A walkthrough of the public booking flow customers use to schedule an appointment (dealership, appointment type, salesperson, date and time, contact form, confirmation screen), the service booking flow, and the embeddable version.
The booking page is your dealership's public scheduling flow: the page a customer lands on from a "Book an appointment" link, a tracked campaign link, the chat widget, or an embedded button on your website. It walks them through a short series of steps and ends with a confirmed appointment that lands on Appointments and the assigned rep's calendar (a sales visit also gets a deal card in your Sales pipeline). This is one of several customer entry points into AutoBook; everything below is configured per dealership, so each dealership in a group sets it up independently.
What the customer gets
When an appointment is confirmed, the customer gets a confirmation by email and text (what is sent, and when, is set on Settings → Customer messages). AutoBook Agent also talks to customers on every channel your store has turned on (chat, text, email, phone).
The step-by-step flow
1
Landing + dealership
The customer sees your logo, a welcome heading, and your trust message with a Get Started button. If your group runs more than one dealership, a Select Location dropdown appears first and the customer must pick one before continuing. With a single bookable dealership, this selector is hidden and the page goes straight in.
2
Choose an appointment type
"What would you like to schedule?" shows a card per active appointment type (test drive, service, finance, etc.), each with its name, description, and duration. Two types behave differently: lead-only types skip scheduling entirely and jump straight to the contact form (the customer submits a request and your team follows up), and external-link types send the customer out to a URL you've set (e.g. a third-party trade-in tool) instead of continuing the booking. Cards appear in the order you set on Settings → Booking.
3
Choose a salesperson
The customer picks how they're matched: Choose a Salesperson (browse the team, with photo, title, languages and each rep's next open slot, and pick one), Any Staff (they pick a time and AutoBook assigns an available rep behind the scenes, balanced by who's least booked), or Soonest Available (AutoBook finds the earliest open slot across the whole team automatically). If Customers pick their rep is off for your dealership, this whole step is skipped: a rep is assigned automatically and the customer goes straight to date/time.
4
Pick a date and time
A calendar shows which days the assigned rep can take the appointment, and the time list shows open slots. Availability is computed from the rep's weekly hours, lunch break, and time-off, minus any appointments already booked, then trimmed by the minimum notice and how far ahead customers can book. AutoBook sets the store-wide notice and booking window; each rep can also set a longer Minimum booking notice for their own appointments in their Availability. If a day has nothing open, AutoBook surfaces other available reps for that date so the customer isn't dead-ended.
5
Contact form + consent
"Your Contact Information" collects the fields you've configured (name, email, phone, vehicle interest, notes, plus any custom fields). Required fields are marked, and a consent checkbox must be ticked: the customer agrees to receive confirmations and reminders and is told they can withdraw consent anytime.
6
Review and confirm
Pressing Confirm Appointment books it immediately and the customer goes straight to the success screen. There is no separate review page. (Lead-only types show Submit Request instead and route to your team rather than the calendar.)
7
Success screen
"You're All Set!" displays the confirmation code, the appointment summary (type, date/time, dealership, assigned rep, duration), and a note that a confirmation is on its way. The customer can add the appointment to Google, Apple, or Outlook calendar, see what happens next (a 24-hour reminder, a rep reaching out), tap Reschedule to move the appointment to a new time (same confirmation code; the original stays until the new time is submitted), or Cancel appointment (it asks first: Yes, cancel it or Keep it). They can also Book Another Appointment.
Why a rep's slots can look empty
If a rep shows little or no availability, check that rep's weekly hours, lunch break, time-off and Minimum booking notice. A long notice hides same-day and next-morning slots. Whether a rep appears on this page at all depends on two things on their staff profile: the Customers can book switch, and being on this store's Sales desk. The staff sheet names whichever one is stopping them. Turning off Customers can book does not deactivate their account.
When a customer books service online
When your store books service through AutoBook, picking a Service Lead type opens the service flow instead of the salesperson step. The customer tells us who they are (a VIN, email or phone, plus a second detail), confirms their vehicle, then picks from your Service menu under What can we do for you? (with Recommended services first) or describes what the car is doing. Then they pick a time.
- If the time is booked for them, the screen says You're Booked! with a confirmation code, and the confirmation arrives by text and email.
- Otherwise the screen says Request Submitted! and explains that your service desk confirms the time before anything is booked.
Either way the request opens a service ticket on your Service desk. A service customer changes or cancels by calling the store and quoting their code or reference; the success screen says so.
The embedded (iframe) version
The same flow can run inside your dealership's own website (copy the embed snippet from the install guide on Settings → Website). It runs the same steps, auto-resizes to fit the page, and can carry a brand color. On Settings → Website, in Booking display, turn on Booking inside your site and pick a Display mode: Modal (popup) opens booking over the current page, so the customer never leaves your site; Embedded (iframe) sits inside a page your web provider builds. With it off, every booking link opens the AutoBook booking page directly. This is set per dealership. If no dealership is bookable, both the standalone and embedded versions show a friendly "Booking Currently Unavailable" notice instead of a broken form.
Configure what customers see
Two more settings drive most of this flow:
Why does the rep-selection step never appear?
Customers pick their rep is off for your dealership, so the step is skipped and a rep is assigned automatically. Turn it on under Settings → Booking → Rep assignment if you want customers to choose.
A type sends the customer to another website instead of booking. Is that broken?
No. That's an external-link appointment type: it's configured to open a URL (like a trade-in or finance tool) rather than continue the AutoBook flow. Edit the type to change or remove the link.
What does a 'lead-only' type do?
It skips scheduling entirely. The customer fills in the contact form and submits a request; your team is notified to follow up and book the time manually. Use it for inquiries where a fixed slot isn't appropriate.
Can customers add the appointment to Google Calendar?
Yes. The success screen offers Google, Apple, and Outlook add-to-calendar buttons for the customer's own calendar. (This is separate from rep calendar sync, where only Outlook is supported, not Google.)
How does a customer change or cancel?
On the success screen they can tap Reschedule: the booking page reopens in reschedule mode and picking a new time moves the existing appointment (same confirmation code, your team gets a quiet update, no cancellation email). Or they tap Cancel appointment, which cancels it and notifies your dealership. The confirmation email also links to the same cancel and reschedule page. A service customer calls the store instead.
Where do these bookings show up for my team?
Each confirmed booking shows on Appointments and the assigned rep's calendar, and a sales booking creates a deal card in your Sales pipeline. A service booking opens a service ticket on your Service desk. There's no separate manual leads list to manage.
Need a hand?
If the booking page won't load or shows "Booking Currently Unavailable" unexpectedly, the dealership may be set as not bookable or have no active appointment types. Contact us at support@auto-book.ca or 647-786-0989.