The Best Appointment Scheduling Software

Square Appointments is included for free for individuals using the Square Payments platform. For $50/month, you can add two to five employees, and for six to ten employees, you’ll pay $90/month. Custom pricing is available for accounts with more than 10 users per month.

Square offers a pretty straightforward appointment tool you can start utilizing from day one of signing up with Square Payments, with no additional hoops to jump through. Simple in design and easy to use, you’ll find the features will help you reduce inbound calls and cut the time it takes to schedule appointments.

Here’s what you’ll get with Square Appointments:

• Free online booking website
• iOS and Android app
• Automated email and text reminders
• Google Calendar sync
• Enforceable cancellation and no-show policy and fees
• Website integration
• Square Assistant
• Waitlist
• Instagram Integration
• Multi-staff appointments and tip-splitting

Square’s built-in payment processor will run you a fee of 2.6% plus $0.10 per card-present transaction on the free plan. You’ll pay 2.5% plus $0.10 per transaction on the Plus plan. You are charged a 3.5% plus $0.15 fee for card-not-present transactions.

The fee for online/eCommerce transactions and invoices is 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction.

Square subscriptions are month-to-month, and you can cancel your merchant account anytime without consequences.

If you damage your Square hardware within your hardware warranty period, even if you didn’t purchase the hardware directly from Square, the company will send you new equipment.

Acuity Scheduling offers a 7-day free trial for all of their plan options. The plans start with the Emerging plan at $16 per month when paid annually.

The Growing plan is their most popular at $27 per month when paid annually and includes 6 total staff logins/locations. The Powerhouse plan is $49 per month when paid annually and can accommodate up to 36 staff members/locations. This plan also allows users to sign BAA for HIPAA compliance.

Acuity Scheduling offers a ton of different helpful features for businesses looking for the best scheduling software.

• Calendar sync
• Mobile app
• Staff permissions
• Online payments
• Gift certificates
• Packages, memberships, and group classes available
• Built-in HIPAA compliance
• Automated email and/or SMS reminders
• Credit cards on file to enforce late fees
• Virtual appointments
• Personalized intake forms
• Customer accounts
• Robust customization
• Squarespace web design

Acuity Scheduling integrates with popular apps like Stripe, Square, Zapier, PayPal, Google Analytics, and more.

Acuity Scheduling doesn’t offer a built-in payment processor but does allow users to take online payments through trusted payment processors like Stripe, Square, and PayPal.

Acuity Scheduling also allows users to accept tips, deposits, and pre-payments as forms of payment.

It’s easy to leave your Acuity Scheduling subscription behind if you need to. You can deactivate your subscription immediately or just turn off your auto-renew to finish out your last billing cycle.

You need to use a computer to manage your Acuity subscription at this time. There are no long contracts or early termination fees that you need to worry about with Acuity Scheduling.

Zoho Bookings makes pricing easy with their Forever Free, Basic, and Premium plans. Rates start at $6 per month for the Basic plan (when paid annually) and $8 when paid monthly. The premium plan starts at $9 (when paid annually) and $12 when paid monthly.

Each plan can begin with a 15-day free trial. If you have more specific needs and require a tailored plan, Zoho Bookings offers a FLEX plan made just for your business. Contact Zoho Bookings directly for quotes.

Zoho Bookings provides other ways to support your organization within the software. You can:

• Calendar syncing
• Automatic work, break, and buffer times, along with time off and special hours
• Meeting integrations
• Administrative reports
• Customer reports
• Personalized, branded booking page
• Dedicated staff booking pages
• Terms and conditions document
• Customer Portal
• Personalized automatic emails and/or SMS messages for team members and customers

You can also take advantage of the Zoho Bookings custom workflow functions like periodic emails (newsletters, coupons, etc.) and APIs that help you build your own scheduling interface on top of Zoho Bookings or bring Zoho Bookings inside your own app.

Zoho Bookings doesn’t have a built-in payment processor but does allow users to take payments via popular processors like PayPal, Stripe, etc.

Zoho Bookings allows you to cancel your plan at any time with no penalties or charges for the next month.

Doodle scheduling is free if you just want to set up a poll to find the best time to meet, but you’ll probably be interested in the actual booking tools, and for that, you’ll need a paid plan.

Paid plans start at the Pro level at $6.95/month for one user (paid annually). The Pro plan also allows you to access custom branding, one-on-one meetings, and a personalized scheduling URL.

Both those Doodle plans let you sync meetings to calendars, create deadlines, reminders, and more, with no ads.

If you have more than one user, you’ll need to jump to the Team plan, which runs $8.95/month per user for up to 20 team members when paid annually.

There’s also a customized Enterprise plan for large user groups.

All of Doodle’s paid plans have a 14-day free trial with no credit card required, so you can check it out for a couple of weeks before paying the annual fee.

Doodle can certainly reduce discord when it comes time to schedule a meeting between multiple attendees. Here are some of the features you get with the Pro plan:

• Sync meetings to calendars
• Deadlines and reminders
• Store email, phone, and address of attendees
• Track meeting invitations
• Zoom, Google Meet, Webex, Zapier, and iCloud beta integrations
• Bookable calendar
• Custom logo and branding
• Personalized scheduling URL
• Doodle one-on-one meetings
• Meeting time polls
• No ads with paid plans

Doodle does not have a built-in payment processor. To take payments using Doodle, you’ll need to use the Zapier integration to have access to popular payment processors like Stripe, PayPal, Square, and more.

Like Square Appointments and other popular scheduling software, Doodle Professional is renewed automatically each year or month, depending on which subscription you choose.

If you want to cancel your Doodle plan, you just need to disable the automatic renewal of your subscription. This will cancel your current plan once it expires, and there are no early termination fees to worry about.

Sign in Scheduling plans start with the Pro plan at $7.20/month per user for up to 40 appointments a month. The Premium plan is $19/month per user for up to 100 appointments a month. Both plans include SMS reminders, the ability to take online payments, support, and custom branding.

The Premium plan adds the ability to manage teams across multiple time zones and can be HIPAA compliant. The fully-customizable Bespoke plan can offer more than the standard basic plans including custom integrations and personalized onboarding.

All Sign In Scheduling plans include a free trial, so you can try before you buy.

From booking appointments or professional services at a small business to helping your sales team organize a meeting, Sign In Scheduling is built to help you book, track activity, and collect payments all in one platform.

Here’s what you get with the Sign In Scheduling solution:

• Book-now button
• Client-facing scheduling and booking menu
• Take payments with PayPal or Stripe
• Automated SMS and email reminders that have read receipts
• Customizable service descriptions
• Assign services to staff members
• Color code staff members and services
• Voice reminders
• Clients can request changes from SMS, and you can respond from the online booking calendar
• Integrates with WordPress and Facebook
• Access control for staff booking
• Tracking for changes, notes, payments, and customer history
• Confirmation emails
• Custom reports
• Platform and messaging in more than 20 languages
• Native Zoom integration
• Automated satisfaction survey
• Client review badge for your website

Payment processing costs are going to depend on what processor you choose. Sign In Scheduling allows you to record payments made via cash, card, check, and bank transfer.

You can also connect a card reader or other POS terminal hardware via Stripe. Stripe charges a standard fee of 2.9% + $0.30 per card transaction.

PayPal has a more complicated fee structure you can learn more about it on their website.

Sign In Scheduling doesn’t provide a lot of information about their contracts or the process of canceling your plan subscription.

If you need to close your Sign In Scheduling account, you have to contact the customer support team.