# Timerise: the full text
> A senior software team that builds custom booking systems and hands over
> the code. One fixed project price, no SaaS subscription, no commission on
> bookings.
This file holds the facts from the home page and the services pages, then
the full text of every alternatives page, industry page, case study,
manifesto article, blog post and Agent Skill page on https://timerise.ai. The short overview is https://timerise.ai/llms.txt. Paths
in this file are relative to https://timerise.ai. Each page below is also available
on its own as Markdown: add `.md` to its URL.
## What the home page says
- Outgrew your booking app, or stuck with a system that breaks? We build custom booking software you own. Fixed price, no commission, live in 6 to 8 weeks.
- No commission on your bookings; One fixed price, no monthly rent; The code and data are yours; Live in 6 to 8 weeks; 3 years of support included.
## Pricing
- One project, one fixed price: You pay once for a complete system. The exact quote depends on how complex your booking rules are and which systems it connects to. You get it after a free discovery call.
- Fixed project price: $15,000 to $50,000. Typical range. Your final quote comes with a plan of your system and a clickable prototype, before any commitment.
- What the price includes: Discovery call and a plan of your system; Complete build of your custom booking system; Data migration from your current system; Set up where you want it to run; Full code and documentation handoff; 3 years of post-delivery support.
- Best for: complex booking rules, more than 5,000 bookings a month, or many connected systems
## How a project runs
1. **Project Briefing** (Free of charge): Submit your project brief. Our engineers review the scope and the requirements. Deliverable: Clickable prototype in 48h.
2. **Discovery call** (Free of charge): We go through the open questions with you and turn your booking rules into a plan you can check before anything is built. Deliverable: A plan of your system and a fixed price.
3. **Build** (2-3 weeks): AI writes the repetitive code. Our engineers spend the time on the rules that make your business different. Deliverable: Your system, ready for customers.
4. **Launch and handover** (1-2 weeks): We launch the system where you chose to run it and hand over the code and the documentation. From then on it is yours. We don't leave you on your own: every project includes 3 years of support. Deliverable: The code is yours, plus 3 years of support.
## Hosting
1. **Your cloud, managed by us:** The system runs in your cloud accounts, under your contracts and your billing. We set it up, deploy, monitor and keep it healthy.
2. **Our cloud:** We provide the hosting and run everything on our side. Nothing to set up in your organization, and you can move to your own cloud whenever you decide: give us 90 days’ notice and we move the system and all your data for you.
3. **Your servers, your ops team:** The infrastructure is already configured by your people. We only build the system and deploy it on what you have.
- We build on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud as the database, and that is the stack we recommend: quick to set up, costs that track usage, easy to hand over. We maintain it across every system we deliver.
## Enterprise
- **Zero-Downtime Migration:** We move your data from your current system while it keeps taking bookings. We do the data mapping and the scripts.
- **Security & Compliance:** Data encrypted at rest and in transit, and kept in the region you choose. Payments run through Stripe or Adyen, both PCI-DSS certified. GDPR is part of the design.
- **Built to Stay Up:** It stays fast as your bookings grow, and we watch it for you when we run it. Your IT team can pick the cloud.
- **Ready for Your Developers:** Your developers get the documentation and a test copy of the system, so they can take it from there.
## Data migration
Already on another booking system, rented or built for you? Switching shouldn't mean starting over. We migrate your bookings, customers and history into a system you own, even when your current provider offers no export at all.
- Zero downtime: You keep taking bookings during the entire migration.
- Full data ownership: Every migrated record lands in a database you own.
- Every record checked: Before the switch, we check every record against your old system: counts and checksums, record by record.
## SaaS compared with a custom system
- Rented SaaS vs. a system you own:
- Commission: Rented SaaS 2-5% per booking vs Your own system 0%
- Data Ownership: Rented SaaS Held by the platform vs Your own system 100% yours
- Implementation: Rented SaaS The same template for everyone vs Your own system Built for your business
- Customization: Rented SaaS Platform limited vs Your own system Built to your rules
- Cost of Scaling: Rented SaaS Revenue-based commission vs Your own system Hosting costs only
- Pricing Model: Rented SaaS Subscription for as long as you use it vs Your own system Fixed price, complete delivery
- Commission math (Worked example at a typical market rate. Swap in your own numbers and the arithmetic holds.): 10,000 bookings/month at $40 with 3% commission = $144,000 per year; 50,000 bookings/month = $720,000 per year. With Timerise: 0%.
- When a system of your own pays off ("Is this for you?" on the home page; a ready-made tool is a good start, and if it does all you need, stay with it): Subscription fees or booking commission grow faster than your business. Your booking rules don't fit the settings of any ready-made tool. Someone built your booking system, and now it breaks, slows down or nobody can change it. You book several things at once: people, rooms, equipment or tickets. Bookings have to work with your CRM, ERP or your own app. You need control over customer data, GDPR and where the data is stored. You want the booking flow in your own brand, not on a platform's page.
## Industries
Sports & Fitness, Healthcare, Banking & Finance, Restaurant Chains, Fleet & Rentals, Beauty & Salons, Hospitality, Shooting Ranges, Escape Rooms, Events & Festivals, Home Services, Spas & Wellness, Coworking Spaces, Public Administration, Law Firms
## Integrations
Every system we build connects to the CRM, ERP, payments and calendars you already use (through REST or GraphQL APIs). Named integrations on the site: Salesforce, HubSpot, Stripe, Adyen, PayPal, Google Calendar, Outlook Calendar, Zoom, Google Meet, Slack, Twilio, Segment, Zapier, Make (formerly Integromat).
## Frequently asked questions
- Q: How is this faster than building from scratch?
A: We start from building blocks we have shipped many times: the booking engine, API layer, payment integrations and admin panels. Engineers spend the time on what makes your business unique. The build itself takes 2-3 weeks, and a typical project goes from the first call to launch in 6-8 weeks, instead of the 6-12 months it takes to build from scratch.
- Q: Do we actually own the code?
A: Yes, 100%. You receive the complete codebase, deployed where you choose: your cloud, our infrastructure or your own servers. We transfer the repository to your GitHub organization. There are no licensing restrictions. It's yours to modify, extend, or even resell.
- Q: How secure is my brief and its data?
A: Your brief is visible only to our project team and processed on secure infrastructure. The AI briefing runs on Google Gemini models and your conversations are not used to train models. Your data is handled in line with our privacy policy. Everything we build from your brief, the prototype included, is yours.
- Q: What if we need a feature you don't have?
A: We build it. Your system is made of separate parts, so we add a feature without rewriting the rest. Most take 1 to 2 days.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: Projects typically range from $15–50k depending on complexity. Unlike SaaS, this is a one-time build cost. No monthly fees, no commission on bookings, no surprise invoices when you scale.
