Reminders and lifecycle messages

The system sends messages around each appointment automatically, cutting no-shows and bringing patients back without you having to remember.

Appointment reminders

For confirmed appointments, the default reminder is sent about 24 hours before their appointment, by email and, where the patient has a usable mobile number and you have SMS credits, by text. Your automation and channel switches and the patient's automated-message preferences still apply. Bookings made after the reminder window has passed do not receive that reminder. A second reminder at 48 hours is available but off by default: switch it on under Settings > Messaging if your cancellation policy needs the extra notice. A patient who has been reminded is far more likely to turn up, and far more likely to cancel in time if they cannot make it, freeing the slot.

Lifecycle messages

Beyond reminders, the system sends messages at the moments that matter, including:

• Booking confirmation. As soon as an appointment is confirmed.
• Aftercare and check-in. Aftercare advice after the visit, and a "how are you getting on?" check-in about two days later.
• No-show follow-up. A warm follow-up when a patient misses their appointment, to re-engage them.
• Rebook nudge and treatment recall. A nudge when a patient has lapsed, or when a treatment's rebooking interval falls due.

The full list, with when each one sends, is in When every automatic message sends.

When an automated text is held back

To protect patients from repeated texts, automated texts to any one mobile number are limited to one of each kind in any 24 hours (one per appointment where the text is about an appointment; waitlist offers and moved-appointment texts have their own limits) and eight in all, birthday greetings included. If the mobile network rejects a text, automated texts to that number pause for 24 hours, or for 7 days when the network reports the number as unknown, a landline, invalid, blocked or unsubscribed. A held text is not sent, uses no SMS credit and is recorded as skipped in the patient's Messages, with the reason. Replies you send yourself from Messages are never held back.

Why automate it

These messages are the kind of consistent follow-up that busy clinics rarely manage by hand. Automating them means every patient gets the same professional touchpoints, which protects your diary and your revenue.

Making them yours

The wording of each message is a template you can edit under Settings > Messaging, so the tone matches your clinic, and the messages listed here can be switched off individually. See Editing message templates.