Different appointment lengths: first visit and follow-up¶

In short: almost no practice runs on a single type of appointment. A first visit needs more time, a follow-up needs less, and a calendar that treats them the same either wastes your minutes or makes you run late. Wably handles different appointment lengths: you set up two of them, each with the name you actually use, and the assistant offers every client the slots that fit what they need.

What a one-length calendar costs you¶

Anyone who works by appointment knows the trade-off. Set everything to the longer length and every half-hour follow-up eats a full hour, so the day fills up only halfway. Set everything to the shorter one and the first visit overruns, and from there you are late for every appointment that follows.

With two lengths the trade-off disappears. Each appointment takes exactly the time it needs, the day compacts, and the slots on offer never overlap each other, whatever mix of long and short appointments the day ends up with.

How different appointment lengths work¶

You set the lengths once from the dashboard, in the Business hours screen. Each length has two things: a name, chosen by you, and the minutes. The gap between one client and the next stays a single setting, shared by both lengths.

From then on, the assistant works like this:

• If the client has already said what they need, it asks nothing. "I'd like to book a first visit on Thursday" is enough: the assistant goes straight to the free slots for that length.
• If it isn't clear, it asks once which type of appointment is needed, listing the options with their length. One question, not a questionnaire.
• If the client asks for something that isn't on the list, the assistant doesn't refuse and doesn't leave the conversation hanging: it offers the available options and carries on from there.

The chosen type doesn't stay inside the chat. It appears on the event in your Google Calendar and in the daily email summary, so when you look at the day ahead you already know what each hour holds.

You choose what each length is called¶

This is what separates Wably from an online calendar with fixed services, and it is worth two lines of its own.

The name of each length is free text. Write First visit, Full treatment, Initial consultation, First session, Follow-up: whatever you actually say to your clients when you talk to them. On WhatsApp the assistant uses exactly those words, without translating them into a generic software label and without forcing them into a preset category.

You can hear the difference. A client reading "Would you like a first visit or a follow-up?" is reading their own practitioner's language. A client reading "Select service: Type A / Type B" is talking to a piece of software, and it shows. It is the same principle behind the whole conversational AI assistant: the practice's way of speaking comes first, not the software's.

The gap a short appointment leaves behind¶

This is the part that makes money, not just order.

Normally the slots start at opening time and advance by a fixed step, length plus gap. With two lengths configured the assistant does one more thing: it also recalculates the slots from the end of every appointment already in the calendar, adding the gap.

A concrete example, with a 9:00 to 13:00 shift, a 50-minute first visit, a 30-minute follow-up and a 10-minute gap. You already have a follow-up from 9:00 to 9:30. The next first visit the assistant offers is at 9:40, not at 10:00: twenty minutes of your room that a rigid grid would have left empty, and that here turn into a booking.

Across a full week of long and short appointments mixed together, that is several hours recovered without working a minute more. The calculation is explained with every example in the Business hours documentation.

When a client reschedules, the length stays¶

Rescheduling is already a nuisance: it shouldn't also turn into a fresh interview.

When a client asks to move an appointment, the assistant already knows which type they had booked and keeps the original length. It doesn't ask for the type again, doesn't start from scratch, and can't put a first visit into the space of a follow-up. It offers alternatives with the correct length and updates the calendar. The full booking, rescheduling and cancellation cycle is described in appointment management on WhatsApp.

Who needs two lengths¶

Almost everyone who works by appointment, in one form or another:

• the physiotherapist and the osteopath, between the first assessment and the treatment session
• the psychologist, between the first session and the ones that follow
• the nutritionist, between the first visit and the check-up
• the speech therapist, between the assessment and the therapy session
• the beauty salon and the massage studio, between a long treatment and a short one
• the personal trainer, between the initial assessment and the training session

Every other category is listed in solutions by profession.

Two lengths on Standard, one on Starter¶

On the Standard plan you can configure up to two different lengths. On the Starter plan there is one length, the same for every appointment: it is still fully configurable in minutes, along with the gap between one client and the next.

Lengths are not the price list. What a treatment costs goes in the Service info screen, which is also where the assistant takes its answers about prices and services from. How long a booking lasts is set in Business hours. Two screens, two purposes: the price does not change with the length chosen.

The full comparison between the two plans is on the plans and pricing page.

Try Wably free for 30 days