How the post-visit feedback feature works and how to set it up.
This guide applies to practices on either Optomate Touch or Sunix Vision. Most of the setup is identical; where the two systems behave differently, look for the Optomate / Sunix callout boxes.
After a patient attends an appointment, they receive an SMS with a link to a branded feedback page. The page gives them a choice: leave a public Google review, or send private feedback back to the practice — with optional thumbs-up/down sentiment to make the signal meaningful even when they don't type anything.
Both paths are presented with equal weight; the system never filters or routes patients toward Google based on sentiment. This keeps the feature compliant with Google's review-gating policy and aligned with AHPRA's guidance on soliciting patient feedback.
Eligible patients are any who attended a selected appointment type, haven't opted out of marketing in your practice system, and haven't been contacted within the frequency cap — not just those who booked online.
The feedback page shows your practice logo and branding:
"Thanks for visiting [Practice Name]"
"Let us know about your experience"
Below the prompt, the page presents two equal-weight choices, in order:
The Google button sits above the comment box on purpose, so the box clearly belongs to the private path — a patient typing a note isn't left expecting it to carry through to Google (it can't). Both options still carry equal visual weight.
The patient can respond with a thumb alone, text alone, both, or by clicking through to Google. Thumb clicks are recorded immediately so even bounces count as a signal. The Send button lights up once either a thumb or text is present. Clicking Google also persists any in-progress thumb/text before opening a new tab to your Google review page.
Each link can only be used once — after the patient submits or clicks through to Google, the page shows a thank-you message.
How "marketing opt-out" and the send channel are decided differs by practice system:
Optomate: eligibility reads the patient's marketing consent (
PREF_MARKETING). Patients set to SMS or Email are eligible and are contacted on that preferred channel; anyone set to Exclude (or to a non-digital channel) is skipped.Sunix: Sunix has no per-patient marketing-channel preference, so the practice picks the feedback channel instead (default SMS), with automatic SMS↔Email fallback. Eligibility is gated by the patient's recall/marketing status — patients flagged as do-not-contact, or whose recall code excludes marketing, are skipped. Because either channel can be used, Sunix practices need both an SMS and an email feedback template (see Step 3).
Feedback is enabled by Your Booking support. Once enabled, you'll see a "Post-Visit Feedback" card in the Recalls & Reminders tab of your admin dashboard.
Choose an SMS template for the feedback message. Templates are managed in the Templates tab — create one with scope "feedback" if none exist. The template can use placeholders like {PATIENT_FIRST_NAME}, {PRACTICE_NAME}, and {FEEDBACK_LINK}.
Tip: No template yet? Click Draft with AI in the template editor — describe the message and Your Booking drafts it for you (see Draft a template with AI).
The default template if none is selected:
"Hi {PATIENT_FIRST_NAME}, thanks for visiting {PRACTICE_NAME}. We welcome your feedback — you can leave a public review or send us private feedback: {FEEDBACK_LINK} Reply STOP to opt out."
Sunix: because the feedback channel is practice-set with an automatic SMS↔Email fallback (rather than per-patient preference), you need both a feedback SMS template and a feedback email template configured, so a send can fall back to email when a patient has no usable mobile. The "Patient preference" channel option isn't shown on Sunix.
Choose which appointment types trigger a feedback request. Only patients who attended one of the selected types will receive a message. If no types are selected, no feedback will be sent.
This lets you target specific visit types — for example, you might want feedback after comprehensive exams but not after quick follow-up appointments.
Optomate: the picker only shows appointment types marked Available Online, because the Optomate API exposes only those. If you want to include a staff-only type (walk-in / phone booking), mark it Available Online in Optomate and disable all New/Recent/Inactive flags on it in YourBooking — it stays invisible to patient booking but becomes targetable here. Same constraint applies to reminder template overrides, pre-visit emails, and the manage-link ineligible list.
Sunix: there's no "Available Online" flag — every appointment type is available to pick here. To target a type without offering it for online booking, leave its New/Recent/Inactive patient flags off.
If your practice has a Website Booking URL or custom short domain configured (admin Domain Settings), you can toggle "Use practice domain for links" so feedback links go through your branded URL instead of yourbooking.au. SMS will use your short domain (e.g. yp.au?t=fTOKEN) and email feedback links use your booking URL — no URL rewrite rules needed on your web server.
When you toggle feedback on for the first time, a compliance dialog explains:
You must accept before the feature activates. The acceptance is recorded with timestamp and username.
Below the main feedback settings, you can enable reply notifications. When a patient replies to a feedback SMS (rather than clicking the link), you receive an immediate email with their reply text.
You can optionally set a different recipient email — useful if feedback replies should go to a manager rather than reception.
YourBooking does not retain the reply text on its own servers. For each feedback reply, a new patient note is created on the patient's record. Feedback SMSs don't ask a yes/no question, so replies aren't classified further than opt-out (STOP) vs message.
Optomate: the note is written to the patient's record with
DESCRIPTIONset toFeedback SMS reply (stop)for opt-outs orFeedback SMS reply (message)for anything else; the full reply text lives in the note'sNOTEfield. Open the patient in Optomate → Notes tab to read it. This requires the Patient Notes (Read + Create) API permission — see the Recalls & Reminders setup guide for where to enable it in Optomate. Without it, YourBooking still classifies the reply and emails you the text, but the patient record won't get the note.Sunix: the reply is saved to the patient's Patient Notes panel — open the patient in Sunix to read it. There are no API permissions to enable; the agent writes the note directly.
The Feedback tab of Recalls & Reminders has a Reporting card with four sections:
"Opened" is stamped the first time a patient's link is loaded. "Responded" counts any patient who selected a thumb or submitted text (or both). Email preview bots can inflate the opened count slightly, so read it as "at least N opens".
Each private submission also triggers an email to your practice (or the reply notification email if configured), with the patient name, a note of whether they sent privately or left a Google review alongside it, and the thumb rating if selected.
In the staff dashboard Sent History tab, each feedback entry shows whether the patient clicked Google, sent private feedback, or hasn't responded. The reply category badge (MESSAGE / STOP) is shown; for the full body of SMS replies, open the patient's notes in your practice system.
Optometry practices are regulated by AHPRA. Key points:
This feature works similarly to HotDoc's post-appointment review requests, which are widely used by Australian health practices. If you have specific compliance questions, check with your professional association or AHPRA directly.
Toggle the feature off on the Post-Visit Feedback card in the Recalls & Reminders tab. No further feedback requests will be sent. Existing feedback links remain valid until used.