Reserving an appointment time but charging per person

[BWLCatCafe]

I may have missed the answer to this question but I couldn't find an answer. If there is an answer that exists, please feel free to link it. 

We have a cat cafe that supports our cat rescue mission. We're running Square for Retail POS Register for that portion of the cafe.

We have recently added Square Appointments to our portfolio. 

What we'd like to do is allow someone to "book" and appointment time (1 hour) but we charge per person. 

Additionally, is there a way to integrate both the Retail & Appointments into a single view on the POS Register? Can we be in Retail and see the Appointments when booked?

Thanks so much for your help!

[TheRealChipA]

Hi @BWLCatCafe.  First, it sounds like you are planning something that is similar to a class — multiple people in the same appointment, each paying.  Square Appointments has a class booking feature, but it is in the paid tiers, only.  Here’s a link to the Square Appointments Pricing and Plans, with a list of features in each tier.  Looks like you’d want the Plus subscription.

Otherwise, as far as one POS, this is possible, but not with Retail.  You’d want to switch to the Appointments POS which also allows you to sell retail items.

[BWLCatCafe]

@TheRealChipA, I understand the concept. I'm guessing I should be able to limit the number of reservations/enrollees into a particular reservation window. For example, we'll offer 5 sessions/classes a day to "come hang out with cats". So I'll setup 5 classes a day. Group A wants to schedule their 3 members at 2pm, Group B wants to schedule their 5 friends/members at 4pm. So once Group A schedules their 3 members at 2pm, the "class" can close and not be available for anyone else. Similar to Group B's reservation at 4pm. Right?

[TheRealChipA]

Ah.  When I read this sentence in your OP “What we'd like to do is allow someone to "book" and appointment time (1 hour) but we charge per person” I did not understand that one person was booking for an entire group at that time.  I understood it to say that multiple un-related individuals might book at the same time.  So, of course, my answer was off base.  Now that I have a clearer picture…..

No, Square Appointments/Classes does not work the way you described.  If 3 people in a group book at 2pm, the class is still open for two more people because the class can hold 5.  You are trying to set up something here that Square Appointments did not envision.

This would require you to submit a feature request to the Square Appointments team on the Ideate Board.  I’m not sure how you would word it though — maybe ask for something that would auto-close a class once there was a booking at that time.  But it would have to be a new setting since most sellers who use Classes use them the traditional way.  What you are doing is not really a class, so that’s why it doesn’t work exactly.

Also, you might want to check out the Square App Marketplace.  There you might find a third-party appointments/class/other app that integrates with your Square account that gives you this functionality.  Otherwise, I can’t think of any work-around in Square that would give you the desired result.