How do I set up a booking calendar in TactStack?
Short answer
Create a calendar for the job type you want customers to book, set the hours, buffers, and how far ahead people can schedule, connect the personal calendars of whoever gets assigned, then share the booking link or drop it on your site. Confirmations and reminders ride along with the calendar instead of being sent by hand.
Before you start
- The job types customers should be able to book, and how long each really takes.
- Real working hours, including the times you refuse to book.
- Travel or setup buffer between appointments.
- Who can be assigned each job type.
Step by step
- 1
Make one calendar per job type, not one for everything
A thirty-minute estimate and a four-hour install should never share a calendar. Separate them so slot length, buffer, and reminders can differ.
This is what stops a quick call from eating an install slot.
- 2
Set duration, buffer, and daily limits
Give each appointment its true length, add travel or cleanup buffer on either side, then cap how many of that job type can land in one day.
The calendar should protect the crew's day, not just fill it.
- 3
Set the booking window
Define the minimum notice so nobody books you for twenty minutes from now, and the maximum horizon so the schedule is not locked six months out.
Notice rules are the difference between a schedule and a scramble.
- 4
Connect the calendars of everyone assignable
Link each person's existing calendar both ways, so an outside commitment blocks the slot and a new booking shows up on the phone they already carry.
Two-way sync is what makes double booking structurally impossible.
- 5
Choose how the work gets assigned
A single owner, round-robin across a team, or assignment by zone and skill so the right truck gets the right job in the right part of town.
Routing at booking time removes an entire dispatch step later.
- 6
Ask only the questions you need at booking
Name, phone, address, and what the problem is. Every extra field costs you bookings. Anything else can be gathered in the confirmation follow-up.
Short forms convert. Long forms are abandoned in the driveway.
- 7
Turn on confirmations, reminders, and reschedule links
Confirm instantly by text and email, remind the day before and again a couple of hours out, and let people reschedule themselves from the message.
Self-service rescheduling recovers appointments that would have become no-shows.
- 8
Publish it everywhere a customer decides
Your site, your email signature, the missed-call text, the quote, and your profiles. Then book yourself once, end to end, to make sure it all works.
A booking link nobody can find is just a nicer calendar.
What good looks like
- Customers book themselves at night and on weekends without a phone call.
- No-shows drop because reminders and reschedule links go out automatically.
- Dispatch stops rebuilding the day from a group text.
- Every booking arrives with the customer record already attached.
Common mistakes
The ways this goes wrong in setup, and what to do instead.
One calendar for every job type›
Different work needs different slot lengths and buffers. Sharing one calendar guarantees somebody gets squeezed.
Do this instead: Create a calendar per job type so duration, buffers, and assignment match the work.
Forgetting the buffer›
Back-to-back bookings across town look great in the morning and fall apart by noon. Buffer is scheduling, not slack.
Do this instead: Add travel and cleanup time to the calendar itself, not to your mental math.
Only syncing one direction›
If the platform cannot see outside commitments, it will happily book over them.
Do this instead: Turn on two-way sync so personal commitments block the booking link too.
Asking for too much up front›
Every additional required field loses bookings. Collect the rest after they are on the schedule.
Do this instead: Collect name, number, and job type first, then gather details after the slot is held.
Frequently asked
6 questions about set up a booking calendarRelated guides
Pick the next thing to set up, or back up a step if something here assumed work you have not done yet.
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Nearby tasks that share the same setup and vocabulary.
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