Email everyone with an appointment a set number of days before or after it — including patients who have already confirmed.
Common uses:
You can run several at once. Each one is a rule with its own timing, wording and audience — a 3-day-before information email, a 1-day-before note to unconfirmed patients and a 1-day-after thank-you can all run side by side.
This is part of the core admin feature set — it does not require the Recalls & Reminders module, and there is no SMS cost because it is email only.
Three different emails can reach a patient around their visit. They do different jobs:
| When it sends | What it's for | |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduled appointment email | A set number of days before or after the appointment | Information. No reply expected. |
| Appointment reminder | A set number of days before, for patients who haven't confirmed | Asks the patient to confirm, reschedule or cancel. Replies update your practice system. |
| Pre-visit email | Immediately after booking | Intake forms and "what to bring", tied to one appointment type. |
The scheduled appointment email deliberately does not ask for a reply, does not update appointment statuses, and does not appear in your reminder summary. It also carries no reschedule or cancel link — every patient already has one from their booking confirmation.
It can run alongside reminders. A patient with both configured may receive both; they read differently, so that is usually fine, but check the days-before settings so they don't land on the same morning.
If you have no rules yet, the Messaging > Scheduled Email tab offers to set one up for you. This is the fastest way to start, and everything it creates can be edited afterwards.
You get a working rule sending at 5:00 PM Monday to Friday for every appointment type, plus a starter template written for that job. Read the template before it sends — it is deliberately generic, and mentions things like parking and what to bring that you will want to make true of your practice. Open Messaging > Templates and edit it.
Running the helper again later reuses your template rather than replacing it, so your edits are safe.
Already had this set up? If you configured the earlier single-card version, it has become your first rule, named Upcoming appointment, with the same timing, template and filters. Open it to check it reads the way you expect. Practices that never configured the old card start with no rules and see the helper instead.
Tip — draft it with AI: Click Draft with AI, describe the message in a sentence, and Your Booking writes it for you. See Draft a template with AI.
Each run day at the send time, everyone whose appointment is that many days ahead (or behind) receives the email.
Three optional filters on each rule:
After-rules read what your front desk records. "Did not attend" is decided by the appointment's status the day after, so a patient who attended but was never moved past Confirmed counts as not attended. If your practice doesn't reliably progress statuses, use Attended only.
One email per patient, not one per appointment. If someone has two appointments on the day, or a family shares an email address, they get a single email listing them. The earliest appointment's type decides which template is used.
Dispensing and collection appointments are skipped automatically, so a patient collecting glasses doesn't get an email written for an eye examination.
Set the rules up at one branch, then use Sync to copy them to your other branches — the same push and copy-from controls the feedback and recall settings use. Rules are matched by name: a rule that's new at the other branch arrives switched off, and one that already exists there keeps its own on/off setting.
Expected if both are configured with similar days-before values. Adjust one so they arrive on different days, or narrow this rule's appointment types.