Start with your core offerings (5-15 services). You can always add more later. Consider:

Recommended approach:

Yes, all service settings can be modified at any time. Changes don't affect existing appointments - only future bookings use updated settings.

Safe to change:

Nothing. Existing appointments retain their original details (price, duration, team member, resource). Only new bookings use updated service settings.

To update existing appointment:
Must manually edit the specific appointment.

Important: If you change a service's price (for example, from $100 to $110), every appointment already on the books keeps the original $100 price. Customers who booked at the old rate are not affected. Only appointments created after the price change use the new $110 rate. If you need to update the price on a specific existing appointment, open that appointment and edit its price directly.

Yes, but only if it has no historical appointments. If service has been used:

These are two different actions with very different outcomes:

Disabling (Recommended for most cases):

What happens: The service is hidden from your public booking page. Customers cannot see or book it online. Staff can still create bookings manually. All historical data, reporting, and existing appointments are preserved. You can re-enable it at any time.

Deleting:

What happens: The service is permanently removed. This only works if the service has zero historical appointments. If appointments exist, Petboost blocks deletion to protect your data.

When to delete vs disable:

Rule of thumb: If in doubt, disable rather than delete. You lose nothing by disabling, but deletion is permanent.

Services have two visibility states controlled by the "Self-Service Booking" toggle:

Self-Service Booking ENABLED:

Self-Service Booking DISABLED:

How to toggle visibility:

Use cases for disabled self-service:

Note: Unlike customer/pet profiles, services don't have a formal "draft" status. All services are immediately available for staff booking once created. The self-service toggle only controls customer visibility.

Yes. This is exactly what the self-service booking toggle is designed for. When you disable self-service booking on a service, it becomes an "internal-only" service:

What stays the same:

What changes:

How to set up:

Common uses:

For a full walkthrough, see the Internal-Only Services guide.

When creating multiple similar services (e.g., size variants of the same groom), you can copy settings from an existing service to save time:

This is particularly useful when:

What gets copied:

What you should change after copying:

Initial:

Regular:

Petboost has six service types, each designed for a specific purpose. The three most commonly confused are:

Initial services gate access to Regular services. Until a pet completes their Initial service, they cannot book the linked Regular service. This is tracked per pet, not per customer. Example: a "Daycare Assessment" must be completed before a pet can book "Full Day Daycare".

Regular services are your bread-and-butter appointment types. They can be booked repeatedly, support variable or fixed pricing, multi-pet discounts, and recurrence patterns.

Add-on services are revenue boosters that cannot be booked standalone. They appear during the booking flow after a customer selects a base service (like extras on a food delivery app). Industry research shows upselling increases revenue by 10-30%.

The other three types:

For full details, see the Service Types Guide.

Use Add-ons for optional extras that cannot be booked alone. Add-ons are a powerful upselling tool: like Uber Eats, customers can add extras during the booking flow. Industry research shows upselling increases revenue by 10-30% (Accenture).

Good Add-on Examples:

Should be Regular (not Add-on):

See the dedicated Add-Ons Guide for complete setup instructions and best practices.

After selecting a base service (like "Full Groom"), customers see relevant add-ons they can tap to add. The price updates instantly, just like ordering extras on a food delivery app. This self-service upselling happens without any effort from you.

Customers get two opportunities to add extras:

Appointments with add-ons display a distinctive pink "Add-ons" badge on the calendar and in Mission Control. Click into the appointment to see the full list of extras and the price breakdown.

Yes! Staff can add or remove add-ons at any point before finalising the appointment. Great for when a customer requests something extra at drop-off.

If add-on services aren't saving or are behaving unexpectedly, work through this diagnostic checklist:

1. Check the service type is set to "Add-on":

2. Check the add-on is linked to base services:

3. Check pricing and duration are set:

4. Check Publish Changes was clicked:

5. Check browser cache:

6. Check team member assignment:

If the issue persists after all these checks, contact Petboost support with:

Stay is for overnight or multi-day services:

Features:

Stay services are purpose-built for overnight boarding and multi-day stays. They work differently from Regular services because they handle check-in/check-out times, nightly pricing, capacity across multiple nights, and optional transport.

