Scheduling Procedures
Agent Booking Checklist
Follow these steps in order for every new appointment:
Step 1 - Identify the Client
- Collect client name (first and last)
- Search
05-Client-and-Dog-Knowledge/active-clients/for an existing file (LASTNAME-FIRSTNAME.md) - If existing client: open their record; confirm contact info is current; proceed to Step 2
- If new client: create a new file from client-record-template before proceeding
Step 2 - Identify the Dog
- Confirm which dog is being booked (client may have multiple)
- Open the dog’s profile section within the client record
- If new dog: create a dog profile section from dog-profile-template
Step 3 - Check for Flags
- Read the dog’s Temperament & Handling → Flags section
- Read Kendra’s Notes in the dog profile
- If any Level 2 or Level 3 aggression flag exists:
- Do not proceed without confirming with Kendra
- See aggressive-dog-policy for the definition
- See approval-workflows for booking requirements
- If any health condition is noted: confirm the requested service is compatible (see health-and-vaccine-requirements)
Step 4 - Verify Vaccine Records
- Check the dog’s Vaccination Record table in the profile
- Confirm Rabies, Bordetella, and DHPP are current (not expired by appointment date)
- If records are missing: inform the client they must be provided before the appointment can be confirmed
- If records are expiring soon: note it and inform the client; do not block the booking unless already expired
Step 5 - Determine Pricing
- Confirm the dog’s breed and coat type
- Look up the base price in breed-pricing-matrix
- Confirm the service tier requested
- Apply any applicable coat-type modifier (matting, first-time, handling difficulty)
- Add any requested add-ons from add-ons-and-upgrades
- Quote the price to the client
Step 6 - Assign a Groomer
- Check the schedule for available slots
- Standard appointment: assign any certified groomer with availability
- Flagged dog: assign Kendra or a Phase 4 certified groomer only
- Confirm Kendra is available that day for the final approval walk
- If Kendra is not available for a flagged dog: offer a date when she is
Step 7 - Confirm and Book
- Confirm the date, time, service, price, and groomer with the client
- Add the appointment to the scheduling system
- Note any add-ons, special instructions, or flags in the appointment record
- Send confirmation to the client (see booking-policy for confirmation timing)
- Set reminder alerts (48 hours and same-day morning)
Groomer Schedule and Capacity
[Agent prompt: Fill in groomer capacity once team is established. Update this table whenever a new groomer is added or schedule changes.]
| Groomer | Days Available | Max Dogs/Day | Cert Level | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kendra | [days] | [X] | Executive | Final approver; handles flagged and complex dogs |
| [Groomer 2] | Certified | |||
| [Groomer 3] | In training | Phase [X] - restricted assignments only |
Schedule Blocking Rules
- Allow [XX] minutes between appointments for cleanup and handoff
- Block [XX] minutes for lunch / break
- Do not book more than [X] full grooms back-to-back without a buffer
- Reserve the last slot of the day for dogs with longer expected drying times (doodles, double coats)
- Kendra’s approval walk time is built into the appointment - do not schedule back-to-back if Kendra is the sole approver
Waitlist Management
The waitlist is not just an overflow queue - it’s the salon’s growth engine. A full book with a healthy waitlist is proof of demand, which is what justifies premium pricing (see business-goals-and-milestones → Pricing Philosophy) and tells Kendra exactly when and who to hire a second groomer for (see 6-Month Goals in the same file).
See booking-pipeline-targets for how many new-client bookings need to be actively acquired each week to fill that waitlist and hit the grooms target - and the booking-admin time that implies (this checklist’s own 14-minute new-client call time is the input for that workload calculation).
When the schedule is full:
- Log the client and dog on the waitlist with the fields below - not just a name and date range
- Add them to the waitlist in the scheduling system (or a simple log if not supported)
- When a slot opens: contact waitlisted clients in priority order, matching service type and groomer
- Script: “Hi [name]! We had an opening come up on [date] at [time] for [dog name]. Would that work for you?”
