even with the best planning, the day of the holiday eve will fill up. The question is what happens to the customers who didn't find a slot. Instead of calling again and again, they can join the waitlist for the full day, or for a day that hasn't opened for booking yet.

When someone cancels, and cancellations before a holiday do happen, the slot that opened up is offered automatically to the waitlist. The business chooses whether to give priority to the first in line, or to send a message to everyone at once, with the slot going to whoever books first. During the holiday period, when demand is high, the second option fills the slot especially fast. For more, read the guide to the smart waitlist.

Tell customers your opening hours

An up-to-date calendar is only half the job. Customers need to know what is going on, preferably before they try to book.

• Business page: update the description on your business page with your holiday opening hours. Once the closures are set in the calendar, the closed days simply won't show as available either.
• The poster in your business: the QR code poster hanging in the business is a chance to remind customers who are already with you to book their appointment before the holiday.
• At the end of every visit: a short line like "The calendar fills up fast before the holiday, it's worth booking now" goes a long way.
• A link to your business page: share the link on social media with a message that holiday appointments are open.

A checklist for the Tishrei holidays

1. Decide which days are closed, shortened or regular.
2. Sync the holidays to the calendar, holiday by holiday.
3. Set staff members' time off in each one's own calendar.
4. Check that there are no existing appointments on closed days.
5. Extend the booking window or turn on gradual opening.
6. Make sure the waitlist is active.
7. Update your business page and let customers know.

The bottom line

Managing appointments over the holidays is mostly a matter of timing. A business that prepares the calendar a few weeks ahead, syncs the holidays, sets staff closures, opens the busy days in time and turns on the waitlist goes into the Tishrei holidays calm and organized, and comes out of them with a full calendar and happy customers.

Want to go into the holidays with your calendar in order? Download OverTor from the App Store or Google Play, sync the holidays to your calendar and start taking appointments today. Shana tova, a good new year!