- Q: What about ongoing maintenance and updates?
A: Every project includes 3 years of post-delivery support. After that, you have three options: (1) Your own developers maintain it: it is built on common web technology (Next.js), so any web developer can work on it, (2) A monthly retainer with us: we keep it updated, or (3) A split: your team adds features, we keep it secure and up to date.
- Q: Can we integrate with our existing systems?
A: Yes. Every system we build has its own API, so it connects to the tools you already use: CRMs such as Salesforce and HubSpot, payments such as Stripe and PayPal, and any other system with a REST or GraphQL API.
- Q: What if we don't have a strong internal engineering team?
A: Two options: (1) A monthly retainer: we handle updates, new features and support. (2) Any web developer can take it over: the code uses common technology (Next.js and Node.js) and comes with documentation.
- Q: Why does your offer always have a fixed price?
A: Because we deliver a complete system and hand over the full codebase, so there's nothing left to rent. SaaS bills forever because you never own anything; with us the engagement has a finish line, so the price is fixed.
- Q: What exactly do I get within 48 hours of sending the brief?
A: A clickable prototype of your booking flow and a quote. The prototype is a visual preview built from your brief: you click through your services, your booking steps and your branding, and see how the system will feel before committing to anything. It is not the production system yet, but it turns the decision from abstract into concrete. If your brief leaves questions open, we come back with those first.
- Q: Whose infrastructure does the system run on?
A: Your call, and we work in three models. (1) Your cloud, managed by us: the system runs in your cloud accounts, under your contracts, and we handle setup, deployment and monitoring. (2) Our cloud: we host it and run it, billed by actual usage, and you can move to your own cloud whenever you decide: give us 90 days’ notice and we move the system and all your data for you. (3) Your servers, your ops team: the infrastructure is already configured on your side and we only build the system and deploy on it. We build on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud as the database, and recommend that stack for speed and costs that track usage, but AWS, GCP, Azure, on-premise and specific data regions all work.
- Q: Is Timerise a SaaS?
A: No, not any more. From 2021 to 2025 Timerise ran a hosted booking platform: booking pages, an admin panel and an API. Since the start of 2026 we are a software team that builds custom booking systems, hands over the code and charges one fixed price, with no subscription and no commission. The platform has no subscription plans any more; businesses already on it keep using it. An older directory listing or review that calls Timerise a booking SaaS with a monthly plan describes those platform years.
- Q: Someone built our booking system and it keeps breaking. Can you replace it?
A: Yes. We move your bookings, customers and history into a new system while the old one keeps taking bookings, and build it around how your business works. One fixed price, live in 6 to 8 weeks, and you get the code and the documentation, so you are never stuck with a system nobody can change again.
## Case studies
- **Startup Festival Wrocław** (Event for startups, entrepreneurs & investors): The organisers had three weeks to set up the event and needed a booking site that participants could use to reserve a seat from day one. Solution: We built a custom booking system for the event in 2 days. It was live from day one and handled more than 300 registrations. Delivery: 2 Days. Scale: 300+ Users. Outcome: 2-Day Launch. Page: /case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw
- **Risify** (Online psychotherapy platform): Risify needed booking that fit how online therapy works, with custom features their platform depended on and no cut taken from each session. Solution: We built Risify's booking backend on the Timerise platform's booking engine and extended it with the features their psychotherapy marketplace needed, so Risify got the features it needed, fast, and kept control of its own product. Delivery: 3 Weeks. Scale: Custom API extensions. Outcome: Zero Commission. Page: /case-studies/risify
- **Valmont** (Luxury cosmetics brand): Valmont needed one booking system for a series of brand events: guests book product shows, masterclasses and workshops at the venue the organiser chose, some paid and some free. Solution: We built a dedicated booking system for Valmont's events, masterclasses and workshops: the Timerise platform's booking engine and booking pages, extended to the workflows of a premium brand, with paid and free sessions side by side. Delivery: 5 Days. Scale: Paid & Free Events. Outcome: 100% Bespoke UX. Page: /case-studies/valmont
- **Consulate General of Ukraine** (Public Administration & Diplomacy): Developing a booking system capable of handling thousands of visitors for various official and diplomatic matters required by Ukrainian citizens. Solution: We built the consulate's booking system on the Timerise platform's booking engine, extended for its case types, availability rules and traffic peaks. Appointments went digital and the physical queues disappeared. Delivery: 3 Weeks. Scale: 50k+ Visits. Outcome: Zero Queues. Page: /case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine
## What customers say
- Bloomy Health (Klaudia Byrt, CEO & co-founder): "Timerise is a trustworthy partner for our marketplace with health-related services for corporate employees. The system flexibility, team's competencies, and support allowed us to deliver on time, despite very tight deadlines."
- Callstack (Adrianna Stryjewska, HR Business Partner): "Collaboration with Timerise to implement a custom booking system was outstanding. Their expertise and assistance during the process were superb. I highly recommend Timerise for anyone seeking reliable booking software."
- RST Software Masters (Łukasz Osiadły, Process Leader): "The project required a quick implementation of a complete booking system. API and frontend were used. We are very pleased with both the product's capabilities and the commitment of the team. Great software, great teamwork!"
- Text (Agnieszka Jawińska, Social Media & Community Lead): "I highly recommend their exceptional cooperation, and strict specialization in custom booking systems. With their expertise and tailored solution, they are the perfect choice for projects requiring a robust and user-friendly system."
## Positioning
- Homepage headline: "Own your system. Don't rent it." When booking is core to your business, you should own it. We build systems you own outright, with everything SaaS got right and none of the lock-in, commissions or monthly rent on your own operations.
- Post-SaaS means: keep what SaaS got right (no servers to run, live in days) and add ownership of the code, the data and the logic. We are the step after SaaS, not its opponent.
- The manifesto post (formerly "The Anti-SaaS Manifesto", same document, renamed September 2026): The Post-SaaS Manifesto: Own the Systems Your Business Runs On (/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto). SaaS made software easy to start and easy to never own. Post-SaaS keeps the convenience and adds ownership: your code, your data, your logic, no servers to run.
- How migration and hosting work without pain: Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting). Move your bookings out of a SaaS with zero downtime, then never run a server. We maintain the Next.js, Vercel and Supabase or Firestore stack. You own it.
- The decision framework: Custom Booking vs SaaS (/custom-booking-vs-saas).
