How to configure the booking system after installation. This guide covers the practice admin dashboard, appointment type configuration, and all available settings.
This guide applies to practices on either Optomate Touch or Sunix Vision. Where behaviour differs between the two, look for the Optomate / Sunix callout boxes.
Open your practice's admin page in a browser:
https://yourpractice.yourbooking.au/adminLog in with the admin username and password provided during onboarding.
Before patients can book online, your appointment types need to be pulled in from your practice management system and set up — which ones to offer online, which patients each one suits, and a short description for each.
The first time you open the Appointment Types tab, before anything is synced, you'll see a Set up your appointment types panel that can do most of this for you.
Optomate: open your Appointment Types screen and tick Available for Online Appointments on every type that relates to an eye examination — you can leave non-examination types (e.g. spectacle collections or repairs) switched off. You don't need to decide which exams to expose: Your Booking only ever shows patients the types you switch on at its end, so it's safest to make them all visible and choose inside Your Booking. Anything you don't want patients to book simply stays switched off there.
Sunix: there's no "online" flag — every type comes through automatically, so there's nothing to do here. Non-examination types (e.g. spectacle collections) will appear too; you can leave those switched off when you review in the next step.
Your Booking pulls in your types and suggests a starting point for each one: whether to offer it online, which patient groups it suits, and a friendly description. Nothing is final — every type is listed so you can adjust or switch any of them in the next step. The suggestions are a time-saver, not a decision you're locked into.
Prefer to set everything up by hand? Click Sync from Optomate (or Sync from Sunix) instead. Your types come in switched off, ready for you to configure from scratch in Step 1.3.
For each synced type, you can configure:
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Active/Inactive | Toggle to show or hide this type from the booking flow. Inactive types cannot be booked. |
| New patients | Allow new patients (never visited before) to book this type |
| Recent patients | Allow recent patients (visited within the inactive threshold) to book this type |
| Inactive patients | Allow inactive patients (not visited recently) to book this type |
| Public description | Short description shown to patients when choosing an appointment type |
| Public details | Longer details shown to patients when choosing an appointment type |
| Display order | Controls the order types appear in the booking flow (lower numbers appear first) |
| Age limits | Optional minimum and/or maximum patient age for this type |
| Booking limits | Optional: a maximum number of this type per day, and/or restricting which days and times it can be booked |
| Pre-visit email | Optional: send an automated email with additional information after a patient books this type (intake form, prep instructions, etc.) — see Pre-visit Emails setup |
After the initial setup, the Appointment Types tab has three AI actions:
Each appointment type's standard length comes from your practice management system and is shown next to the type (e.g. 30 min) on the Appointment Types tab. It isn't edited in Your Booking.
Per-optometrist overrides (Optomate). If an optometrist has a different length for a particular type set in Optomate, it appears as a small badge next to the standard length — for example RM: 45m (the optometrist's initials and their length). These are read live from Optomate, so:
Sunix uses one length per appointment type (no per-optometrist overrides), so no badges appear.
When a patient identifies themselves, the system classifies them based on their record in your PMS:
The inactive threshold can vary by patient age if the optional age-based cutover is configured (see Patient Registration settings below). For example, children might be classified as inactive after 12 months while adults use the standard 36-month threshold.
Each appointment type can be enabled for any combination of these patient types. For example:
An appointment type that is active but has no patient type flags set (N/R/I all off) will not appear in the standard booking flow. However, it can still be booked via a recall link if a recall mapping points to it. This is useful for appointment types that should only be available to patients who receive a specific recall.
Use the age icon on each appointment type to set optional age restrictions. For example:
Use the clock icon on each appointment type to set optional booking limits:
Both limits only ever hide slots, never add them, and are re-checked at booking confirmation as a safety net. After changing them, click Save changes on the Appointment Types tab to apply.
You can configure an automated pre-visit email per appointment type. It sends after a patient books (or from the staff dashboard manually for walk-in / phone bookings) and can contain anything useful for that type: a link to an online intake form, "what to bring", pre-visit prep instructions, etc. Full walk-through: Pre-visit Emails setup.