Step 1: Create the service

Step 2: Configure pricing

Stay pricing uses two tier systems that work together:

See the Pricing Guide for complete examples and calculations.

Step 3: Set default check-in/check-out times

Step 4: Configure capacity

Step 5: Add stay-specific add-ons

Create add-on services for boarding extras:

Step 6: Consider linking an Initial service

For first-time boarders, create a "Boarding Trial Night" Initial service that must be completed before booking extended stays.

Individual services are standalone appointments booked and paid for one at a time. Packages are prepaid bundles of services sold at a volume discount.

When to use individual services:

When to use packages:

Setting up a package:

Package features:

Revenue impact: Package customers typically have 30-50% higher lifetime value. Prepaid cash flow arrives before services are delivered, and package holders book more frequently.

For full details, see the Packages Guide.

For detailed pricing documentation including complete stay pricing examples, see the Pricing Guide.

Fixed Pricing - Use when:

Variable Pricing ("from $X") - Use when:

Option 1: Separate Services (Recommended)

Benefits: Clear pricing, accurate duration, better eligibility controls

Option 2: Variable Pricing

Benefits: Fewer services to manage, flexibility

Recommendation: Use separate services if pricing and duration differ significantly. With separate services you can also set weight restrictions on each variant so that only pets of the correct size can book. For example, set "Full Groom (Small)" to 0-10kg, "Full Groom (Medium)" to 10.01-20kg, and so on.

To set up size-based services efficiently, create the first variant, then use the Copy Settings feature to duplicate it for each size. Adjust the name, price, duration, and weight restrictions on each copy.

Create separate services for each tier with clear naming and value differentiation:

Example structure:

Setup tips:

Use service categories to group tiers together on your booking page for easy comparison.

Petboost's bulk update feature allows you to update multiple services at once, but it currently works with fixed dollar amounts rather than percentage-based adjustments.

What you can do today:

What you cannot do (yet):

Workaround for a percentage increase:

Tip: If most of your services are priced similarly, a flat dollar increase often achieves a similar result. For example, adding $5 to a $100 service is a 5% increase.

We are aware this is a frequently requested feature. Percentage-based bulk pricing adjustments may be added in a future update.

Petboost provides a bulk actions feature on the services list:

Bulk actions available:

Tips for effective bulk updates:

For more granular control, edit each service individually. The bulk feature is best for broad, uniform changes across many services.

Petboost does not offer a built-in deposit feature. Instead, we strongly recommend card-on-file with pre-authorisation, which gives you the same protection with a much better experience when plans change.

Card on File + Pre-Authorisation (Recommended)

For high-value or boarding bookings, we recommend combining this with a longer cancellation period (e.g., 72 hours or more). This protects you against last-minute cancellations while keeping refunds fast and admin-free.

Workaround: Quick Sale for Upfront Payment

If you must collect a partial or full payment before the appointment:

Note: this requires manual refund processing if the customer cancels, so we recommend pre-authorisation as the default approach.

Yes, but not through a traditional deposit system. Petboost uses card-on-file with pre-authorisation as the recommended approach for securing payment before service delivery.

Per-service configuration:

How it works for specific services:

For truly non-refundable upfront charges (e.g., a booking fee for peak holiday boarding):

See also: No-Show Protection and Upfront Payments

Petboost does not currently have a built-in seasonal pricing feature that automatically switches rates on specific dates. However, there are practical workarounds:

Option 1: Seasonal service variants (Recommended)

Create separate services for peak and off-peak periods:

Option 2: Variable pricing with manual adjustment

Option 3: Surcharge add-on

Tips for managing seasonal pricing:

Option 1: Create Package Services

Option 2: Manual Discount at Booking

Option 3: Use Packages Feature (if available)

Duration should include:

Duration should NOT include:

Formula:
​Service Duration = Average Service Time + Minor Buffer
​Buffer Time = Setup Before + Cleanup After

Example:

Service Duration:

Buffer Time:

Example:

Buffer time adds a gap before and/or after each appointment for setup, cleanup, or transitions. It is not visible to customers but prevents back-to-back scheduling conflicts.

