Appointment Agents: Telling Your Assistant About a Calendar
Appointment agents is what your AI assistants read to decide whether to send someone to this calendar. This guide explains each of the five fields, what happens when you leave one empty, when the assistant may name a person, and how to fill them in so customers reach the right calendar.
Telling your assistant about this calendar
If you use an AI assistant to answer calls or messages, it needs to know what this calendar is for before it can send anyone to it. That is what the Appointment agents tab is: what your assistants need to know to send people here.
Open it from Settings > Calendars Config, click Settings on the calendar, then the Appointment agents tab.
The five fields
What is booked here
The services this calendar takes, separated by commas — for a dental practice, something like cleaning, whitening, root canal.
Leave it empty and this calendar is offered for everything. That is fine with one calendar and a problem with several, because the assistant has no way to choose between them.
In your own words
A plain description of what this calendar covers. The assistant reads it to decide whether this calendar fits what the customer asked for.
Write it as you would explain it to a new receptionist — for example, annual physicals, follow-ups and lab work. This is the field that does the real work of matching a request to the right calendar.
How the assistant may refer to it
What the assistant says out loud, such as a person's name or a role.
Leave it empty and the assistant only offers times, never a person. That is the right choice when appointments are not tied to one individual, or when you would rather not promise a specific person before the booking is made.
What customers call it
The informal names people actually use — nicknames, shorthand, the way they ask for it on the phone.
This is only used to understand them and is never spoken, so it is the place for casual or imprecise wording you would not want your assistant repeating.
Can it name this one?
Whether the assistant may say the name from the field above:
- Same as the assistant — follows whatever each assistant is set to.
- Never — only offer times.
- Only if they ask or name it.
- Always — may offer the choice.
Click Save when you are done.
Filling it in well
- Be specific about services when you run several calendars. Vague descriptions are how customers end up booked with the wrong person.
- Use the words your customers use, not your internal ones. Somebody asks for a check-up, not a preventive care appointment.
- Put the messy versions in “What customers call it” — abbreviations, misspellings, slang. It costs nothing and helps the assistant understand.
- Think before naming a person. If they leave, or are away, an assistant promising them creates a problem.
FAQ
Q: Do I need this if I have one calendar?
A: Not strictly — an empty services field means it is offered for everything. It still helps the assistant describe you accurately.
Q: Is this the same as the availability settings?
A: No. Availability decides when you can be booked; this decides how an assistant talks about the calendar.
Q: Will the assistant read my description aloud?
A: It reads it to decide whether this calendar fits. What it may say aloud is governed by the naming fields.
Q: I do not use an AI assistant yet.
A: Then nothing here changes anything today. It is worth filling in before you start.
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