Booking requirements: products, guests, and first-time clients
Booking requirements: products, guests, and first-time clients
Support hears from clients fairly often that it's not clear what happens when they try to book — whether they need to own a package first, and what happens the very first time someone books with you. It comes down to two independent settings in Settings → Online booking → Access & checkout: Require product to book, and Guest mode. This article walks through what each combination means in practice.
If Require product to book is on
A signed-in client can only book an activity they hold a valid, active package for. When they book, they either select the package they already own, or buy one on the spot as part of booking. Either way, checkout is fully automatic: for a credit-based Class Pack, the unit is deducted right away, for the future session, rather than after it takes place — neither you nor the client has to do anything further.
This assumes Requires approval is off for the client. If it's on, product validation and checkout don't happen automatically at all: the booking lands in your Inbox to approve first, and even once you approve it and the client is added to the class, checkout stays a manual step — see How online booking works and Approving and declining requests.
If Require product to book is off
Clients can book without holding a package at all. If they choose to select one anyway — because they want to pay in advance, say — it works exactly the same way as above: the package is selected or bought at the point of booking, and the credit is deducted immediately for a Class Pack — again, only when Requires approval is off. With it on, this booking goes through the same manual path described above: no automatic checkout while it waits in your Inbox, and none once you approve it either.
First-time clients (guest requests)
Someone who isn't on your client list yet — Bobclass matches clients by email address — can still request a booking, provided Guest mode is turned on. Turn Guest mode off and only people already on your list, signed in, can book.
A guest request always needs your approval, whatever your Requires approval setting is for known clients — see Approving and declining requests.
After a first-time request is approved
Approving a guest request books the client in and automatically adds them to your client list — there is no separate step. From that point on, they are no longer a guest: they should sign in at bobclass.com/go or in the Bobclass Go app using that same email address, and manage all their future bookings from there — joining waitlists, cancelling their own bookings, and buying Class Packs or Memberships, none of which is available to a guest. See How clients book.