How to display class booking system in external website

[Contentment]

Hi there.

I have been a Square customer for many years. I started off with a Square reader and then incorporated Square payment processing into my Wix website for online payments.

I have just looked into using Square Appointments as my booking platform for classes (I am a yoga class business). I signed up to a free trial of Square Appointments Plus. I created my classes and packages. Then I went to explore how to "insert" the booking calendar into my website.

However, I when I go to Appointments/Online booking/Channels it says under Booking Channels that the features - "Add a book button to your website" and "embedding a booking flow into a website" are not currently available for classes. 

 I asked support but they confirmed that it wasn't available. I am not clear if this means not available to me specifically (perhaps based on my free trial status?), my region, or if this functionality is not yet available? 

If it is the latter then I have to say that the Square sales pages for Appointments are highly misleading and I've just wasted two days of my life trying to set up a new booking system that is impractical to use. How can Square justify $40AUD per month for a booking system that can't be displayed on or integrated into your website?

I really hope I've got it wrong some how. Any advice/feedback would be really appreciated.

[tomven]

Sure – here’s a shorter, more human version that still answers the question clearly and calmly.

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Hi @Contentment, you haven’t got this wrong – Support gave you the correct info, unfortunately.

Embedding a booking calendar or ‘Book’ button on an external website is not currently supported for classes in Square Appointments. This is a product limitation.

To be honest, the booking embed can be annoying anyway, personally I hate embedded iframes on websites as they confuse users with scrolling etc (especially on mobile devices). This is not specific to Square; it's just a limitation of web functionality in general (most systems have this struggle).

What you can do instead
Not perfect, but these are the current options:

Option 1 – Link out to Square’s booking page
• Copy your Square booking site URL
• Add a ‘Book a class’ button on your website that links to it

Option 2 – Link to individual classes
• Use the share link for each class
• Link class times on your website directly to those booking links

Option 3 – Use Square Online just for bookings
• Create a simple Square Online page with classes
• Link to it from your website

Your frustration is fair though. Square’s Appointments pages don’t clearly spell out that class bookings can’t be embedded, which is a real gap for class based businesses. 

If staying fully on Wix is a must, and embedding is essential, Square Appointments may not be the right fit for class bookings right now. Some Sellers keep Square for payments and POS, and use a separate booking tool purely for website embeds.

I’d strongly recommend submitting this as a feature request though – class embedding is an obvious gap.

[Contentment]

Thanks so much for your thoughtful reply. In the end, I have found an alternative platform that ironically, also cannot be embedded. But it costs less than half what Square Appointments costs. That’s fine, Square has grown to such a size that I understand that its pricing model is no longer the best for sole traders and micro businesses. 

I did consider moving to Square online if the functionality was better than Wix, but sadly it’s not and again, is more expensive.