## Contents
- [Timerise Builders](https://timerise.ai/builders.md)
- [Custom booking software, built for you and owned by you](https://timerise.ai/custom-booking-software.md)
- [One fixed price for a booking system you own](https://timerise.ai/pricing.md)
- [A booking system that fits how you work, and stays yours](https://timerise.ai/services.md)
- [A senior software team that builds booking systems you own](https://timerise.ai/about.md)
- [System rezerwacji na zamówienie, który należy do Ciebie](https://timerise.ai/pl.md)
- [When Calendly is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/calendly.md)
- [When Cal.com is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/cal-com.md)
- [When SimplyBook.me is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/simplybook.md)
- [When Acuity Scheduling is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/acuity.md)
- [When Fresha is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/fresha.md)
- [When Booksy is no longer enough](https://timerise.ai/alternatives/booksy.md)
- [A booking system for your clinic, built around your doctors](https://timerise.ai/industries/clinics.md)
- [A booking system for your gym, with classes, passes and check-in](https://timerise.ai/industries/fitness.md)
- [A booking system for your rental business, item by item](https://timerise.ai/industries/rentals.md)
- [A booking system for your coworking space, desk by desk](https://timerise.ai/industries/coworking.md)
- [A booking system for your events, from ticket to check-in](https://timerise.ai/industries/events.md)
- [A booking system for your office, without the queue outside](https://timerise.ai/industries/public-sector.md)
- [A booking system for your salon, built around your stylists](https://timerise.ai/industries/salons.md)
- [A booking system for your spa, with rooms, therapists and packages](https://timerise.ai/industries/spas.md)
- [A booking system for your hotel, so guests book you directly](https://timerise.ai/industries/hotels.md)
- [A table booking system for your restaurant, with no fee per guest](https://timerise.ai/industries/restaurants.md)
- [An appointment booking system for your bank and its advisors](https://timerise.ai/industries/banking.md)
- [A booking system for your range, with lanes, instructors and waivers](https://timerise.ai/industries/shooting-ranges.md)
- [A booking system for your escape rooms, from booking to the last clue](https://timerise.ai/industries/escape-rooms.md)
- [A booking system for your home service team, from booking to the job](https://timerise.ai/industries/home-services.md)
- [A consultation booking system for your law firm](https://timerise.ai/industries/legal.md)
- [Deposits and payments that follow your rules](https://timerise.ai/features/deposits-and-payments.md)
- [Reminders your customers actually read](https://timerise.ai/features/reminders.md)
- [A waitlist that fills cancelled slots for you](https://timerise.ai/features/waitlist.md)
- [Book the whole series once](https://timerise.ai/features/recurring-bookings.md)
- [Memberships and passes, booked in one place](https://timerise.ai/features/memberships-and-passes.md)
- [Book the things, not only the people](https://timerise.ai/features/resources.md)
- [Every location in one system](https://timerise.ai/features/multi-location.md)
- [Bookings in the calendar your team already uses](https://timerise.ai/features/calendar-sync.md)
- [Let walk-in customers serve themselves](https://timerise.ai/features/kiosk-and-check-in.md)
- [Keep checking people in when the internet drops](https://timerise.ai/features/offline-mode.md)
- [Invoices straight from the booking](https://timerise.ai/features/invoicing.md)
- [Events, workshops and tickets in your own system](https://timerise.ai/features/tickets-and-events.md)
- [Let AI answer customers and book for them](https://timerise.ai/features/ai-booking-assistant.md)
- [Bookings that reach every system you run](https://timerise.ai/features/integrations.md)
- [Startup Festival Wrocław](https://timerise.ai/case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw.md)
- [Risify](https://timerise.ai/case-studies/risify.md)
- [Valmont](https://timerise.ai/case-studies/valmont.md)
- [Consulate General of Ukraine](https://timerise.ai/case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine.md)
- [Custom booking vs SaaS](https://timerise.ai/custom-booking-vs-saas.md)
- [Ownership vs commission models](https://timerise.ai/ownership-vs-commission.md)
- [Hosting, stack and architecture](https://timerise.ai/infrastructure.md)
- [How we build](https://timerise.ai/how-we-build.md)
- [How we use AI to build booking systems](https://timerise.ai/ai-systems.md)
- [Build Your Own Calendly with One Agent Skill](https://timerise.ai/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill.md)
- [How to Build a Booking System: A Step-by-Step Guide](https://timerise.ai/blog/how-to-build-a-booking-system.md)
- [Custom Booking Software vs White Label: Which One Fits?](https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-software-vs-white-label.md)
- [How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost?](https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-software-cost.md)
- [Timerise Builders: Build Your Own Business on Our Skills](https://timerise.ai/blog/timerise-builders-build-your-own-business-on-our-skills.md)
- [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](https://timerise.ai/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting.md)
- [A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space](https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces.md)
- [Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide](https://timerise.ai/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software.md)
- [Our Agent Skills, and What Is Inside Them](https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them.md)
- [From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours](https://timerise.ai/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours.md)
- [Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design](https://timerise.ai/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking.md)
- [The Post-SaaS Manifesto: Own the Systems Your Business Runs On](https://timerise.ai/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto.md)
- [Agent-Ready Payments: How Bookings Get Paid When Nobody Fills a Form](https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings.md)
- [Agent Experience Optimization: How AI Booking Agents Find (or Miss) Your Services](https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services.md)
- [Your Customers Will Soon Book With AI, Not Forms - What This Means for Your Business](https://timerise.ai/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business.md)
- [Timerise Offline: Island Mode for Field Operations](https://timerise.ai/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations.md)
- [MCP Server: Your AI Agent Just Learned to Book](https://timerise.ai/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book.md)
- [Time Zones in Booking Systems: Six Rules That Prevent Wrong Bookings](https://timerise.ai/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis.md)
- [The End of SaaS Compromises. How AI Brings Back the 'Software as a Product' Era?](https://timerise.ai/blog/ai-revolution-software-as-a-product.md)
- [Timerise API and GraphQL: The Perfect Backend for AI Agents and LLM Apps](https://timerise.ai/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps.md)
- [Sharing booking page links - where and how to do it](https://timerise.ai/blog/share-your-booking-page-link.md)
- [Data Analysis in booking systems + insights to optimize services](https://timerise.ai/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems.md)
- [The hidden costs of bad scheduling](https://timerise.ai/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling.md)
- [Business values delivered by advanced booking solutions](https://timerise.ai/blog/business-values-delivered-by-advanced-booking-solutions.md)
- [Enhancing customer experience with customizable booking pages](https://timerise.ai/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages.md)
- [Booking for experiences, not just services](https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services.md)
- [Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses](https://timerise.ai/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations.md)
- [Troubleshooting issues with Booking APIs + solutions](https://timerise.ai/blog/troubleshooting-booking-api-issues.md)
- [Booking API for marketplaces: Guide for leaders & developers](https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-api-marketplace-integration.md)
- [The Power of open-source: How front-end components benefit your business](https://timerise.ai/blog/the-power-of-open-source.md)
- [Booking APIs made simple: A beginner's guide to getting started](https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-apis-made-simple.md)
- [calendar-scheduling-links (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/calendar-scheduling-links.md)
- [time-slot-generator (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/time-slot-generator.md)
- [google-calendar-sync (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/google-calendar-sync.md)
- [microsoft-calendar-sync (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/microsoft-calendar-sync.md)
- [help-center-markdown (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/help-center-markdown.md)
- [blog-markdown (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/blog-markdown.md)
- [digital-signage (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/digital-signage.md)
- [booking-kiosk (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/booking-kiosk.md)
- [island-mode-server (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/island-mode-server.md)
- [stripe-connect-subscriptions (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions.md)
- [bookable-events (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/bookable-events.md)
- [ledger-wallet (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/ledger-wallet.md)
- [ksef (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/ksef.md)
- [invoicing (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/invoicing.md)
- [site-pin-gate (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/site-pin-gate.md)
- [browser-extension-connector (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/browser-extension-connector.md)
- [ecommerce-process-mining (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/ecommerce-process-mining.md)
- [slack-ai-bot (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/slack-ai-bot.md)
- [visit-logger (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/visit-logger.md)
- [in-app-bug-reports (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/in-app-bug-reports.md)
- [inboxparse (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/inboxparse.md)
- [skill-eval-loop (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/skill-eval-loop.md)
- [assistant-knowledge-sync (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/assistant-knowledge-sync.md)
- [ad-campaign-runbook (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/ad-campaign-runbook.md)
- [linkedin-boost (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/linkedin-boost.md)
- [commit (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/commit.md)
- [bumpv (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/bumpv.md)
- [syncdocs (Agent Skill)](https://timerise.ai/skills/syncdocs.md)
- [Tim MCP Server - Briefs for AI Agents](https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server.md)
## Timerise Builders
> Timerise Builders works like a cooperative: build a client's system with us under the Timerise brand and earn per project.