Optomate only — note on per-type configuration. Per-appointment-type rules in YourBooking — pre-visit emails, reminder template overrides, feedback filters, the manage-link ineligible list — can only target types marked Available Online in Optomate. The Optomate API doesn't expose staff-only types. If you have a staff-only type you want to include (e.g. a distinct walk-in type), mark it Available Online in Optomate and disable all New/Recent/Inactive flags here — it stays invisible to patient booking but gains access to all per-type features.
Sunix doesn't have this limitation: every appointment type is synced, so per-type rules can target any type even if you've left it Inactive for patient booking.
These photos are shown to patients when choosing an available time slot, helping them recognise their optometrist.
If appointment types share physical equipment (e.g. a visual field machine that can only be used by one patient at a time), configure shared resources to prevent double-bookings.
Resources are shared across all appointment types — once created, they appear in every appointment type's dialog. The link icon shows a count badge when resources are assigned.
Shared resources can also be used to reserve a room — for example, if a contact lens fitting requires a specific consultation room, create a resource for that room with max_concurrent: 1 and assign it to the relevant appointment type.
The booking system will then check resource availability when offering time slots, ensuring conflicts are prevented.
Go to the Settings tab to configure booking behaviour.
| Setting | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Online booking enabled | Master switch — when off, the booking page shows as unavailable to patients. Turn this on when you're ready to go live. | Off |
| Minimum advance hours | How far in advance patients must book. Prevents last-minute bookings. | 24 hours |
| Maximum days ahead | How far in the future patients can book. | 90 days |
| Allow patient rescheduling | Whether patients can reschedule their own appointments via the manage link. | Yes |
| Block reschedule/cancel within (hours) | How close to the appointment patients can no longer reschedule or cancel online. Applies to both SMS and email links. | 24 hours |
| Setting | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Default patient source (Optomate only) | Optomate source applied to newly registered patients (e.g. "Online Booking"). Select from your Optomate sources list. Sunix doesn't have a Sources concept — this setting is hidden on Sunix tenants. | None |
| Default inactive months threshold | Months since last visit before a patient is classified as inactive. | 36 |
If your practice uses different inactive thresholds for younger and older patients, you can configure an age-based cutover:
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Age cutoff (years) | The age that separates "young" and "old" thresholds |
| Young threshold (months) | Inactive threshold for patients under the cutoff age |
| Old threshold (months) | Inactive threshold for patients at or above the cutoff age |
When all three fields are set, the system uses the age-appropriate threshold instead of the default. For example, with an age cutoff of 18, a young threshold of 12 months, and an old threshold of 36 months: a 10-year-old would be classified as inactive after 12 months, while a 40-year-old would need 36 months.
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Policy acknowledgement | Text that patients must explicitly tick a checkbox to accept before the Finalise Appointment button becomes active — e.g. "I acknowledge that a cancellation fee may apply for missed appointments." Leave blank to disable the checkbox entirely. |
| Confirmation notice | Text shown to patients on the booking confirmation screen and included in the confirmation email as an "Important notice". Use this for billing information, what to bring, parking instructions, etc. |
The booking system doesn't just show every possible time slot. It intelligently places appointments to keep each optometrist's day compact and avoid fragmented schedules.
When a patient looks for available times, the system:
Patients are shown the preferred times first, grouped by day. If none suit, they can tap "Other times" under a day to reveal that day's remaining available times — shown alongside the preferred ones in a lighter style and in time order, so it's easy to see which times sit next to each other (helpful when booking two appointments together).
The "Restrict presented slots" setting controls how much "Other times" reveals: off (default) shows every available time on your slot grid; on shows only times that sit directly against your preferred times, keeping your day gap-free.
