Square Appointments

Why would I pay $90&#x2F;mo [1] with Square when I can pay for the same services and features directly from BookFresh for just $20&#x2F;mo [2]?<p>In case you are not aware, Square purchased BookFresh back in February [3].<p>I think it&#x27;s a safe assumption that Square Appointments is just rebranded BookFresh<p>[1] <a href="https://squareup.com/appointments#pricing" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;squareup.com&#x2F;appointments#pricing</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.bookfresh.com/pricing" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bookfresh.com&#x2F;pricing</a><p>[3] <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/26/square-acquires-bookfresh-to-add-booking-services-for-merchants/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2014&#x2F;02&#x2F;26&#x2F;square-acquires-bookfresh-t...</a><p>EDIT: links

Square bought BookFresh in February. <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/26/square-acquires-bookfresh-to-add-booking-services-for-merchants/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2014&#x2F;02&#x2F;26&#x2F;square-acquires-bookfresh-t...</a>

Thanks HN for these comments.<p>I was looking for an appointment SaaS for a dental office and was only aware of ZocDoc[0] which charges a steep $300 per month.<p>[0]<a href="http://www.zocdoc.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.zocdoc.com</a>

Most of the comments here seems to be about the pricing. IMO if you&#x27;re a small business, the pricing is fair. Yes, competition may be better&#x2F;cheaper but keep in mind that Square is trying to create an entire platform here. They&#x27;ve got payments, point of sale, invoicing, and analytics.

So I wonder what ran through patio11&#x27;s mind when he read that...<p>Though it is an all or nothing proposition - you can&#x27;t take just the appointment reminding features and leave everything else.

Is there any automation of the common yet difficult problem of &quot;your dentist &#x2F; hair stylist &#x2F; doctor has called in sick today and we&#x27;re trying to reschedule all of todays appointments&quot;. This is not all that unusual. My wife&#x27;s hair stylist was sick two appointments ago and my kids pediatrician office (windowless) had a summer time air conditioning failure.<p>Its not in the PR page so I assume its not handled although this would be a very handy feature. &quot;One click reschedule everyone for today&quot;

Why is it not free? These additional features are to lure you in to using the payment platform and lock businesses in. More so I need end-users to also install the square app to use this feature. So there is that additional friction as well. This is really not something they should be charging for.

I&#x27;m interested in this new wrinkle, and always looking for something that will help out my day. But is $30 a month, for a single person, a competitive pricing plan?

I shopped around for a service like this a week ago.<p>We went with Setmore: <a href="http://www.setmore.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.setmore.com</a>. Clean design, their branding is subtle on the free tier, multiple staff&#x2F;services, ical, and most of all it&#x27;s extremely easy for customers to create&#x2F;re-schedule&#x2F;cancel appointments.<p>Over Square Appointments I&#x27;d say their pricing is much more keen (substantial free tier, $25&#x2F;month premium).

Another example of Google squandering a good thing. They had appointments built into calendar, pushed Google apps to businesses, then promptly shut down appointments.<p>I just recently noticed They slipped appointments back in to Google Apps Calendar, but it&#x27;s still just wonky and not integrated well in typical Google fashion.

I wonder why there don&#x27;t seem to be many open-source options in this space?<p>I did a Google before, but I could only find a single option - <a href="https://code.google.com/p/easy-appointments/" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;code.google.com&#x2F;p&#x2F;easy-appointments&#x2F;</a>, a PHP app.<p>Is anybody aware of any others?

Congrats to Square on their new product. Execution looks a bit &quot;cheap&quot; but I&#x27;m sure they will be working hard on it.<p>I recommend <a href="https://www.appointlet.com" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.appointlet.com</a> for online appointment scheduling.

Seems like they are competing with MyTime - <a href="http://www.mytime.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.mytime.com</a>. The only thing they lack is good search to find businesses

Isn&#x27;t this what patio11&#x27;s Appointment Reminder essentially does?

Competing with appointment reminder now ;)

My barber uses Appointy.<p><a href="http://appointy.com/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;appointy.com&#x2F;</a>

It&#x27;s really cool to the additional value being added tot he platform outside of payments.