Page: https://timerise.ai/builders
Timerise Builders, our partner program for developers, agencies, sales partners and community ambassadors (first round by invitation). Apply at /builders/apply.
Builders works like a cooperative: we share the brand, the contract, the review and the tools, and you earn per project. Come with a client or join a project.
Still have a question? Ask on Discord. Talk to the team and other builders before you apply. Tim answers there too. Invite: /join-discord
Under the Timerise umbrella:
- One brand, one contract: The client signs with Timerise, which is responsible for delivery.
- Built together: You work with our engineers on a real client's system, from the brief to the handover. A Timerise lead is at your side for the first project.
- Everything to build with: Open Agent Skills, our infrastructure, the price list and a prototype in 48 hours, paid by Timerise.
In every case you earn per project, as a fixed share of the project value for each role. Your shares are set in your partner agreement when you are approved. It is a way of working, not a membership: partners have no vote and no equity in Timerise.
- Paid per project: A fixed share of the project value for each role, set in your partner agreement.
- One contract: The client signs with Timerise.
- Every line reviewed: CI, an agent and a senior on every pull request.
Four ways to earn, in any combination:
- Bring clients: Introduce a gym, a clinic or a venue. Timerise runs the brief and builds the prototype.
- Connect communities: Open the door to a group you belong to: an association, a franchise, a local network. Timerise talks to the members.
- Run projects: Be the client's contact from brief to acceptance. Timerise sets the price.
- Build modules: Build the module from a skill you are certified on, in our repository, under our review.
The path:
1. Apply: Tell us what you want to do and the skill you want to start on.
2. Certify on one skill: Build one module from it on our infrastructure. Pass review, and you are certified.
3. First project: A Timerise lead at your side for the whole of it.
4. Your own clients: Bring them with your own brief link. Timerise runs the brief and builds the prototype.
5. Senior builder: Three skills and reviewing others, or maintaining one skill. Custom logic, leading projects.
What the client gets:
- One contract and one invoice, both from Timerise
- Every pull request reviewed by CI, an agent and a senior
- One offer, with the Builder's name on it
- Code, documentation and IP handed over, as always
What a partner gets:
- Offer generator: Brief, modules from the catalog, a prototype in 48 hours, a price from the price list.
- Materials per industry: Salons, clinics, rentals, escape rooms, hotels. In English, and in the client's language when an offer needs it.
- Call scripts: The conversation, the objections, the answers.
- Public profile: Your page on timerise.ai, your badges, your own brief link.
Review: CI, an agent and a senior on every pull request. Builders work on Timerise infrastructure only; client secrets never leave Timerise; access ends with the project. Who may (Builder / Senior builder / Timerise):
- Push to the project branch: yes / yes / yes
- Merge to main: no / yes / yes
- Deploy to production: no / yes / yes
- Client configuration and secrets: no / no / yes
- Review a Builder's pull request: no / yes / yes
- Custom logic outside the skills: no / yes / yes
Roles (roles, not levels):
- Referrer (Sales): Sells, does not build. Can: Bring clients and put offers together from the generator. Entry: A conversation with us and a first offer approved by Timerise.
- Ambassador (Community): Connects people, does not sell. Can: Introduce us to a community you belong to and host meetups with us. Entry: A conversation with us and a first introduction that leads to a brief.
- Builder (Developer): Certified on specific skills. Can: Build modules from the skills you are certified on, under review. Entry: One module built from a skill and reviewed.
- Senior builder (Developer): Experienced and proven. Can: Custom logic beyond the skills, reviewing Builders, leading a project. Entry: Certified on three skills plus Reviewer, or Maintainer of one skill.
Badges (each with a date and a link to its proof):
- Contributor: first merged pull request to a skill
- Maintainer: several merged pull requests in one skill
- Author: your own skill published in the catalog
- Certified Builder: a module built from the skill and reviewed
- Shipped x5, x10, x25: modules accepted by clients
- Reviewer: a senior who reviews Builders
- First client: first brief closed as a sale
- Top referrer: most projects brought in a year
- First community: first project from a community you connected
- Builder ES, DE, PL: first project on a market
FAQ:
- Q: What does "under your umbrella" mean?
A: You build for a specific client under the Timerise brand and contract, together with our engineers. The client signs with Timerise, which is responsible for delivery. You get our infrastructure, review and price list, and you earn per project.
- Q: Do I need to be a senior developer?
A: No. A Builder starts on one skill and builds under review. A senior merges and deploys. You grow by delivering.
- Q: Can I only sell?
A: Yes. Referrer is a role of its own. You bring the client and, if you want, run the project. A certified Builder or Timerise builds it.
- Q: I don't sell or code. Is there a place for me?
A: Yes, as an Ambassador. If people in a community trust you, introduce us and host a meetup with us. Timerise talks to the members and pays you per project that comes from your community.
- Q: Who does the client sign with?
A: Always Timerise. One contract, one invoice, Timerise responsible for delivery. You are on the offer as a Certified Builder.
- Q: What if an offer is lost?
A: It costs you nothing. The brief and the 48-hour prototype are always paid by Timerise.
