7 steps to online booking for your patients
You choose what patients finish before they book (a form, a card, or an insurance step) and how each booking is confirmed. Then you share one link.
Head of Engineering, JotPsych
Your front desk answers the phone 9 to 5, and a new patient decides to book at 9 p.m. on a Sunday. Your booking page lets that patient pick a time inside the open hours you set.
The screens carry the names a patient sees on the booking page, in order. Each setting you turn on adds a screen before your patient's booking is made.
- Check your appointment types. Patients pick a clinician on the Provider screen, then see the name and length of every practice-wide type, plus that clinician's own types. Check each type's name and default length in Your Practice, Settings, Appointment types, Manage appointment types. Each booking holds its type's default length, or 30 minutes if the type has none.
- Set open hours under each clinician who takes bookings. Go to Your Practice, Settings, Self-scheduling. Under Whose hours, choose the clinician, then add the days and times. Patients won't see a clinician without open hours. Add a block to close a lunch break or a day off.
- Choose what patients finish before they book. Under Required to book, pick your intake form in Forms, and the booking is made when your patient submits the form. Add Card on file to save your patient's card. The card isn't charged. Turn on Verify insurance at booking to add an insurance step before your patient picks a time.
- Choose Review requests first or Book instantly. Make the choice under When a booking comes in before you share the link, since the choice sets what your patient sees after booking. Either way, decide who on your team reviews new online bookings in Requests, on the Schedule.
This rule is the default
Each booking holds its time as a request
Your calendar shows the request as Suggested
Your team accepts or declines the request
Patient sees: Request received
This rule confirms a booking that meets every requirement
The booking goes on the calendar as a visit
Missing a requirement? The booking arrives as a request
Patient sees: You're booked!
Review requests first is the default rule, and Book instantly confirms a booking only when every requirement is met. Either way, a booking with a requirement missing waits as a request for your team.
- Set how close to the visit patients can reschedule or cancel. Your patient gets a Reschedule or cancel this appointment link after booking. Cut-off for changes sets the latest time your patient can make changes online, 1 day before the visit by default. Past the cut-off? Your patient is told to call your practice.
- Go through your booking page on your phone. Open the link from Your booking page, at the top of Self-scheduling. Stop at Your details, headed Tell us about yourself. Selecting Request appointment makes a real booking. The booking holds the time. Then share the link with Copy link.
- Send self-pay patients a good faith estimate on time. Federal rules require one for an uninsured or self-pay patient who books at least 3 business days ahead, or who asks for one. The deadline is 1 business day after booking, or 3 business days for a visit 10 or more business days out, or for a request.
In JotPsych, Self-scheduling holds the hours, forms, and confirmation rule your booking page follows.
Book 15 minutes- Department of Health and Human Services, 45 CFR 149.610, good faith estimates for uninsured or self-pay individuals, read October 2, 2026.
- Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Good faith estimate, page last modified August 25, 2026, read October 2, 2026.