Glossary & Legends

The URL-safe identifier for a business (a–z, 0–9, hyphen; max 50). Used to build the public booking URL /appointments/book/{slug} and to resolve which tenant a public request belongs to. See Online Booking Portal.

The shareable web address of a business's online booking page, built from the company slug: /appointments/book/{slug}. Read-only on the settings screen.

A bookable start time computed by the availability engine from the service duration, buffers, provider schedule, and existing bookings — not free-typed. Spacing is set by the slot-interval setting.

How a booking or waitlist entry originated: staff (added by front desk) or online (self-created from the public portal). Stored on each record.

On each public request the controller looks up the company slug in the main database, verifies the tenant is active, and switches the active database to that tenant so services, availability, and booking all operate within that company.

The unique code identifying an appointment. Used in the customer-visible success and review URLs and shown as the booking Reference on the thank-you page.

Booking without pre-selecting a provider. The system pools every staff member assigned to the service and offers their combined open times; picking a specific slot then assigns whichever provider that slot belongs to. See Calendar & Appointments.

Turnaround padding in minutes attached to a service (setup before, cleanup after). The availability engine pads busy intervals on both the existing and the new appointment so services don't overlap their prep/cleanup time.

Free-text reason captured via a browser prompt when cancelling an appointment, stored with the cancelling user's id. Pressing Esc on the prompt aborts the cancel entirely.

A bookable room, chair, or piece of equipment optionally reserved alongside the provider for an appointment. Only active resources are selectable.

The outstanding amount still owed on an invoice. Recorded payments are silently clamped to this — you can never over-collect. See Checkout & Payments.

An appointment line that gets charged to the customer: a service line or a retail-sale product line that is not covered by a package. Back-bar consumption lines are never billable.

A standard core ERPat consumer invoice generated from an appointment's billable lines. Viewable, printable, and payable in the core Invoices module; balance due is the outstanding amount.

Points a customer earns per 1.00 of completed-appointment value at the configured rate. Awarded automatically once on completion (points = floor(total × rate)); the running balance is the sum of the customer's points ledger. No redemption UI in this module.

A one-time verification URL generated at checkout that lets the customer pay the invoice online (Stripe/PayPal) without logging in — but only if the tenant has online payments and guest invoice payment enabled.

A product consumed during a service (e.g. shampoo, dye, foils) rather than sold. Priced 0 to the customer, decrements inventory on completion, and is captured at unit cost. Never appears on the bill. See the line-type legend.

What an appointment line represents: Service (the booked treatment, auto-managed), Back-bar use / consumption (product used, priced 0), or Retail sale (product sold, billable).

A product sold to the customer to take home during the visit. A billable line that carries a retail price and appears on the invoice.

The single primary service attached to an appointment (line type service); auto-created and rewritten by the booking form and cannot be deleted from the items modal.

A package entitlement that is active, unexpired, and still has remaining sessions — the only kind offered in the checkout Apply package dropdown. See Packages & Memberships.

None / Monthly / Yearly setting on a membership package. Informational only in this version — it does not trigger automatic recurring billing.

The atomic act of consuming one package session (quantity used +1) when coverage is applied. Only succeeds if the entitlement is active, unexpired, and has remaining balance; concurrent claims mean only one wins.

A service line that is being paid for with one of the customer's package sessions and is therefore excluded from the invoice. Shown as a blue badge with a red X to remove (only before invoicing). See the coverage legend.

A specific customer's purchased instance of a package, stamped with purchase time, expiry, status, source (staff), and an optional linked invoice.

A per-service session balance created when a package is sold (quantity total granted, quantity used consumed, remaining = total − used, with its own expiry). Redeeming one covers a booked service line so it isn't billed.

A package whose type is membership, carrying a billing period (None/Monthly/Yearly) that is informational only — there is no automatic recurring billing in this version.

Returning one previously claimed package session (quantity used −1, floored at 0) when coverage is removed or an uninvoiced appointment is cancelled.

How many days after purchase a package and all its sessions remain usable. 0 = never expires (shown as ∞). Expiry is stamped at the moment of sale — changing validity later does not extend already-sold packages.

On the Workforce Monitor, a provider's total scheduled service time in the range (minutes ÷ 60), counting every appointment except Cancelled and No Show. See Reports & Analytics.

A percentage of each completed service line's price, captured on the line at completion and summed per provider on the Workforce Monitor report.

On the Workforce Monitor, the sum of the total amount of a provider's COMPLETED appointments in the range. Only completed appointments contribute; anything not completed counts as zero.

The per-provider performance table on the Reports page: appointments, completed, no-shows, booked hours, revenue, and commission for a chosen date range (the only section that honors the date filter).

A customer star-rating/comment marked as published. Only published reviews feed average ratings and the recent-reviews list. Reviews in this module are published immediately by default.

A customer-submitted 1–5 star rating plus optional comment for a completed visit. One review per appointment (DB-enforced), published by default, and averaged per staff/service.

