Customer booked the same class twice, checking out as a guest

[Laura_B]

Hello! I am looking to offer free classes for 2 weeks as a promotion. I expect people to book more than one class during the promotion period. Testing this as a client, I was able to book the same class twice, checking out as a guest: I booked a class once, then clicked "Book another" button on the confirmation page, and was able to book the same class again. Is there a way to prevent class double booking with guest checkout? If a client signs into Square for consecutive booking, will double booking will be prevented?

@MayaP - hoping you can answer my question or add experts to this post. Thank you!

[Summer2024 · Accepted solution]

Hi, @Laura_B !

Here's what you need to know about preventing double bookings in Square Appointments:

1. Guest Checkout Limitation

• Unfortunately, Square cannot prevent double bookings for guest checkouts
• This is because guest checkouts don't create a customer profile to track bookings
• Each guest checkout is treated as a new, unique customer

2. Signed-in Customer Experience

• When customers create an account and sign in:
  • Square can track their bookings
  • Double booking prevention works
  • They can see their booking history
  • They get automatic confirmation emails

3. Possible Solutions:
   1. Require Account Creation
   2. Turn off guest checkout
   3. Force customers to create an account
   4. This will prevent double bookings but might reduce conversion

b) Manual Review

• Keep guest checkout on
• Review bookings manually
• Contact customers if you spot duplicates

c) Communication Strategy

• Add clear messaging on your booking page
• Include "one class per person" in your class descriptions
• Add a note in confirmation emails

4. Best Practice for Your Promotion For your 2-week free promotion, consider:

• Requiring account creation for free classes
• Creating a special promotion code that can only be used once per account
• Setting up class packages with limited redemption periods

I hope this helps. 

[Summer2024 · Accepted solution]

Hi, @Laura_B !

Here's what you need to know about preventing double bookings in Square Appointments:

1. Guest Checkout Limitation

• Unfortunately, Square cannot prevent double bookings for guest checkouts
• This is because guest checkouts don't create a customer profile to track bookings
• Each guest checkout is treated as a new, unique customer

2. Signed-in Customer Experience

• When customers create an account and sign in:
  • Square can track their bookings
  • Double booking prevention works
  • They can see their booking history
  • They get automatic confirmation emails

3. Possible Solutions:
   1. Require Account Creation
   2. Turn off guest checkout
   3. Force customers to create an account
   4. This will prevent double bookings but might reduce conversion

b) Manual Review

• Keep guest checkout on
• Review bookings manually
• Contact customers if you spot duplicates

c) Communication Strategy

• Add clear messaging on your booking page
• Include "one class per person" in your class descriptions
• Add a note in confirmation emails

4. Best Practice for Your Promotion For your 2-week free promotion, consider:

• Requiring account creation for free classes
• Creating a special promotion code that can only be used once per account
• Setting up class packages with limited redemption periods

I hope this helps. 

[Laura_B]

@Summer2024 Thank you very much for your thorough response! Not only you answered my question about the limitation of guest checkout, but you provided valuable additional tips! Since you clearly are an expert, I hope you can help me with the following:

1. Can you please point me to an article what describes how to turn off guest checkout and require account creation.

2. For your suggestion to add a note in confirmation emails:

A) I attempted to customize class booking notification, however, even after the customization, the default notification continues to be sent. My fear is that the customization works for Appointments but not for Classes. I would love to be proved wrong here.

B) including the class Description in the notification email would be a really good workaround. However, I am not seeing a variable for class Description that I could add to the notification. To make the matter worse, when a client clicks the "View details" button included in the email notification, class Description still does not show.

3. I noticed that a reminder for a booked class says "Your appointment with ... is coming up" instead of "Your class with .... is coming up". How can I change that?

Many thanks again @Summer2024 

[Summer2024 · Accepted solution]

@Laura_B - I need to look into turning off guest checkout for regular accounts. I know Square for Franchises can do this. But I need to double check with the product team on if this is available for regular accounts.

Turning Off Guest Checkout To require account creation:

• Log into Square Dashboard
• Go to Settings > Online Booking Site
• Look for "Checkout Options" 
• Toggle off "Allow Guest Checkout"

Notification Issues

A) Multiple Notifications Problem You're correct about the dual notification issue. This is because:

• Classes use a different notification system than regular appointments
• The default system notifications can't be fully disabled
• Your customizations are adding to, not replacing, the default notifications

Current workaround options:

• Keep customizations minimal to avoid confusion
• Use the default notification and add your custom message to the class description
• Contact Square Support to request better notification control for classes

Class Description in Notifications Unfortunately, you're right - there isn't a direct variable for class descriptions in notifications. This is a known limitation. Possible workarounds:

• Add key information to the class title (which does show in notifications)
• Use the "Additional Information" field which might be available in notifications
• Create a custom URL with full class details to include in notifications

"Appointment" vs "Class" Terminology This is a known issue where Square's system treats all bookings as "appointments" in their notification system. Currently:

• There's no built-in way to change this terminology
• It's a system-level text that can't be customized
• This has been reported by many class-based businesses

Recommendations:

1. For immediate needs:

   • Use class titles and custom fields to convey critical information
   • Create a standard welcome email that explains your booking system
   • Consider using a third-party email system for follow-up communications

[Laura_B]

@Summer2024 I greatly appreciate your guidance and tips! Including the Zoom link in the class title, even though it will make the class title quite long, is certainly an option.

After a number of tests I found that while my customizations do not impact the initial class booking notification, I can include a custom message/URL in the Reminder email. It's unfortunate that the reminder email says "Your appointment with ... is coming up", instead of "Your class with .... is coming up".

I suppose that classes are essentially appointments where multiple bookings of the same appointment are allowed? I suspect that Square still differentiates between an appointment and a class, simply based on the fact that the initial notification to the client says "... has accepted your class booking". It seems like the same differentiator can be applied to the reminders?

@Summer2024 Is the roadmap for class features known? It seems like some of the improvements may be a low hanging fruit:

• making Description field variable available to be included in the notifications
• displaying class Description when the client clicks "View details" button in the email notification
• making the Subject field of notifications editable
• updating the Subject of the Reminder email to refer to class instead of appointment, as it's done in the "appointment accepted by business" email.

Many thanks, again!