Bookable times come from sessions, not from the day being switched on. That one sentence explains most of what follows.

Why a day can be on and still not bookable

Each team member has a week, and each day is in one of three states.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions and find the team member.
2. Switch the day on, so its header reads Working.
3. Select Add Session on that day, set the Start Time and End Time, then select Add Session.
4. Select Publish Changes, tick the box in Before You Publish, then select Publish Changes.

Turn Thursday on and watch it. It becomes a working day with No sessions, and it is still not bookable.

Inside a session

Open a session and you get its start, its end, and how many pets can be in it at once.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions and find the team member.
2. Select the session on the day you want to change.
3. Set Pets at a time, then select Stage for Publishing.
4. Select Publish Changes, tick the box in Before You Publish, then select Publish Changes.

Pets at a time is how many pets you can have on the go at the same moment, not how many you will do that day. 3 at a time across a 3 hour session with hour-long services is 9 bookings. Leave the field empty and the session uses the team member's default.

A session can also carry a name for your clients. Enter it under Label, such as Drop-off from 9am, then switch on Show on booking page, which only appears once the session has a label. Customers then see the label instead of the start time for that session, and it wins over a service set to A message instead of a time. Leave the switch off to keep the clock, or to let the service's message show on its own.

Two sessions at once, and a session for set dates only

Two sessions can cover the same hours on one person or one room when each is limited to its own services, so a full-day daycare session can run underneath the two-hour ones.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions and select Add Session on the day, or the session you want to change.
2. Set the Start Time and End Time, then turn on Runs at the same time as another session. It only shows when the day already has a session.
3. Open Advanced options and, under Services in this session, choose the services this session takes.
4. Open the other session and give it its own services. A service cannot be on both.
5. Select Stage for Publishing, then Publish Changes, tick the box in Before You Publish, then select Publish Changes.

Both sessions share the one Pets at a time total, so a full-day dog and a two-hour dog in the same hour count against the same number. If the other session is still open to every service, limit it first: an open session cannot run beside another.

For a run of dates rather than every week, turn on Special date only while adding the session, set Start Date and End Date, then choose Keep the normal day and add this session or Only this session on these dates.

Set up an alternating fortnight

An alternating roster is a special date, not a second schedule. Pick the first week and the frequency, and the preview shows every week it will create before you commit to any of them.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions and switch the team member to Special Dates.
2. Select New special dates, then turn on Repeat these special dates.
3. Set First Start Date and First End Date to the first week.
4. Under Repeat every, choose Every 2 Weeks.
5. Under Ends, choose After or On a date, then check every week the preview will create.
6. Name the roster in Special Date Label, then select Next: Configure Schedule.
7. Set the hours, then select Next: Check bookings.
8. Choose what happens to any booking outside the new hours, then select the Create button, which counts the special dates.

The run saves as soon as you create it, with no Publish Changes step. To change the hours on the rest of the run later, open any of its weeks and choose This and the N after it.

To check the roster afterwards, select Special dates at the top of Schedules & Sessions. Every schedule sits on one month, with the normal hours and the special dates side by side, and the special dates list beside the month jumps to any of them, past ones included.

Close for public holidays

Petboost knows the Australian dates for your state, so you switch on the ones you close for and apply them in one pass.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions, then the tools menu, and select Public Holiday Manager.
2. Choose your state, then switch on each holiday you close for.
3. Leave each one on Closed all day, or switch it to Open with hours.
4. Select Apply Holidays, then the Apply button, which counts the holidays.

Toggle a holiday between its two states and read the label.

Check your setup

The health check reads your schedule the way the booking form does, and it needs working hours to read.

1. Open Schedules & Sessions.
2. Open the settings menu and select Health Check.
3. Read Overview and How it works, then work through What to review.

That empty page is what you see before any team member or resource has hours. Add hours, then run it again.