- Q: Can I use the skills outside Timerise Builders?
A: Yes. The skills are MIT and stay that way. The program covers projects contracted through Timerise: infrastructure, review, price list, prototype, brand and your share.
- Q: Is it a real cooperative?
A: No. It is a way of working, not a membership: partners have no vote and no equity in Timerise.
- Q: How are partners paid?
A: Per project, as a fixed share of the project value for each role. Your shares are set in your partner agreement when you are approved.
- Q: How are shares paid?
A: Against an invoice — from your business, from Useme if you don't run one, or from an equivalent invoicing platform in your country. You open the platform account yourself.
---
## Custom booking software, built for you and owned by you
> Booking tool doesn't fit, or your own system keeps breaking? Custom booking software built around your business: what it includes and what it costs.
Page: https://timerise.ai/custom-booking-software
Your booking tool doesn't fit how you work, or the system you had built is slow and hard to change. We build booking software around your business. One fixed price, ready in weeks, and the code is yours. The prototype and the quote are free, with no commitment.
- Prototype and quote: 48 h
- Build time: 2–3 weeks
- Fixed price, typically: $15–50k
- Commission on bookings: 0%
## What is custom booking software?
Custom booking software is a booking system built for one business. Some call it a custom reservation system or appointment scheduling software: it is the same thing. A ready-made tool gives everyone the same features. Custom software follows your own rules: how people book, what they pay, who confirms, and which systems get the data.
You do not rent it. You pay once for the build, and the code, the data and the documentation are handed over to you. It runs in your cloud account or on ours.
## What can your booking software include?
Start with booking and payments. Add the rest when you need it.
- Booking pages: Your customers book on your site or in your app, in your brand, with the steps your business needs.
- Admin panel: Your team sees the day, moves bookings, blocks time and handles exceptions in one place.
- Schedules and resources: Staff, rooms, desks, vehicles or tickets: anything you book gets its own calendar and rules.
- Payments: Deposits, full payment, packages and refunds, through the payment provider you choose.
- Notifications: Confirmations and reminders by email or text message, written the way you talk to customers.
- Works with your other tools: Connected to your CRM, ERP, payments and single sign-on, so nobody types a booking twice. Every function has an API for your developers.
- AI inside the system: Assistants that answer customers and book for them, and an API that AI agents can use.
- Data migration: Customers, bookings and history moved from your current tool, with no break in bookings.
Read more: [Every feature we build, one page each](/features).
## How is it different from a booking platform?
A platform is rented and shared. Custom software is built for you and owned by you.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: A monthly fee for every user or location, and often a commission on every booking. With custom software: One fixed price for the build. No subscription and 0% commission.
- Booking rules. On a SaaS platform: Your process has to fit the settings the platform offers. With custom software: The software follows your rules, however unusual they are.
- Data. On a SaaS platform: Your customers and history sit in the platform's account. With custom software: The data and the code are yours, in your cloud or ours.
- Changes. On a SaaS platform: A missing feature waits for the platform's roadmap. With custom software: We build it. Most new features take one or two days.
Read more: [Custom booking system vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas), [Build vs buy: how to decide](/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software), [Custom vs white label](/blog/custom-booking-software-vs-white-label).
## When is a custom booking solution worth it?
A ready-made tool is a good start. If it does all you need, stay with it. Custom software makes sense when:
- Subscription fees or booking commission grow faster than your business.
- Your booking rules don't fit the settings of any ready-made tool.
- Someone built your booking system, and now it breaks, slows down or nobody can change it.
- You book several things at once: people, rooms, equipment or tickets.
- Bookings have to work with your CRM, ERP or your own app.
- You need control over customer data, GDPR and where the data is stored.
- You want the booking flow in your own brand, not on a platform's page.
## Who will build your booking software?
The two founders lead every project: Piotr on the product and how it feels to use, Matt on the backend and the infrastructure it runs on. You work with them and the senior engineers who build the modules, from the brief to the handover.
- Piotr Kozak, CEO: Product design, UX and UI
- Matt Sowa, CTO: Backend and infrastructure
- You talk to engineers: The people who answer your questions are the people who build your system. There are no account managers in between.
- A few projects at a time: We take on a small number of builds at once so every project has senior attention from the brief to the handover.
- Public building blocks: The modules we ship most often are published as open-source Agent Skills. You can read what we build from before you hire us.
Read more: [More about the team](/about), [How a project runs](/how-we-build).
## Booking software for your industry
- [Booking software for clinics](/industries/clinics): A custom booking system for clinics and medical practices: online appointments, doctor schedules, reminders and payments, with the code and data you own.
- [Booking software for gyms and fitness studios](/industries/fitness): A custom booking system for gyms and fitness studios: classes with waitlists, memberships and passes, check-in and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for rental businesses](/industries/rentals): A custom booking system for rental businesses: availability per item, deposits, pick-up and return, several locations, with the code and data you own.
- [Booking software for coworking spaces](/industries/coworking): A custom booking system for coworking spaces: desks and rooms on a floor plan, passes and memberships, payments and building access, with code you own.
- [Booking software for events and festivals](/industries/events): A custom booking system for events, festivals and workshops: tickets and seats with capacity, payments, check-in at the door and refunds, code you own.
- [Booking software for public offices](/industries/public-sector): A custom booking system for public offices and consulates: visits booked by matter, queue screens, kiosks and reminders, with the code and data you own.
- [Booking software for beauty salons and barbers](/industries/salons): A custom booking system for beauty salons and barbers: online booking per stylist, deposits against no-shows, gift cards and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for spas and wellness centres](/industries/spas): A custom booking system for spas and wellness centres: treatments with rooms and therapists, spa days, gift vouchers and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for hotels and guesthouses](/industries/hotels): A custom booking engine for hotels and guesthouses: direct room bookings, extras such as spa, tables and tours, deposits and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for restaurants and restaurant chains](/industries/restaurants): A custom table booking system for restaurants and chains: tables on a floor plan, deposits for groups, events and set menus, with code and data you own.
- [Booking software for banks and financial advisors](/industries/banking): A custom appointment booking system for banks and financial advisors: branch and video meetings, advisor calendars and branch queues on your own servers.
- [Booking software for shooting ranges](/industries/shooting-ranges): A custom booking system for shooting ranges: lanes by the hour, instructors, online waivers, ID checks, packages and payments, with code and data you own.
- [Booking software for escape rooms](/industries/escape-rooms): A custom booking system for escape rooms: games by the slot, prices per group, gift vouchers, game master shifts and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for home service companies](/industries/home-services): A custom booking system for home service companies: jobs by area and skill, technician schedules, quotes, a field app and payments, with code you own.
- [Booking software for law firms](/industries/legal): A custom booking system for law firms: paid consultations, a conflict check before the meeting, lawyer calendars and client data that stays yours.