| Setting | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Slot interval (min) | Minutes between available slot start times | 15 |
| Minimum gap (min) | Minimum usable time that must remain between appointments. Slots that would create a gap smaller than this are hidden. | 30 |
| ASAP search days | How many days ahead to search when showing "next available" slots | 30 |
| Max ASAP slots | Maximum number of slots returned per search | 500 |
| Date picker max days | Maximum days ahead when using the date picker | 90 |
| Cache TTL (sec) | How long availability results are cached (0 = always live). Cache is automatically cleared when a booking is made. | 0 |
| Restrict presented slots | When on, "Other times" shows only slots adjacent to preferred times; when off, the full slot-grid schedule | No |
An optometrist's day with two existing appointments:
9:00 AM +--------------+
| Patient A |
9:30 AM +--------------+
(empty)
12:00 PM +--------------+
| Patient B |
12:30 PM +--------------+
(empty)
5:00 PMFor a 30-minute appointment, the system would offer:
A slot at 10:00 AM would leave a 1.5-hour gap after Patient A and a 2-hour gap before Patient B — both usable. But a slot at 11:15 AM would leave only a 15-minute gap before Patient B — too small to be useful — so it's excluded.
Add the booking system to your website using a two-line embed. The hosted script handles the iframe, auto-resizing, and routing of email/SMS link tokens to the right view inside the iframe.
<div id="yourbooking-embed"></div>
<script src="https://yourbooking.au/embed.js" data-tenant="yourpractice"></script>Replace yourpractice with your practice's subdomain slug.
If you use this option, set the Website Booking URL in admin Domain Settings to the full URL of the page hosting the iframe (e.g. https://www.yourpractice.com.au/book-online). Email appointment links go directly there. See the Website Integration Guide for full setup including the optional SMS short domain.
Simply link to https://yourpractice.yourbooking.au/ from your website. The booking system runs as a standalone page with the practice header and footer visible.
This is simpler but the patient leaves your website to book.
If your practice changes its name, address, phone number, email, or default optometrist in your PMS, update the booking system:
The email address (also shown as Reception email in the SMS Configuration card) is where booking notifications, recall summaries, patient SMS replies, and agent offline alerts are sent. It's also shown to patients in the booking page footer.
This information is used for creating new patients, in booking confirmation emails and in the map link.
Note: To prevent sync from overwriting a manually-set value, the practice phone and email are only filled by sync when they're empty in YourBooking. To force a re-sync after a change in your PMS, contact YourBooking to clear the field first, then click Sync again.
The Booking Activity tab shows a history of all booking activity, including:
The Overview tab shows:
Click Change Password in the admin header to update your login credentials.
For higher-risk admin actions — editing message templates, adding or removing admin users, changing SMTP or domain settings, or turning 2FA off — you can require a fresh passkey tap on top of your normal password login. Routine work (viewing bookings, sending links, syncing appointment types, etc.) is unaffected.
The feature uses passkeys — the same OS-level credential mechanism used by Apple Passwords, Google Password Manager, 1Password, Windows Hello, and so on. There are no SMS codes, no authenticator apps, no QR codes to scan; if you've used Touch ID, Face ID, or Windows Hello to log into anything else, you're already familiar with the flow.
Enrol a passkey:
Turn on enforcement:
Once on, any of the listed sensitive actions will prompt for a passkey tap. You can't disable 2FA again without a fresh passkey verification.
Things to know:
yourpractice.yourbooking.au and a custom domain (e.g. book.yourpractice.com.au), enrol a passkey on each.By default, patient emails — booking confirmations, reminders, recalls, follow-ups — come from obs@yourbooking.au with your reception address as the reply-to. If you want them to come from your own domain (e.g. info@yourpractice.com.au) so patients see your branding in the From line, you can plug in your own SMTP credentials. See the Practice Email Setup guide.
Once you've configured everything and tested the booking flow, enable online booking:
The booking page will immediately become available to patients. You can turn this off at any time to temporarily disable bookings (e.g., during holidays or maintenance).
If a Recalls & Reminders tab is visible in your admin dashboard, your practice has been enabled for the recalls and reminders module. This module automates:
For full configuration, start with Messaging Setup (the shared foundation — SMS, templates, logins), then the Reminders and Recalls guides.
Patient Chat lets patients message your practice and have a two-way conversation, all from one inbox on the staff dashboard:
Turn on Web Chat in the Patient Chat section of your admin settings. See the Patient Chat guide for full configuration, what patients see, and front-desk workstation setup.
The staff dashboard is available at https://yourpractice.yourbooking.au/staff. Staff can log in with the same credentials as admin (or staff-role accounts if configured). The dashboard provides: