Understand why a slot can or cannot be booked, and read a "slot rejected" message

Zelun never lets two bookings clash. Before it accepts an appointment, from you or from a client, it checks several things at once. The slot is bookable only if every one of them passes. If any one fails, nothing is saved and no half-made appointment is left behind.

The checks are:

• The location is open. The start and end fall inside the location's weekly hours, read in the location's own timezone.
• The person is working. The slot falls inside that staff member's weekly hours.
• The person is not away. No approved time off covers the slot. A request that is still waiting, or was declined, does not block anything. Time you blocked for that person, or for the whole location, also makes the slot unavailable (see the block time article).
• The person is free. They have no other appointment that overlaps. Sharing a start is only allowed for a group service, and only for the same service at the same time, up to its group size.
• The service fits. The service's whole length, including any processing phases, fits in the slot. During a waiting phase the person counts as free for other bookings, but they are busy during the work and finish parts.
• The person performs this service. They must be set up for it.
• The room or equipment is free. If a chair or room is needed and it is already holding as many people as its capacity allows, the slot is refused.

The same rules apply to your own appointment book, to walk-ins, to rescheduling and to the booking page, so a client cannot book what you cannot.

1. Make sure the location's hours and timezone are right. They are edited in My business, under Locations, with Edit branch, in the fields Weekly hours and Timezone.
2. Make sure each person's hours are set. Open Staff, choose the person and look at Weekly hours, or press Staff hours in the appointment book.
3. Check that the services are assigned to the right people. See the services article.
4. If you use chairs or rooms, their capacity is set under Chairs and rooms, in the same Locations section.

Leaving every day of the weekly hours unchecked means no limit is applied for that location or person.

Check a slot before you book it, and read the answer

1. Open Book and choose the location in the header.
2. Start a new booking with Walk-in or Appointment.
3. Choose the Staff, the Service and the Start.
4. Press Check. A green message means the slot fits. It names the person, the time window and confirms it is inside branch and staff hours with no conflict. It may add the next free time after it.
5. A rejected check shows an amber message that says why. Read it like this:

• The location is closed then. The slot is outside the location's hours. Fix the hours, or pick another time.
• (Name) is not working then. The slot is outside that person's hours. Change their hours or pick another person.
• (Name) is away then. An approved time off covers the slot.
• (Name) already has a visit that overlaps this time. Another appointment is in the way. Look at the diary for that person.
• The room or equipment this service needs is already taken then. Every chair or room is already in use at that time.
• (Name) is not set up to perform this service. Tick the service on that person in Staff.
• That start and end do not make a slot that can be booked. The end is not after the start.
• The second service has processing segments, which are not supported for multi-staff bookings yet. A two-person booking cannot use a service with waiting phases as its second part.

1. Whether the answer is green or amber, the message may end with Next free after this is a time. It is the first later start that day for the same person and service, shown only when one exists. It is a suggestion. Nothing is held for you.

Fix the cause

1. For a closed location or a person who is not working, correct the hours as described above.
2. For time off, review the request under Staff, Time off.
3. For a room or chair that is full, raise its Capacity under Chairs and rooms only if it really holds more people at once.

• The booking page offers only starts that pass every check, so a client rarely meets a rejection. Starts are listed on the location's Public booking start interval (5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes), so a start that is legal but off that rhythm is not offered online. You can still book it yourself from the appointment book.
• When a client picks a start that was taken a moment earlier, the booking is refused and they are asked to choose another.
• If two people try to book the same time at once, only one gets it.
• Approving time off does not move or cancel appointments that already exist in that period. Those stay as they are, and you decide what to do with them.
• Changing an appointment to a time that fails a check leaves the original appointment exactly where it was.

• Wrong timezone on the location. Hours are read as the clock on the wall in that timezone, so a wrong zone shifts every slot.
• Setting hours for the location but forgetting the person. A slot must be inside both.
• Assuming a pending time off request blocks the person. Only approved time off does.
• Expecting the offered times to match every legal desk time. The booking page uses the start interval, while the desk can use any legal start.
• Raising a room's capacity to make a conflict go away. The capacity is how many people it really holds at the same time.
• Booking two different services for one person at the same time. Only a group service allows overlap, and only for the same service at the same start.

The services article and the time off article explain two of the inputs.