## How much does custom booking software cost?
Fixed project price: $15,000 to $50,000. Typical range. Your final quote comes with a plan of your system and a clickable prototype, before any commitment.
What the price includes:
- Discovery call and a plan of your system
- Complete build of your custom booking system
- Data migration from your current system
- Set up where you want it to run
- Full code and documentation handoff
- 3 years of post-delivery support
No setup fee, no monthly fee, no commission on bookings.
Read more: [What drives the price, in detail](/blog/custom-booking-software-cost).
## Booking systems we have built
- [Startup Festival Wrocław](/case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw) (Event for startups, entrepreneurs & investors; Custom build): The organisers had three weeks to set up the event and needed a booking site that participants could use to reserve a seat from day one.
- [Risify](/case-studies/risify) (Online psychotherapy platform; Built on the Timerise platform): Risify needed booking that fit how online therapy works, with custom features their platform depended on and no cut taken from each session.
- [Valmont](/case-studies/valmont) (Luxury cosmetics brand; Built on the Timerise platform): Valmont needed one booking system for a series of brand events: guests book product shows, masterclasses and workshops at the venue the organiser chose, some paid and some free.
- [Consulate General of Ukraine](/case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine) (Public Administration & Diplomacy; Built on the Timerise platform): Developing a booking system capable of handling thousands of visitors for various official and diplomatic matters required by Ukrainian citizens.
## Custom booking software FAQ
- Q: What is custom booking software?
A: Booking software built for one business instead of rented from a platform. It has your booking rules, your brand and your integrations, and you own the code and the data.
- Q: How much does custom booking software cost?
A: Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000. The price is fixed before the build starts and paid once. There is no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take to build?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks. The system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, with migration and handover.
- Q: Custom software or a SaaS booking tool: which one do I need?
A: If a ready-made tool does everything you need, stay with it. Custom booking software pays off when fees and commission grow, when your rules don't fit, or when bookings have to work with your other systems.
- Q: Do you also build reservation and scheduling systems?
A: Yes. Booking, reservations and appointment scheduling are the same job under different names: tables, rooms, desks, vehicles, classes or appointments. We build all of them as custom software.
- Q: Who owns the software?
A: You do. The repository is transferred to your organization with full documentation and no licensing restrictions.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches.
- Q: What happens after launch?
A: Every project includes three years of support. After that, your team can run it, we can keep it on a retainer, or you can split the work.
## See your booking software before you pay for it
Describe your business in a short brief. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed quote.
Start with a free brief: /brief
---
## One fixed price for a booking system you own
> What a custom booking system costs: one fixed price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, no subscription and no commission. What moves it and what it includes.
Page: https://timerise.ai/pricing
Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000, paid once. No subscription, no commission on bookings, and the code is yours. You see your exact price next to a clickable prototype, before you commit.
- Prototype and quote: 48 h
- Build time: 2–3 weeks
- Fixed price, typically: $15–50k
- Commission on bookings: 0%
## What does the price include?
Fixed project price: $15,000 to $50,000. Typical range. Your final quote comes with a plan of your system and a clickable prototype, before any commitment.
What the price includes:
- Discovery call and a plan of your system
- Complete build of your custom booking system
- Data migration from your current system
- Set up where you want it to run
- Full code and documentation handoff
- 3 years of post-delivery support
No setup fee, no monthly fee, no commission on bookings.
## What moves the price?
Two things: how complex your booking rules are, and how many other systems the software talks to.
Closer to the lower end:
- One location or one type of service
- A standard flow: choose a service, a time and pay
- Card payments through one provider
- Email confirmations and reminders
Closer to the upper end:
- Several locations, each with its own staff, rooms or equipment
- Packages, memberships, deposits, approvals, member and guest prices
- Integrations with your CRM, ERP, access control or single sign-on
- Extra modules such as a kiosk, screens in the venue or an AI assistant
- A large migration from a tool that has no export
## Can we add more later?
Yes. Each module gets one fixed quote of its own. These are the ones we build most often, each from a tested plan you can read before you order.
[calendar-scheduling-links](/skills/calendar-scheduling-links), [time-slot-generator](/skills/time-slot-generator), [google-calendar-sync](/skills/google-calendar-sync), [microsoft-calendar-sync](/skills/microsoft-calendar-sync), [help-center-markdown](/skills/help-center-markdown), [blog-markdown](/skills/blog-markdown), [digital-signage](/skills/digital-signage), [booking-kiosk](/skills/booking-kiosk), [island-mode-server](/skills/island-mode-server), [stripe-connect-subscriptions](/skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions), [bookable-events](/skills/bookable-events), [ledger-wallet](/skills/ledger-wallet), [ksef](/skills/ksef), [invoicing](/skills/invoicing), [site-pin-gate](/skills/site-pin-gate), [browser-extension-connector](/skills/browser-extension-connector), [ecommerce-process-mining](/skills/ecommerce-process-mining), [slack-ai-bot](/skills/slack-ai-bot), [visit-logger](/skills/visit-logger), [in-app-bug-reports](/skills/in-app-bug-reports), [inboxparse](/skills/inboxparse)
## What do you pay once it is live?
No subscription and no commission. Only what you actually use.
- Hosting: In your own cloud account, on your bill, or on our infrastructure, billed by actual usage. Never a share of your revenue.
- Payment fees: Your payment provider, such as Stripe or Adyen, charges its usual fee per transaction. We add nothing on top.
- Support after year three: Three years of support come with the project. After that, your team runs it, we keep it on a retainer, or you split the work.
## When is it cheaper than a platform?
A platform looks cheaper on day one. The cost shows up over time: a monthly fee, often per user or per location, and on many platforms a commission on every booking.
`yearly cost = monthly fee × 12 + commission × yearly booking revenue`
An example with made-up numbers: a platform charges $400 a month and 2% of $500,000 in yearly bookings. That is $4,800 plus $10,000, so $14,800 a year and $44,400 over three years. Your own system is paid once, then hosting by usage.
If a ready-made tool does what you need and the fees stay small, stay with it. See [when Calendly, Booksy and others stop being enough](/alternatives).
## How do you get your quote?
The brief, the prototype and the quote are free, with no commitment.
1. Project Briefing (Free of charge): Clickable prototype in 48h
2. Discovery call (Free of charge): A plan of your system and a fixed price
3. Build (2-3 weeks): Your system, ready for customers
4. Launch and handover (1-2 weeks): The code is yours, plus 3 years of support
## What do people ask about price?
- Q: How much does a custom booking system cost?
A: Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000. The price is fixed before the build starts and paid once. You see it next to a clickable prototype, within 48 hours of the brief.
- Q: Is there a monthly fee?
A: No. You pay once for the build. If we host the system, hosting is billed by actual usage.
- Q: Do you take a commission on bookings?
A: No. The commission is 0%, always. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
- Q: Can the price change during the project?
A: The price is fixed for the agreed scope. If you want to add something later, we quote it before we build it.
- Q: Can we start small?
A: Yes. Start with booking and payments, and add modules when you need them. A smaller first scope means a smaller first price.
- Q: Is moving our data from the current tool extra?
A: No. Migration is part of the price. We move customers, bookings and history, even when your current tool has no export.
## See your price in 48 hours
Describe how you take bookings. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed quote.
Start with a free brief: /brief
---
## A booking system that fits how you work, and stays yours
> Outgrown your booking app, or stuck with a system nobody can fix? We build a custom booking system you own. Fixed price, data moved, 3 years of support.
Page: https://timerise.ai/services
Stuck on an app that charges per booking, or on a system someone built that nobody can fix? We build the system to your rules, move your data in and hand over the code. One fixed price.
- Fixed project price: $15,000 to $50,000
- Build time: 2 to 3 weeks
- Yours: code and data: 100%
- Support included: 3 years
## Seven services, one team
- Custom booking system: Booking pages, admin panel, API, payments, calendars and notifications, built to your rules. Price: Fixed price, typically $15–50k. [About custom booking software](/custom-booking-software)
- Data migration: Bookings, customers and history moved out of your current tool, with no downtime, even without an export. Price: Included in the project.
- Ready-made modules: Kiosk, in-venue screens, offline server, payouts, e-invoicing, Slack assistant: built into your system or one you already run. Price: One fixed quote per module.
- AI inside your system: Assistants that answer customers and take bookings for them, and read the documents they send. Built in, not bolted on. Price: Scoped with the project.
- Hosting and operations: Your cloud or ours, with monitoring, updates and security patches if you want them. Price: Billed by usage, never a share of revenue.
- Integration and security: ERP, CRM and single sign-on connected; GDPR, EU data residency and audit logs built in. Price: Scoped with the project.
- Post-delivery support: Three years with every project. After that: your team, a retainer with us, or a split. Price: Three years included.
## From brief to production in six to eight weeks
1. Project Briefing (Free of charge): Clickable prototype in 48h
2. Discovery call (Free of charge): A plan of your system and a fixed price
3. Build (2-3 weeks): Your system, ready for customers
4. Launch and handover (1-2 weeks): The code is yours, plus 3 years of support
## One fixed price, everything included
Fixed project price: $15,000 to $50,000. Typical range. Your final quote comes with a plan of your system and a clickable prototype, before any commitment.
What the price includes:
- Discovery call and a plan of your system
- Complete build of your custom booking system
- Data migration from your current system
- Set up where you want it to run
- Full code and documentation handoff
- 3 years of post-delivery support
No setup fee, no monthly fee, no commission on bookings.
Hosting:
- Your cloud: Your cloud, managed by us
- Our cloud: Our cloud
- We build, your team runs it: Your servers, your ops team
## Built for businesses that take bookings
[Sports & Fitness](/industries/fitness), [Healthcare](/industries/clinics), [Banking & Finance](/industries/banking), [Restaurant Chains](/industries/restaurants), [Fleet & Rentals](/industries/rentals), [Beauty & Salons](/industries/salons), [Hospitality](/industries/hotels), [Shooting Ranges](/industries/shooting-ranges), [Escape Rooms](/industries/escape-rooms), [Events & Festivals](/industries/events), [Home Services](/industries/home-services), [Spas & Wellness](/industries/spas), [Coworking Spaces](/industries/coworking), [Public Administration](/industries/public-sector), [Law Firms](/industries/legal)
## Before you send a brief
- Q: What kind of company is Timerise?
A: A senior software team. We design, build and hand over custom booking systems. No hosted product, no subscriptions, no commission on bookings.
- Q: How is the price set?
A: One fixed price per project, agreed after a free discovery call and shown next to a clickable prototype before any commitment. Typically $15,000 to $50,000.
- Q: How long does a project take?
A: The build takes two to three weeks. The system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including discovery, migration and handover.
- Q: Who owns the result?
A: You do, completely. You get the code, the data and the documentation, with no licence and nothing locked with us.
- Q: Is Timerise a SaaS?
A: No, not any more. From 2021 to 2025 Timerise ran a hosted booking platform: booking pages, an admin panel and an API. Since the start of 2026 we are a software team that builds custom booking systems, hands over the code and charges one fixed price, with no subscription and no commission. The platform has no subscription plans any more; businesses already on it keep using it. An older directory listing or review that calls Timerise a booking SaaS with a monthly plan describes those platform years.
- Q: Can we integrate with our existing systems?
A: Yes. Every system we build has its own API, so it connects to the tools you already use: CRMs such as Salesforce and HubSpot, payments such as Stripe and PayPal, and any other system with a REST or GraphQL API.
- Q: What if we don't have a strong internal engineering team?
A: Two options: (1) A monthly retainer: we handle updates, new features and support. (2) Any web developer can take it over: the code uses common technology (Next.js and Node.js) and comes with documentation.
- Q: Whose infrastructure does the system run on?
A: Your call, and we work in three models. (1) Your cloud, managed by us: the system runs in your cloud accounts, under your contracts, and we handle setup, deployment and monitoring. (2) Our cloud: we host it and run it, billed by actual usage, and you can move to your own cloud whenever you decide: give us 90 days’ notice and we move the system and all your data for you. (3) Your servers, your ops team: the infrastructure is already configured on your side and we only build the system and deploy on it. We build on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud as the database, and recommend that stack for speed and costs that track usage, but AWS, GCP, Azure, on-premise and specific data regions all work.
- Q: What if we need a feature you don't have?
A: We build it. Your system is made of separate parts, so we add a feature without rewriting the rest. Most take 1 to 2 days.
---
## A senior software team that builds booking systems you own
> Timerise is a senior software team. We ran our own booking platform from 2021 to 2025, and since 2026 we build booking systems that clients own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/about
Timerise is a senior software team. From 2021 to 2025 we ran our own booking platform, used by a consulate, a luxury brand and marketplaces. Since 2026 we build custom booking systems: one fixed price, code and data the client owns, no subscription and no commission.
- Building booking systems since: 2021
- Per project, never by the hour: Fixed price
- Commission on bookings: 0%
- Support with every project: 3 years
## Where does Timerise come from?
From 2021 to 2025 we ran our own booking platform. At the start of 2026 we began building systems that each client owns.
Before:
- 2021: We launched a booking platform. Booking pages, an admin panel and an API that businesses used every day.
- 2022 to 2025: Years in production. Running it showed us where booking systems break and that the same parts come back everywhere: booking rules, calendar sync, payments, a kiosk, screens in the venue, invoicing. It also showed us what a rented system can't give a business: its own code.
