What is Availability Control & Management?
Availability Control & Management determines which time slots appear on your booking pages and when customers are allowed to book them.
Availability works in two layers:
- Availability Schedule: A reusable weekly schedule containing working hours, timezone, and date-specific exceptions.
- Per-Calendar Booking Rules: Calendar-specific controls for buffers, minimum notice, time-slot intervals, meeting limits, and booking timeframe.
You can create multiple availability schedules and assign them to different calendars. For example, you might use Working Hours for client meetings and Evenings Only for coaching sessions.
Why Do You Need It?
- Control when customers can book: Define the exact days and hours you are available.
- Avoid unwanted bookings: Block holidays, days off, lunch breaks, or other unavailable periods.
- Reuse schedules: One availability schedule can be connected to multiple calendars.
- Prevent back-to-back meetings: Add buffers before and after appointments.
- Control last-minute bookings: Set a minimum notice period.
- Limit your workload: Control how many bookings a calendar can accept over a specific period.
Because schedules are reusable, changing your working hours in one place automatically affects every calendar connected to that availability schedule.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Open the Availability Page
Go to Dashboard → Availability.
Each availability schedule appears as a card showing its name, timezone, working hours for each day, and the number of calendars currently using it.
The default schedule is marked with a Default badge.
New workspaces start with an availability schedule called My Availability, configured for Monday through Friday from 09:00 to 17:00 in UTC.
Step 2: Create a New Availability
Click Create Availability.
Enter a name for the schedule. You can also enable Set as Default if you want newly created calendars to use this schedule automatically.
Save the schedule to open its settings page.
The Create Availability button is hidden when your role does not have permission to create availability schedules.
Step 3: Set the Weekly Hours
The schedule editor displays all seven days of the week. Each day has its own on/off switch.
Turn a day on to define when you are available. You can edit the start and end times for that day.
You can add multiple time ranges to the same day. For example:
| Day | Available Hours |
|---|---|
| Monday | 09:00 – 12:00 |
| Monday | 14:00 – 17:00 |
This creates a break between 12:00 and 14:00.
Use the plus icon to add another range. The duplicate option lets you copy one day’s working hours to other days.
Time ranges are validated while you edit them. An end time earlier than its start time is refused.
Step 4: Set the Timezone
Use the timezone control in the right-side panel to choose the timezone for the availability schedule.
All working hours you enter are interpreted in this timezone. Booking times are then converted appropriately for each guest.
The timezone belongs to the availability schedule rather than an individual calendar. Calendars sharing the same availability schedule therefore use the same interpretation of your working hours.
Step 5: Add Date Specific Hours
Use the Date Specific Hours card to create exceptions to your normal weekly schedule.
Click Add Another, choose a date, and then either:
- Set custom working hours for that date.
- Mark the entire date as an off day.
Date-specific hours override the normal weekly schedule for that date.
You can use them for holidays, half days, conferences, vacations, or one-off working days. Only today and future dates can be selected.
Step 6: Save the Availability
Use the Save button at the top to save the schedule name, timezone, and weekly working hours.
Date Specific Hours are saved separately when you confirm their dialog, so they do not require the main Save button.
Step 7: Manage an Availability Schedule
Open the action menu on an availability card to manage the schedule.
| Action | What It Does |
|---|---|
| Edit | Opens the availability settings. |
| Duplicate | Creates a copy of the schedule, including its working hours. |
| Set as Default | Makes this the default availability for newly created calendars. |
| Delete | Permanently removes the availability schedule. |
Step 8: Attach Availability to a Calendar
Open the calendar you want to configure and go to its Availability tab.
Select an availability schedule from the dropdown.
Below the selector, you can see a read-only preview of the selected schedule’s working hours and timezone.
Click Edit availability if you need to open and modify the selected schedule.
Per-Calendar Booking Rules
The calendar’s Availability tab also contains booking rules that further control which slots customers can choose.
Unlike availability schedules, these settings belong to the individual calendar.
Buffer & Booking Rules
| Setting | What It Does |
|---|---|
| Before Event | Blocks time immediately before a booking. |
| After Event | Blocks time immediately after a booking for notes, travel, cleanup, or preparation. |
| Minimum Notice | Controls how close to the appointment start time a customer can still make a booking. |
| Time-slot intervals | Controls the spacing between available start times. |
Minimum Notice
Minimum Notice is entered as a number plus a time unit. Supported units include minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years.
Slots inside the minimum-notice period are removed from the booking page.
Time-Slot Intervals
Time-slot intervals determine how frequently booking start times are offered.
Leave the value at 0 and start times are spaced according to the meeting duration. Set it to 15 and start times are offered every 15 minutes regardless of the meeting duration.
Meeting Limit
The Limit section controls how many bookings a calendar can accept over a particular period.
| Limit | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Per day | Maximum bookings accepted each day. |
| Per week | Maximum bookings accepted each week. |
| Per month | Maximum bookings accepted each month. |
| Per year | Maximum bookings accepted each year. |
A value of 1 means there is no limit.
Once the configured limit is reached, the remaining slots for that period disappear from the booking page.
This feature requires a plan that includes Meeting Limit.
Booking Timeframe
Booking Timeframe controls how far into the future customers are allowed to book.
Enter a number and a time unit to define the booking horizon. Dates beyond that period are not displayed on the booking page.
This feature requires a plan that includes Booking Timeframe.
Key Functionality
Availability Schedules Are Reusable
One availability schedule can be connected to multiple calendars. The Availability page shows how many calendars currently use each schedule.
When you change the schedule, every calendar connected to it follows the updated working hours.
Date Overrides Affect Every Connected Calendar
Date Specific Hours belong to the availability schedule rather than an individual calendar.
For example, marking 24 December as an off day on Working Hours removes availability on that date from every calendar using Working Hours.
Timezone Belongs to the Availability Schedule
Calendars using the same availability schedule also use the same timezone for interpreting working hours.
Booking Rules Belong to the Calendar
Buffers, minimum notice, time-slot intervals, meeting limits, and booking timeframe are stored on the calendar itself.
This means two calendars can share exactly the same weekly availability while still having completely different booking rules.
Prerequisites
- Permission to create, read, update, or delete availability schedules, depending on the action.
- A plan that includes Meeting Limit to use booking limits.
- A plan that includes Booking Timeframe to control how far ahead customers can book.
Important Notes
- Deleting an availability schedule is permanent and cannot be undone.
- Before deleting a schedule, check the Active on: N calendars information on its card and repoint affected calendars if necessary.
- Setting an availability schedule as default does not change existing calendars. It only determines which schedule newly created calendars use.
- A day with its switch turned off has no available hours at all.
- Multiple working-hour ranges are supported on the same day and should be used to represent breaks such as lunch.
- Minimum notice and buffers work together when determining available booking times.
- Date Specific Hours override the normal weekly schedule for the selected date.
- Timezone is controlled by the availability schedule, not by individual calendars.
Minimum Notice and Buffer Example
Minimum notice and event buffers can affect the same available slot.
For example, if a calendar requires 2 hours of minimum notice and has a 30-minute Before Event buffer, the earliest available start can effectively become 2.5 hours away when an existing booking ends directly on that boundary.
Availability vs Conflict Checking
Availability and calendar conflict checking solve two different problems.
| Feature | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Availability | Defines when you are normally open for bookings. |
| Check for conflicts | Checks connected external calendars to determine whether you are already busy. |
External calendar conflict checking is configured separately from the calendar’s Advanced Settings tab under Check for conflicts.