Appointments Classes should Merge with Item Events

[sweet_chatchaya]

So I am trying my best to get a functional and convenient method for people to sign up for CLASSES  or an EVENT.

So you have within ITEMS > EVENTS and in this you can set a time period and allow people to purchases multiple tickets for this event. There are also a lot of options similar to CLASSES. However you do not allow these listed EVENTS a calendar like you do with CLASSES. Yet with CLASSES you don't allow people to purchases multiple 'tickets' at a time.

So if you can allow people to choose multiple attendees at a time with CLASSES this would be wonderful. You have all the tools in various areas just not together.

[_Violet]

Hi @sweet_chatchaya and thanks for sharing your feedback on Events and Classes in Square Appointments. Since this is a feature request, I've moved your post to our Feature Request board.

Additionally, I've updated the status to "Open". This step in the Feature Request process will be a time in which other Square Sellers can add their use cases to your idea to make it stronger and demonstrate further how much it is needed. Later on, we'll re-visit the most popular feature requests in the "Open for Votes" status and bring them to our Product Team.

To other Sellers who see this feature, please “like” the post and reply with a use case that your business would have. This will help to signal that this feature request is even more important to address.

[sweet_chatchaya]

@_Violet Thanks for that, sorry it was not posted in the correct area.

I very very much love all the options and abilities that Square has and it is def something I even promote to customers that come in.

Being a bakery we are having customers request Decoration Events. So a parent could sign up their say 3 kids to a Cupcake Decoration Event and like CLASSES they could have acess to a calendar to pick dates and times, yet they would have to sign up each child separate and pay separate - I feel in the retail industry this would be a negative aspect to people to process 3 separate transactions and they most likely would not sign up.

[wheelhousebzn]

To add on to this —

I co-run a community art studio. We manage retail, private event bookings (services), ticketed classes, and ticketed community events. We actually switched away from Square a few years ago because class bookings weren't available, and it was very challenging to manage our classes and events using "physical" items alone.

We switched back recently for our retail and invoicing, since Square also connects with Wix for class bookings. Wix actually has a great class booking system in place, but we've been frustrated by managing our business in two places. More recently, I've looked back into Square for managing classes, but there are a few features we just can't live without, that Square does not have. I don't see them on the roadmap, either, and would love to advocate for them. This post is the closest to describing what we would be looking for.

High priority features that Square doesn't have that are dealbreakers for us:

• Better management from the "appointments overview" tab of our Square dashboard (desktop and mobile). Right now, only appointments show up in the "upcoming appointments" view. For us to use the class booking feature effectively, we'd need scheduled appointments and classes to appear here together. Especially since that list view is the primary way to see what's coming up on the mobile app.
• The ability to add images to classes.
• The ability to add class repetition on specific dates. Right now, I could create a class that happens weekly, but not a class that happens on a Monday and Wednesday, for instance.
• Site integration with (or replacement of) the "events" section of Square websites, so we could offer a grid, list, or calendar view of upcoming classes within multiple site pages. The appointments integration with the website is decent, but the "events" pre-built section is even better, so that would be our preferred experience. Events and classes feel like they need the same framework, but being able to change the customer-facing language to accommodate both would be helpful

Some other high priority features that aren't dealbreakers:

• The ability to create multi-day classes, where customers are automatically included and reminded of all dates. We often have two to six-week workshops, where customers register to attend all days in advance. We can add participants manually to all other dates and make them free, so customers get reminders...but we're always short on time and that's a pain.
• The ability to create separate payment and cancellation policies for classes and appointments.
• The ability to customize notifications separately for classes and appointments, or even just to automatically change the language so it doesn't always default to "appointments" for class bookings

All of the above are features Wix booking offers, which is why we're still using them, but I would much prefer using Square if the class bookings feature evolved to accommodate my business' needs. That said, there are some features you already have that are great.

Features I love about Square class bookings:

• The ability to choose from existing classes, instead of creating a new class each time
• Being able to easily see "spots available" in the calendar month view
• The ability to associate and send forms when anyone books an appointment. This feature is GREAT.
• Seeing class bookings and appointments together in the calendar view (desktop)
• Look, feel, and ease of reminder texts and emails

Features I love about Square Events (items):

• Adding multiple images and longer, rich text descriptions
• Choosing between in-person and online for each event
• The way events integrate with Square websites