If you keep private events, holidays or appointments from another tool in a calendar, connect it to a location. While that calendar has an event, the location is marked as full and customers can't book those times.
This is available on the Business plan and with an Access Pass. You need to be a business admin to connect a calendar.
1. Copy your calendar's iCal link
Every calendar app can share a calendar as an iCal (.ics) link:
- Google Calendar: open the calendar's settings and copy its Secret address in iCal format. Only people with the link can see the calendar.
- Outlook: go to Settings › Calendar › Shared calendars, publish the calendar with Can view when I'm busy and copy the ICS link. The link then shows only when you're busy, not what the events are.
- iCloud: in the Calendar app, open the calendar's settings, turn on Public Calendar and copy the link.
iCloud has no private link: a public calendar shows its events and their details to anyone who has the link. Use a separate calendar that only holds the times you're busy, without personal details, before you make it public.
2. Connect it to a location
Go to Integrations and click Configure on the Calendar card. Open the Block busy times tab, find the location and click Connect calendar. Choose your calendar app, paste the link and click Connect.
WaitQ reads the calendar straight away and shows how many busy events are ahead. You can connect up to 5 calendars to each location, for example one per team member.
How blocking works
- WaitQ checks each calendar every 10 minutes. To pick up a change sooner, open the calendar's options and click Check now.
- During each event, new bookings are blocked across every booking list of the location. Existing bookings stay as they are.
- Repeating events are blocked on every date they repeat.
- WaitQ keeps only the start and end of each event, never its title, guests or description.
If an event ends early, or you want to take bookings during one anyway, go to the location's overview and click Reopen now.
Change or remove a calendar
Open the calendar's options in the Block busy times tab:
- Change link if you reset the calendar's private address.
- Remove to stop blocking bookings with it. The times it blocked open up again.
If WaitQ can't read a calendar, the tab says why, for example that the link was reset or doesn't return a calendar. WaitQ keeps trying, and keeps the busy times it last read in the meantime.
Related
To see your WaitQ bookings in your calendar, see How to see your bookings in Google, Apple or Outlook Calendar. To close a single day by hand, see How to block a day from new bookings.