Use Appointment Slots for discipleship appointments, interviews, etc. It’s perfect for making a time available for others to grab rather than all the back-and-forth you might otherwise go through to set up a meeting.

Because Cru uses Google Apps, the new appointment slots feature is available to us. Since I’m a consultant, this should work very well for people to meet up with me. I’m going to give it a try on three days in November at Lake Hart. If it goes well, I’ll continue in 2019 and may even try virtual appointments. For now, I’ll try it here at headquarters.

Here’s how to make appointment slots and also how to sign up for consulting with me if you work at Lake Hart.

Making Appointment Slots with Google Calendar

Google Calendar’s Appointment Slots function is not available to general Gmail users, just those who use Apps, which Cru does. The Appointment Slots feature creates an additional view of your calendar which only shows your available appointment slots. This is your “Appointment Page” view. Any appointment you create has a URL link to this calendar view.

Before using this feature, make sure you’ve set your time zone. To create appointment slots that other Google Calendar users can book:

• Go to the week view of your calendar.
• Click on the date and time for your appointment.
• In the event box, click “Appointment slots.”
• Add a title and other information.
• Copy the URL for your Appointment Page. Look for the globe icon and “This calendar’s appointment page.”
• Email the link to your Appointment Page to people who would want to book an appointment.

For your view of the Appointment Page, you’ll see your other calendar items. Of course, this helps so you don’t double-book.

You can make recurring appointments. You can add a person to an appointment with “Add Guests”.

You may prefer to make one block of time for appointments, like one afternoon per week, and break that up into smaller slots of time.

In your Google Calendar view, Appointment Slots have a little grid icon in the upper left corner.

Booking Your Appointment

• Go to a person’s appointment page. To see what this looks like, visit my Appointment Page. You’ll see diagonal lines in the appointment slots.
• Click on an appointment slot event, then click “Save”.
• Your name shows up in the person’s Google Calendar and the appointment also shows up in your calendar.

Again, this is a trial basis for me, so please only those who can meet me at Lake Hart should book appointments. I will let everyone know if I open this up in 2019.

How will you use this new calendar feature? I’d love to hear that creating appointment slots is useful for your ministry. 

Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash