New features?

The presence of COVID-19 in our communities has meant that many sporting, therapy and health venues have had to close during lockdown and when they open up again they may have to run their businesses slightly differently to prevent further spread of the virus.

We have added a number of new customizable features to help cope with the lockdown and the reopening to members and clients.

Video conferencing and documents

We have added a video conference link from the bookings timesheet. So if you are a fitness instructor wanting to run your classes online during the Coronavirus COVID-19 lockdown or a music instructor wanting to teach your student online you can now do this direct from WebBookings by clicking on the video icon displayed on the booking. You can have as many participants as you wish and each can view the instructor, while the instructor can view all of the clients. We use a free video conferencing site at jitsi.org at no extra cost to you. The video link is also included in booking confirmation and reminder emails.

For some classes or tuition sessions you may want to include notes, e.g. music sheets for the next lesson. You can include these on each booking as PDF files and a link is sent in the booking reminder emails or the client can click on the document icon on the booking to view the PDF file.

Reminders and booking terms

You can now choose to add daily terms and conditions which members or clients need to accept when logging in for the first time that day. These terms are designed as reminders that people should not come to the club if they or any of their household have COVID-19 symptoms or should be self-isolating. Similarly, we have added optional booking terms and conditions for similar reasons and also to remind bookers that they should cancel their bookings if they develop symptoms. Users cannot book without accepting these terms.

Buffer period between bookings

To enable physical distancing you can now add buffer periods between your bookings which allows any members or clients on previous bookings to leave safely before the next arrive. This beffer period can be set in muliples of 5 minutes and can be different for each booking activity. The examples here show 5 minutes for tennis and 30 minutes for bowls.

Doubles Matches

Current UK government advice specifies that singles tennis can only be played with others from outside of your household or that doubles can be played with people from your household. We have enabled an optional message to appear next to doubles bookings and enabled a feature to let to turn off doubles bookings should you wish to.

Report for contact tracing

By accepting the new terms and conditions for bookings customers are also requested to divulge if they subsequently develop symptoms after a booking. If they do that you can now run a new report 'Coincident Bookings' to find out who was present at the venue at the same time. The report has names, times and contact details so that you can pass on the information to your clients or members in case they need to self-isolate.

Orders from your cafe or bar

WebBookings links to a Point-of-Sale system called Vend which can be used to sell retail goods. Many of our customers just sell food and drink at their cafe or bar tills. As the venues start to open up after lockdown the cafes and bars may still be closed but our customers would still like to sell their food and drink. We have added a free text ordering system to bookings which can be optionally switched on. The member or client can therefore add that they want a coffee at the end of their booking and the venue can make sure it's ready to be picked up as they leave.