Pet Attributes

Unlike a free-text note that can be overlooked, an attribute is colour-coded, searchable and shown across Petboost. Petboost includes over 1,600 pre-built attributes in 48 categories, and your business can add its own custom attributes. The category sets the badge colour.

What attributes record

Attributes give you a standard way to capture and show the information your team must not miss:

• Allergies: food allergies, such as chicken or beef, and environmental sensitivities
• Medical conditions: arthritis, seizures, heart conditions and medication requirements
• Service preferences: blade and comb sizes, such as #4f, #7f and #10 blades and mm combs, and hand stripping
• Behavioural traits: high energy, nervous or reactive
• Care instructions: extra-special care requirements and special handling needs

Attributes and notes

Attribute categories

Major care (red)

The Extra-special Care, Major Health Condition, Adverse Allergy, Disease and Major Behavioural Trait categories show on a red background, for high visibility. Examples are Frequent Grooming Required, Frequent Exercise Required, Arthritis, Seizures, Chicken Allergy, Beef Allergy and Reactive.

Special care (amber)

The Minor Health Condition, Minor Allergy and Minor Behavioural Trait categories show on an amber background. Examples are High energy and Nervous.

Neutral traits (blue)

Categories such as Neutral Behavioural Trait, Test/Procedure, Size and Life Stage show on a blue background. Examples are Friendly, Playful, and the training levels from Training Level 0: Untrained to Training Level 4: Elite.

Service preference (pink)

Blade, comb and technique attributes show as pink text on a light pink background. The coat categories, for colour, length, density and characteristics, use the same pink.

• #4f blade, #5f blade, #7f blade, #10 blade and other blade sizes
• Combs by length, from 1.6mm Comb to 50mm Comb, and by colour, such as Blue Comb
• Hand Stripping

Other categories

• Medication, Supplement and Vaccinations & Injections, in green
• Care Advice, Eye Colour, Nose Colour, Breed Purpose, General Characteristic and Permitted Treats

Add attributes to a pet

Add an attribute when you learn something your team needs to see before every booking. An attribute saves as soon as you select it. There is no separate save step.

1. Open Customers & Pets and select Manage on the pet.
2. On the Petprint card, select Add on the attribute's row, or Not recorded on an empty row.
3. Type the name, such as chicken, blade or nervous, and select the attribute.
4. Optional: leave the list open and select more.

If you know the name but not the row, select Search attributes… in the Petprint card header instead. It searches every category, and the chips above the list, such as Allergies, Grooming or Custom, narrow it. Attributes already on the pet stay in the list with a tick.

Remove an attribute from a pet

1. Open Customers & Pets and select Manage on the pet.
2. On the Petprint card, select the cross on the attribute.

You can also open the row's list, or Search attributes…, and select the ticked attribute. Either way, the attribute is removed straight away.

Where attributes show

• On the pet's profile, each attribute shows with its category icon and colour. The Petprint card counts them at the top in red major care and amber special care chips
• On the calendar, a red icon before the pet's name marks major care and an amber icon marks special care. Cards do not list attribute names; hover over a card to see the pet's attributes
• In the booking form, the pet's attributes show next to its name and special care pets are flagged, so there is no need to open the profile separately

What pet owners can change

Pet owners can add or remove shared library attributes on their pet's profile in the pet owner app, under Petprint ID > Attributes > Manage. They choose from the full library, and your business cannot limit which library attributes they choose.

Pet owners do not add attributes during online booking. The one exception is Coat Colour, when a signed-in owner adds a new pet.

Pet owners can add or remove a custom attribute only when you set it to Pet Owner can edit. They do this on the Fields & Forms tab of their pet's profile.

Choose attributes well

• Be specific: use "Chicken Allergy" rather than "Allergy", and "#10 blade" rather than "Short cut"
• Keep major care for conditions that affect every appointment, and special care for information your team should note
• Review each pet's attributes from time to time, remove conditions that no longer apply and add new ones
• Make sure your whole team understands the colours, go over what the attributes mean when someone joins, and choose attributes the same way across the team

Filter pets by attribute

Filter by attribute to find every pet with a condition, such as all dogs with allergies, every pet on medication, or the pets who need a #10 blade.

1. Open Customers & Pets and select Filter.
2. In Filter Pets, under Attributes, select the attributes.

Each attribute under Attributes shows how many pets carry it, counting pets with an appointment in the last 400 days or the next 90 days. Petboost has no attribute report, so use these counts instead.

Create a custom attribute

Create one for information specific to your team that the shared library does not cover. Custom attributes are private to your business.

1. Open Pet Attributes and select Add New. With no custom attributes yet, select Create Your First Attribute instead.
2. In Create Custom Attribute, enter the Attribute Name.
3. Choose an Icon.
4. Pick a Care Type: General, Minor care or Major care.
5. Pick a Visibility: Business Only, Pet Owner & Business or Pet Owner can edit.
6. Select Create Attribute.

Then assign it on the pet's Petprint card, with Search attributes… or the Custom row. If your role can manage custom attributes, you can also create one from there: open Search attributes… or the Custom row and select Create custom attribute. It is added to your library and assigned to the pet.

Care types

Each custom attribute has a care type that sets how it behaves and looks:

• Major care: red, and treated exactly like Petboost's extra-special care attributes. It flags the pet for major care on the calendar, in tooltips and in Mission Control
• Minor care: amber, and treated like Petboost's special care attributes
• General: no care treatment. You choose the badge colour, and Petboost works out a readable background tint

For Major care and Minor care, the badge colour is locked to Petboost's red and amber so it matches the built-in attributes. All three types keep the icon you chose.