The automated post-visit email inviting the customer to leave a review, sent by an hourly cron job after the configured delay — once per appointment (latched even if the email fails).

A customer's 1–5 satisfaction score for a visit, shown as gold stars (#f0ad4e) in the review widget, Customer History, and Reports. 0 = not yet rated.

How long a service takes, in minutes. Used to size the appointment block and compute available time slots. Clamped to a 5-minute minimum; a blank/zero service duration falls back to 30. See Services & Staff.

A service that is NOT shown on the public online booking page (is public = 0); bookable only internally by front-desk staff. Grey Private badge. See the visibility legend.

The staff member who performs a service (the assignee of an appointment). Only staff explicitly assigned to a service are offered when booking it.

A service shown on the customer-facing online booking page (is public = 1). New services are Public by default; a service must be both Active and Public to appear online.

A single bookable treatment on the menu, with a name, duration, price, optional category/color, buffers, visibility (public/private), and a set of qualified providers.

A grouping label (e.g. Hair, Nails, Facials) used to organize and color-code services. Has its own name, color, sort order, and active/inactive status; only active categories appear in the service dropdown.

An optional setting that automatically raises an invoice for the billable items the moment an appointment is marked Completed. Requires a customer attached and at least one billable line. See Settings & Reminders.

How many hours before an appointment a customer is still allowed to cancel or change it (an Appointment Settings value; seeded default 24).

A 0→1 flag on an appointment (reminder_sent, review_requested, loyalty_awarded, stock_committed) that guarantees a one-time action even if completion or a job runs again — so customers aren't emailed twice and stock/points aren't double-applied.

The furthest-out date customers may book (the booking horizon, in days; seeded default 60). Dates beyond this window return no slots.

How soon before start a booking is still allowed (in minutes). Slots closer than this to now are hidden and rejected on submit — used to block last-minute online bookings.

A configuration value stored for one business/company. Every value on the Appointment Settings page is per-tenant, so each company running ERPat has independent values.

How long before an appointment the reminder email is sent, in minutes (1440 = 24 hours). If set to 0 or blank the reminder job substitutes 1440 — it never uses 0.

How many hours after completion the review-request email is sent (an Appointment Settings value; default 24). A negative value falls back to 24.

The granularity of bookable start times offered to customers (e.g. every 15 minutes). Minimum 5, in steps of 5; seeded default 15.

Pending Booking exists but is not yet confirmed (typically a fresh online booking). Amber chip #f0ad4e. The only next action offered is Confirm. Full legend: Appointment statuses.

Confirmed The booking is confirmed and the customer received a confirmation email. Every successful online booking starts here. Teal chip #1d97a6. Only Confirmed appointments are eligible for reminder emails.

Checked In The customer has arrived at the front desk. Light-blue chip #5bc0de. Can move to Completed, No Show, or Cancelled.

In Progress The service is currently underway. Light-blue chip #5bc0de. It has no dedicated button on the detail card — set it via the Status dropdown on the edit form.

Completed The visit finished. Triggers one-time completion logic: commission capture, back-bar stock decrement, and loyalty award. Green chip #5cb85c. Terminal; hidden by default in the list filter and the only status that unlocks the review page.

Cancelled Terminal appointment status. Cancelling captures a reason, releases any package entitlements the booking consumed (unless already invoiced), and emails matching waitlist entries. Red chip #d9534f. Hidden by default in the list filter.

No Show Terminal appointment status recording that the customer did not arrive. Grey chip #777777. Excluded from availability and workforce workload; counts toward the No-shows this month metric. Sends no email.

Booked Waitlist status meaning the customer converted and actually re-booked. Set manually; hidden from the default waitlist view. See Waitlist.

Shown in the waitlist when no preferred date is set. A flexible entry matches a freed slot on any date.

The auto-notify rule: same service, and (no preferred date OR same date), and (no/unassigned preferred provider OR same provider), among entries still in Waiting.

Notified Waitlist status meaning a slot opened email has been sent (manually via the bell, or automatically on a cancellation) and notified_at was stamped. Light-blue chip #5bc0de.

Emailing a waiting customer the a spot just opened message (with a booking-page link) and moving them to Notified. Can be automatic on cancellation or manual via the bell icon.

On a waitlist entry, the date the customer would ideally like. Blank means Flexible (matches any date when a slot frees up).

The appointment_waitlist_slot_open email, populated with company name, logo, customer name, service name, and a booking URL, sent when a matching slot frees up.

Waiting Waitlist status meaning the customer is queued and has not yet been alerted. Only Waiting rows show the manual bell action and are eligible for auto-notify on a cancellation. Orange chip #f0ad4e; shown by default.

A queue of customers who want a service but couldn't get a slot. When a matching appointment is cancelled, matching Waiting entries are auto-emailed that a spot opened (capped at 20 per cancellation).

One record of a customer waiting for a specific service, with optional preferred provider and date, and a status of Waiting / Notified / Booked / Cancelled.