How to configure:

The buffer is automatically added to the calendar block:

Recommended buffer times:

Common issue: If your appointments consistently run over time, increase the buffer after rather than the service duration. This preserves accurate time reporting while giving you a realistic schedule.

Common causes:

Solutions:

Set Minimum Advance Notice in booking settings:

Balance:

The Minimum Advance Notice setting controls how much lead time is required before a customer can book. This prevents last-minute bookings that you cannot accommodate.

How to configure:

Common configurations:

Same-day booking restrictions:

If you want to prevent same-day bookings entirely, set the minimum notice to 24 hours. This means a customer booking at 9am on Monday can book for Tuesday at the earliest.

If you want to allow same-day bookings but with reasonable lead time, set it to 2-4 hours. A customer booking at 9am can book for 11am or 1pm the same day.

Important: This setting applies per service. You can allow same-day bookings for dog walking (2-hour notice) while requiring 48-hour notice for grooming.

Tip: If you find you are getting too many last-minute bookings that disrupt your schedule, increase the notice period. If you are losing bookings because customers want shorter lead times, reduce it.

No, only assign team members if:

Leave unassigned if:

Required:

Optional:

Example:

Yes. You can assign specific team members to a service and mark the assignment as Required, ensuring only qualified staff can deliver that service.

How to configure:

What this means:

Use cases:

Tip: If you want to track which team member performed a service but do not want to restrict who can be booked, set the assignment to Optional instead of Required. This gives you reporting data without limiting availability.

Result: Maximum 3 simultaneous grooming appointments (one per table).

Yes, for most services. Enable self-service unless:

Benefits of self-service:

Instant confirmation for 95% of services.

Manual approval only if:

Downsides of manual approval:

Toggle Enable Self-Service Booking off in the Booking Settings tab:

What this does:

Use cases:

Note: There is no separate "active/inactive" or "deactivate" toggle. The self-service booking toggle is the only visibility control for services. See Internal-Only Services for more detail on managing services without online booking.

System behaviour:

Yes:

System behaviour:

Best for:

Option 1: Eligibility Restrictions (Recommended)

Note: Breeds must be selected individually by searching and adding one at a time. There is no bulk selection by coat type or breed group. Once you've set up restrictions on one service, use that as a reference list when configuring similar services.

Option 2: Service Naming

Option 3: Weight/Size Restrictions

Multi-pet discounts use rate-per-pet tiers. When customers book multiple pets for the same service, the system finds the matching tier and applies that per-pet rate to ALL pets:

System behaviour:

Important: The rate you configure is the price per individual pet, not the total. Total = rate per pet x number of pets.

Example:

The rate automatically applies at booking.

Best for:

Not recommended for:

Yes, but the per-pet rate applies to the service price before package credits are used.

Example:

Yes! Each service can have its own multi-pet rate tiers.

Example:

This is the most commonly misunderstood pricing model. For complete documentation with examples, see the Pricing Guide.

Stay pricing bills per 24-hour period, not per calendar night.

When you book a stay from Monday 10am to Saturday 6pm, Petboost calculates:

The system then applies your configured tier rates to these periods.

1. Per-Day Period Rates (Green section)

2. Short-Stay & Spillover Rates (Blue section)

When a stay exceeds a tier's minimum duration, that tier's rate unlocks and applies to ALL full 24-hour periods.

Example:

A 5-day stay unlocks the "2-7 days" tier at $73/day. The customer pays:

5 x $73 = $365 total (not $117 for the first 2 days + $73 for the rest)

Spillover rates handle the hours remaining after full 24-hour periods.

Example: A stay of 6 days and 8 hours:

Without spillover rates, those 8 hours would be charged at the full daily rate ($73), which would be unfair to the customer.

If you prefer simple nightly billing without tier discounts:

Every 24-hour period will be charged at the base rate.

Calendar-based billing (counting nights) doesn't account for check-in/out times:

Same "2 nights" but different actual durations. 24-hour period billing is fairer.

If spillover hours fall between tier boundaries (e.g., you have 0-8h and 12-24h but not 8-12h), the hours in that gap use the per-day rate as a fallback.

Solution: Ensure your spillover tiers cover the full 0-24 hour range with no gaps.