Waitlist Record Fields
Capture this for every dog added to the waitlist - it’s what turns the list into a hiring and pricing tool, not just a callback queue:
| Field | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Client & dog name | Identify who to contact |
| Breed & coat type | Determines base price and groom time - see breed-pricing-matrix |
| Expected price (tier + likely add-ons) | Projects revenue per slot before it’s ever booked |
| Expected frequency (e.g. every 4/6/8 weeks) | Projects recurring revenue, not just a one-time booking |
| Temperament / handling notes | Flags whether this dog is safe to route to a newer groomer or requires Kendra/a certified lead - see [[aggressive-dog-policy |
| Date added | Preserves order for fairness within a priority tier |
| Preferred date range / service | What they’re waiting for |
Waitlist Priority
- VIP loyalty clients
- Existing clients (in waitlist order)
- New clients
Within a tier, Kendra may pull a specific dog out of strict order when it’s a better fit for an open slot - e.g. an easy, well-behaved regular is a better use of a newly opened chair than a difficult first-timer, even if the first-timer has been waiting longer. The list is a curation tool, not just a FIFO queue.
Using the Waitlist to Justify a Hire
Once the waitlist is consistently non-empty, total its expected price × expected frequency to estimate the monthly revenue a second groomer’s chair would generate. When that projection comfortably covers the new hire’s cost (see ongoing-expenses), it’s time to act on the 6-Month Goal of bringing on groomer #2 - Kendra can then hand-pick which waitlisted dogs go into the new groomer’s book, keeping the easiest, most reliable clients for the new hire to build confidence on.
See waitlist-sizing-analysis for the actual headcount math - how many unique dogs a full-time vs. part-time groomer’s book needs once fully ramped, based on rebooking frequency.
Using the Waitlist for Cancellations
The same list is the first call when a same-day cancellation opens a slot - match the open slot’s service/duration against waitlisted dogs and work down the priority order above.
Rescheduling
For reschedules requested by the client with 48+ hours notice:
- Rebook at no charge; note the original date in the appointment history
For reschedules due to late cancellation or no-show:
- Apply the applicable fee from cancellation-and-no-show-policy
- Rebook after the fee is acknowledged
For reschedules due to groomer absence:
- Contact the client as early as possible
- Offer the next available slot with their preferred groomer OR offer any certified groomer
- No fee to the client - this is a salon-side reschedule
For a missed/cancelled appointment for a recurring client:
- Make a courtesy call to get the client rebooked (see no-show follow-up script in cancellation-and-no-show-policy)
- If a slot is open before their next regular cycle date, fit them in there
- If the schedule is full, place them at the next available appointment via the standard waitlist process, even if this shifts them off their usual cadence - see cancellation-and-no-show-policy for acceptable drift
Open Challenge: Weather / Emergency Closures
Not yet solved - this is a documented open problem, not a policy. No decision has been made on how to handle it. Flagged here so it isn’t lost, and so it gets designed deliberately rather than left as pure improvisation.
A snow day (or other weather event) is not a single cancellation - it’s a whole day’s book needing to move at once, and it compounds in two directions simultaneously:
- Client-side: clients may cancel dramatically/last-minute on bad-weather days, on top of (or instead of) the salon choosing to close.
- Staff-side: groomers may not want to (or safely be able to) drive in, which can make closing the right call even for clients who would’ve shown up - but that then means every dog booked that day needs to move, not just the ones who self-cancelled.
That combination is what makes this harder than a normal cancellation: a full day of appointments needs to be re-absorbed into an already-full book, all at once, usually with very little lead time (weather calls are often same-day or the night before).
Current state: there is no defined process. The default today is entirely ad hoc - Kendra just squeezes affected dogs in wherever there’s room, case by case. Asking her directly for “the policy” won’t surface anything new; the honest answer is that it’s currently improvised, which is exactly why it’s worth designing on purpose rather than treating as a solved problem.
Open questions to eventually work through (not answered here):
- Who makes the call to close, by when, and based on what threshold (forecast vs. day-of conditions)?
- Does a weather closure follow the same no-fee rescheduling terms as a salon-side reschedule (see Rescheduling above), even for clients who would have shown up?
- Does the waitlist (see Waitlist Management above) absorb any of this, or is it a separate mechanism given the volume hits all at once rather than trickling in?
- Is there a priority order for re-slotting a day’s worth of displaced dogs (e.g. recurring clients before new clients, similar to waitlist priority), or first-come-first-served?
- How far does this compound during multi-day weather events, where displaced dogs from day 1 are still unplaced when day 2 also closes?
See also business-goals-and-milestones → Key Open Decisions.