Microsoft Bookings was announced by the company back in July, 2016, as a service to make it easier for businesses, particularly smaller ones, to manage appointments with their customers. The service is completely integrated into Office 365 and was initially available only for Office 365 Business Premium subscribers in the U.S. and Canada. Today, eight months later, Microsoft announced the worldwide availability of Microsoft Bookings to all Office 365 Business Premium subscribers.
Bookings can be accessed by customers through a web-based interface where they are able to book an appointment even outside of business hours. The service automatically sends a confirmation email to customers with a unique link that enables the management of their appointment, to help businesses to reduce "no-shows". Reminders are also automatically sent to customers ahead of the appointment. Also, to boost customers" engagement, Microsoft released back in October, 2016, the ability to integrate Bookings with Facebook Page.
Microsoft is also adding some new features to Bookings today, based on users" feedback. It is now possible to connect a user"s Office 365 calendar to Bookings to keep only the available time unblocked in the public Bookings page. Furthermore, users can now add buffer time before and after appointments for personal preparation, which also automatically blocks that time in the Bookings page. Finally, new customization colors for the page are now available.
The Bookings app is also available for iOS and Android. It can currently be used to view and manage the Bookings calendar, create and edit bookings, see real-time availability and whereabouts of the staff, respond to customers with bookings, get directions, and access the customer list.
Source: Office Blogs