This appears when a tier crosses the 24-hour boundary (e.g., min: 12h, max: 2d). Such tiers cause incorrect pricing calculations.

Fix: Click "Fix Automatically" to split the misconfigured tier into proper sub-24h and per-day tiers, or manually delete and recreate the tiers correctly.

Yes. Petboost calculates the exact duration between check-in and check-out times. Earlier check-in or later check-out naturally increases total hours, which may result in additional charges based on your tier configuration.

Simple explanation for customers:

"We charge per 24-hour period. Longer stays unlock better daily rates. Any remaining hours are charged at our partial-day rate. For example, a 3-day stay at our standard rate would be $73 x 3 = $219."

For detailed customer-facing explanations, consider:

Petboost includes built-in AI to help generate professional service descriptions.

Available for:

How to use:

Benefits:

Yes! The AI provides a starting point. You should:

Badges displayed on services to highlight them to customers.

Common labels:

Best practices:

Examples:

Yes! Add YouTube or Vimeo links:

Best practices:

Forces customers to complete an introductory "Initial" service before booking regular services.

Use case:
Your business requires first-time assessments before ongoing services.

Example:

When they try to book a regular service requiring initial completion:

No - only new customers who haven't completed the initial service.

Behaviour:

Automated workflows that reduce manual tasks throughout the appointment lifecycle.

Six automation types:

It depends on your service type and business needs.

Fully automated (all 6):

Partial automation (1-4 only):

Minimal automation (instant confirmation only):

Yes! Each service has its own Pro Automations configuration.

Example:

You can manually override automation behaviour on individual appointments.

Example scenarios:

Staff can always intervene at any stage.

No - Auto-Pay requires customers to have a payment method on file.

Without stored payment:

Best practice:

System logs the failure and notifies staff.

Common failures:

Fallback:

Overrides how duration appears to customers.

Default display:

Custom display:

When to use:

How to set:

Yes! Duration is automatically hidden when you use custom time window labels.

This is useful when:

How to hide duration:

What customers see:

Example:

Instead of showing "9:00 AM - 11:00 AM (2 hours)", customers see:

Staff view: Exact scheduled times and duration remain visible internally for scheduling purposes.

Services that can only start at specific times.

Example:
Group class starts at 9:00 AM, 2:00 PM, 6:00 PM only (not 9:15, 9:30, etc.)

Best for:

Use Fixed Start Times to create structured session blocks:

For multiple sessions per day, create separate services:

Benefits:

Suburb-based restrictions (not km radius):

Important: Petboost uses suburb boundaries, not "km as the crow flies" distance. This is more practical because:

For custom travel fees:

Currently, travel fees aren't automatically calculated based on distance. Options:

Example:

No, Petboost integrates exclusively with Stripe for card payments. However, you have zero-fee alternatives:

Zero-fee payment options:

Why Stripe is worth it:

What you lose without Stripe:

Most businesses find Stripe's automation saves $2,000+ per month in bookkeeping time, far exceeding the Stripe processing fee (1.7% + $0.30) and booking fee (1.4% on Pro and Flex, 1.2% on Max). You can also pass fees to customers as transparent line items.

See also: Payment Settings

Two separate fees give you full control:

You choose who pays each fee:

Configure in Settings -> Payments -> Fee Configuration.

Integrated payment methods:

Not supported: PayPal, Afterpay, EFTPOS machines from other providers

Cancellation fees are configured per service:

How it works:

Industry standard: 50% fee with 24-hour notice period

Common reasons for failed cancellation fees:

How to identify failed cancellation fees:

To retry a failed cancellation fee:

Tip: Require card on file at booking to prevent this issue. Configure in Settings -> Booking Configuration.

Yes, staff can waive fees on a case-by-case basis:

Best practice: Create a written policy for when staff can waive fees to ensure consistency.

Yes, both use the same cancellation fee percentage.

Petboost applies a single Cancellation Fee Percentage for both:

How it works:

Industry standard recommendations:

Tip: If you want to charge 100% for no-shows but less for late cancellations, set the percentage to 100% and manually adjust the invoice for late cancellations where you want to be lenient.

Check:

Prevention:

If it happens:

Solutions:

If services run long:

If services finish early:

For more information, see: