So you going out of town, planning a trip, or just simply don’t want to be scheduled on a particular day.  There is now a simple way to block out an entire day so that you won’t be scheduled.  Just follow the instructions below:

Pencil’em Desktop:

1. Select “<Personal Time>” from the “Select Client” drop down menu item.
2. From the “Personal Time” drop down menu item, select “Entire Day” to signify you would like to block out the entire day.  At this point the “Select Time” menu settings will disappear since the entire day will be blocked out, there is no need to specify the start time.
3. Continue on to add your Appointment Label and any neccessary notes.
4. Click the “Create Personal Time” button and the personal appointment will be scheduled.  It will appear in your daily view as a personal appointment starting at 12:00 am and lasting 24 hours.  You can still book other appointments on this day, however you will need to confirm the booking conflict.

Pencil’em Mobile:

1. Click on “Schedule” to access the scheduling page.
2. Click on “Personal Appointment” in the secondary navigation bar.
3. Set the Date you would like to block out.
4. You can skip the “Start Time” as this will be an all day appointment, and the start time will be automatically set for you.
5. From the “Length” drop down menu select “Entire Day”.
6. Add a label and notes and click “Schedule”.

This might not be a question you’ve ever asked yourself. Or, you might immediately say, “It costs me nothing, I use my appointment book and that works just fine!”. And I would probably agree with you, it does work fine. Many nail techs and hair stylists live by the book to manage their daily schedules. So you might then be asking yourself why I’m asking you how much your scheduling costs you….let me explain.

For many stylists, missed appointments means lost revenue. With this in mind, I’m guessing that a majority of you are taking personal time to make calls, send emails, or send text messages to remind your clients of upcoming appointments. If the client is aware that your expecting them, they are less likely to cancel or no show. So how much time does it take to make these calls, write the emails, and type the text messages? I would also ask, if you weren’t spending the time to make this contact, what else could you be doing? Developing new clients, building your business, spending time with family / friends?

On average, we find the stylists that use Pencil’em manage between 75 – 150 clients (or more!). Now, lets assume that on average, a stylist books 6 appointments per day (5 days a week). That’s 30 appointments a week. If we were going to calculate the time it takes to make contact with each of these clients (assuming 5 minutes per contact) that would come to 150 minutes a week, 600 minutes a month, 7200 minutes a year!

Cost of scheduling calculation

So, as you can see above, stylists are leaving a lot of money on the table, just to manage their schedules! This is the main reason that we’ve created Pencil’em. At just $14.95 a month, Pencil’em is the most affordable business management tool available today. With Pencil’em, you will spend a fraction of the time / money you are currently spending managing your appointments, so you can spend more time on your clients, your business, and your life. Pencil’em helps to eliminate this schedule management by automating the process of appointment reminders. Since you won’t have to spend as much time on the phone, you can focus on what’s really important, the client in the chair!

Benefits of Pencil’em Scheduling Software

• Access anywhere, from any computer with an Internet connection.
• Pencil’em Mobile lets you manage your appointments from your web enabled mobile device.
• Not tied to one book (what if you lost your book?), your data is safely secured on our servers.
• Connect with clients in new ways!
• Bring your business up to date and embrace technology to make your life easier!
• Spend less time reminding customers of upcoming appointments.

If your still not convinced, we ask that you give Pencil’em a try, for free! Sign up for a free trial (no credit card required) and you will see first hand how this great tool can help you build your business.

Hello All!  We’ve got great news that all Pencil’em “Mobile” users should know about.  We’ve added a “Settings” screen that will enable you to customize how “your” Pencil’em Mobile works.  On this new “Settings” screen (which you can find in the main navigation bar), look for the “Start Page” setting.  This new feature will enable you to select which page Pencil’em Mobile loads whenever you  login.  In the past, the “Schedule” screen was loaded by default when you logged in and if you wanted to then see your daily schedule or Week-at-a-glance you would have to click into those screens.  Now, you can set the “Start Page” to which ever screen you use most often, saving yourself many clicks a day!  This new feature simply lets you have immediate access to the information you use most!   See the image below for more details about how to access the settings page:

The new settings page.

Also of note, we’ve moved the “Logout” button into the main header, opposite the logo, to make room for the Settings button.  We think these new changes make Pencil’em Mobile even more flexible and efficient.  As always, we appreciate your comments!

Editing Client Appointments

Editing appointments is extremely simple in Pencil’em Mobile.  Simply click on the “View Schedule” screen, where you will see a list of appointments for the current day.  You will now see a pencil icon next to the red x to the right hand side of each appointment.  Click this pencil icon and the “Edit Appointment” screen will open.  The details of the current appointment will be filled out for you, allowing you to change the neccessary details.  As you edit the current appointment, Pencil’em will always check to make sure that no conflicts have resulted with the new date, time or service.  See below for screenshots:

Pencil'em Mobile - Editing Appointments

Mobile Personal Appointments

We’ve now added the ability to create your personal appointments from the Pencil’em Mobile.  From the “Schedule” screen, simply click on the “Personal Appt.” link found in the secondary navigation bar. Fill out the form for the personal appointment and click “Schedule”.  All booking conflict rules apply, so you will see a booking conflict screen if the personal appointment conflicts with any other appointment.  Also, your personal appointments will show up in a red font on your “View Schedule” screen, as well as the “Week-at-a-glance” screen.  More details below:

Create personal appointments in Pencil'em Mobile!

Today we added the “Week-at-a-glance” feature to our Mobile Platform, Pencil’em Mobile.  This lets you see one full week of appointments on one screen.  To access this feature, simply click “View Schedule” and you will notice there is now a secondary navigation bar with the “Week-at-a-glance” button.  Click this button and the week at a glance will load, starting on today, and show you seven days out.  You can change the start day by selecting a different date from the form at the top of the week-at-a-glance and clicking “Go”.  See image below for more details:

Mobile "Week-at-a-glance"