Visibility

Each custom attribute has a visibility setting that controls whether pet owners see it:

• Business Only, the default: never shown in the pet owner app. The attribute stays with your team, on the calendar, in Mission Control and on pet profiles
• Pet Owner & Business: the pet owner sees the badge on their pet's profile for your business, but cannot add or remove it
• Pet Owner can edit: the pet owner can also add or remove the attribute on their pet's profile

Visibility and care type are independent: a Major care attribute set to Business Only still drives the Mission Control special care columns without the client ever seeing it. Custom attributes created before this setting existed behave as Business Only.

Custom attributes:

• Are available only within your business
• Can be edited or archived by account owners and admins
• Stay on the pets that already carry them after they are archived, and can no longer be assigned
• Drive major or minor care behaviour only with the Major care or Minor care care type. General attributes stay informational
• Are shown to pet owners only with Pet Owner & Business or Pet Owner can edit visibility

Change who sees a custom attribute

1. Open Pet Attributes.
2. Under Your Custom Attributes, find the attribute.
3. Under Visible to, choose Pet Owner & Business or Business Only. The change saves straight away.
4. To let the owner add or remove it themselves, select Edit, set Visibility to Pet Owner can edit, then select Save Changes.

To retire an attribute, select Archive on its row, then Archive Attribute. Pets that already carry it keep it.

Who can see attributes

Shared library attributes cannot be hidden from clients. If a library attribute records something clients must not see, recreate it as a Business Only custom attribute.

For a free-text behaviour note that clients must never see, use a Staff Only pet field under Fields & Forms. Attributes are badges, not free text.

For a colour-coded badge that only your team sees, create a custom attribute and leave its visibility as Business Only. Choose Major care or Minor care to have it in the Mission Control special care columns; General stays informational and does not appear there.

Add booking properties

Booking properties apply a price, duration, attendance or eligibility rule to every pet that carries the attributes you choose. Manage Pet Attributes, in the gear menu beside Add New on Customers & Pets, opens the same page.

1. Open Pet Attributes.
2. Under Booking Properties, select Add Booking Properties. On a phone, once you have a set, it reads Add.
3. Under Applies to attributes, search for and select the attributes.
4. Under Price adjustment, choose No price adjustment, Discount or Surcharge. For a discount or surcharge, set Type to Percentage or Fixed amount, then enter Percentage (%) or Amount per service.
5. Under Duration change, choose No duration change, Additional time or Less time. For more or less time, set Additional time per booking or Less time per booking.
6. Under Attendance cap, choose No attendance cap, Business-wide maximum or Per team member or resource. For a business-wide maximum, set Maximum pets at a time. For per team member or resource, set the maximum in each team member's, resource's or session's editor; a blank value there means no cap.
7. Optional: choose services under Required for these services and Blocked from these services.
8. Select Add Booking Properties.

Each set then shows as a row under Booking Properties, with a badge for each effect, such as 10% surcharge, +30 min or Max 2 in at once. To change a set, select the pencil on its row, then Save Booking Properties. Cancel closes the dialog without saving. To remove a set, select the bin on its row, then Remove Booking Properties: new bookings stop getting its rules, and existing bookings are not changed.

Attributes as booking gates

The eligibility badges on a service use the same attributes you assign on the pet's Petprint card. The pet must have every attribute under Required badges (all of these), and any attribute under Blocked badges (any of these) refuses the booking. Business Only custom attributes still count.

See Service prerequisites.

Troubleshooting

Attributes are not showing on the calendar

Appointment cards show care icons, not attribute names. Hover over a card to see the pet's attributes. To colour the whole card for major and special care pets:

1. Open Appointments and select the view menu, the button showing Day, Week, Month or Timeline.
2. Set Colour Major & Special Care Event Cards? to Always or Until checked in.

The choice applies to that browser only.

A customer cannot see an attribute

Pet owners see the shared library attributes on their pet, plus any of your custom attributes set to Pet Owner & Business or Pet Owner can edit. If a customer cannot see an attribute you expect, check these in order:

1. Assigned. Is it on the pet's Petprint card, and not only written in a note?
2. Visibility. For a custom attribute, is Visible to on Pet Attributes set to something other than Business Only?
3. Refresh. Ask them to refresh or reopen the pet's profile.

Business Only custom attributes and Staff Only custom fields never appear for pet owners. That is intentional.

A custom attribute is missing from the Mission Control special care column

The Mission Control special care columns include only:

• Shared library attributes whose category is special or extra-special care
• Custom attributes with the Major care or Minor care care type

A custom attribute set to General shows on the pet, and as an icon where custom attributes are listed, but not in the special care column. Select Edit on it on Pet Attributes and change the Care Type if you need that column.

An attribute is missing from the library

Search again with different words, because it may be listed under another name. If it is not there, contact support to ask for it to be added to the shared library.

Related FAQs

Have questions about pet profiles and attributes? See these commonly asked questions:

• How do I mark a pet as deceased?
• How do I know when vaccinations are expiring?
• How do I require proof of vaccination before customers can book?
• Why is weight tracking important for my business?
• Do I have to fill out grooming preferences?
• Can I add a breed that is not in the list?

Related guides

• Pet & Owner Profiles: the profile tabs
• Pet Profiles Overview
• Managing Customer Information
• Calendar Configuration