2026: This year we went through an AI transformation. AI took over the repetitive code, so engineers spend their time on the logic that makes a business its own. The past is behind us.
After:
- Since 2026: A studio, not a platform. We wrote each part down as an open Agent Skill and build every new system from those parts on the client's own stack.
- Every project: Delivered in weeks, owned by the client. Our team hands over the code and the data, and stays for three years of support.
## What are we not willing to compromise on?
Six principles, written down in full in the [Post-SaaS manifesto](/#manifesto).
- Own what is core: If booking drives your revenue, you should own the code, the data and the logic behind it. We build systems and hand them over. We never keep a key.
- Owning is not operating: Owning a system never means running a server you do not want to. We set it up in your cloud and can keep it healthy for as long as you like, or hand it to your own team.
- Growth must not raise the bill: No commission on bookings, no per-seat fees, no revenue share. Hosting costs track usage, not your success.
- Workflows shape the system: Your rules are the specification. We model conditional availability, shared resources and local pricing instead of asking you to fit a template.
- Leaving stays cheap: Common technology, full documentation, and the code in your own account. Any good developer can pick it up after us, and that is the point.
- AI ended the trade-off: Custom used to mean slow and expensive. AI now writes the repetitive code, so engineers spend their time on the logic that makes your business yours.
## Who will you work with?
The two founders lead every project: Piotr on the product, its scope and how it feels to use, Matt on the backend and the infrastructure it runs on. You talk to them from the first brief to the handover, together with the senior engineers who build the modules.
- Piotr Kozak, CEO: Product design, UX and UI
- Matt Sowa, CTO: Backend and infrastructure
We work in English and Polish, with clients across Europe and beyond.
## What is it like to build with us?
- You talk to engineers: The people who answer your questions are the people who build your system. There are no account managers in between.
- A few projects at a time: We take on a small number of builds at once so every project has senior attention from the brief to the handover.
- Public building blocks: The modules we ship most often are published as open-source Agent Skills. You can read what we build from before you hire us.
- AI accelerates, engineers decide: AI generates the repetitive parts and drafts the prototype you see within 48 hours. Architecture, business logic and review stay with people.
The full process, phase by phase, is on [How we build](/how-we-build). The building blocks are on [Agent Skills](/skills).
## Where are our clients?
In 10 countries on 3 continents. We work remotely, in English and Polish, so distance is not a problem.
## What our clients say
- Bloomy Health (Klaudia Byrt, CEO & co-founder): "Timerise is a trustworthy partner for our marketplace with health-related services for corporate employees. The system flexibility, team's competencies, and support allowed us to deliver on time, despite very tight deadlines."
- Callstack (Adrianna Stryjewska, HR Business Partner): "Collaboration with Timerise to implement a custom booking system was outstanding. Their expertise and assistance during the process were superb. I highly recommend Timerise for anyone seeking reliable booking software."
- RST Software Masters (Łukasz Osiadły, Process Leader): "The project required a quick implementation of a complete booking system. API and frontend were used. We are very pleased with both the product's capabilities and the commitment of the team. Great software, great teamwork!"
- Text (Agnieszka Jawińska, Social Media & Community Lead): "I highly recommend their exceptional cooperation, and strict specialization in custom booking systems. With their expertise and tailored solution, they are the perfect choice for projects requiring a robust and user-friendly system."
## Who signs the contract?
One legal entity signs every contract and every invoice, and it is the same one that builds the system.
- Timerise Sp. z o.o., ul. Księcia Witolda 49/15, 50-202 Wrocław, Poland
- KRS: 0000895019
- NIP: 8971890756
- EU VAT: PL8971890756
- Email: hello@timerise.ai
- Profiles: [LinkedIn](https://linkedin.com/company/timerise), [GitHub](https://github.com/timerise-ai), [X](https://x.com/timerise_ai), [Clutch](https://clutch.co/profile/timerise), [Sortlist](https://www.sortlist.com/agency/timerise), [GoodFirms](https://www.goodfirms.co/company/timerise), [TechBehemoths](https://techbehemoths.com/company/timerise), [Crunchbase](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/timerise)
Contact: /contact
---
## System rezerwacji na zamówienie, który należy do Ciebie
> Budujemy dedykowane systemy rezerwacji dla firm. Stała cena, gotowe w kilka tygodni, bez abonamentu i prowizji. Kod i dane należą do Ciebie.
Page: https://timerise.ai/pl
Gotowe narzędzie do rezerwacji nie pasuje do Twojej firmy albo system, który ktoś Ci zbudował, działa wolno i nikt nie umie go zmienić. Budujemy system rezerwacji pod Twoje zasady. Jedna stała cena, gotowe w kilka tygodni, a kod jest Twój. Prototyp i wycena są bezpłatne i do niczego nie zobowiązują. Rozmawiamy po polsku.
- Prototyp i wycena: 48 h
- Czas budowy: 2 do 3 tyg.
- Stała cena netto, zwykle: 60 do 200 tys. zł
- Prowizji od rezerwacji: 0%
## Czym jest system rezerwacji na zamówienie?
To system rezerwacji zbudowany dla jednej firmy. Gotowe narzędzie daje wszystkim te same funkcje. System na zamówienie działa według Twoich zasad: jak klienci rezerwują, ile płacą, kto potwierdza i do jakich systemów trafiają dane.
Nie wynajmujesz go. Płacisz raz za budowę, a kod, dane i dokumentację dostajesz na własność. System działa na Twoim koncie w chmurze albo na naszym, jeśli tak wolisz.
## Co może mieć Twój system rezerwacji?
Zacznij od rezerwacji i płatności. Resztę dodasz, kiedy będzie potrzebna. Jeśli potrzebujesz czegoś, czego tu nie ma, też to zbudujemy.
- Strona rezerwacji: Klienci rezerwują na Twojej stronie albo w Twojej aplikacji, w Twoich kolorach i w krokach, których potrzebuje Twoja firma.
- Panel dla zespołu: Twój zespół widzi cały dzień, przesuwa rezerwacje, blokuje czas i obsługuje wyjątki w jednym miejscu.
- Grafiki i zasoby: Pracownicy, sale, biurka, auta albo bilety: wszystko, co da się zarezerwować, ma swój kalendarz i swoje zasady.
- Płatności: Zaliczki, pełne płatności, karnety i zwroty, przez operatora płatności, którego wybierzesz.
- Powiadomienia: Potwierdzenia i przypomnienia mailem albo SMS-em, napisane tak, jak mówisz do swoich klientów.
- Połączenie z innymi systemami: Łączymy system z CRM, ERP, płatnościami i logowaniem firmowym, żeby nikt nie przepisywał rezerwacji ręcznie. Każda funkcja ma API.
- AI w systemie: Asystent, który odpowiada klientom i rezerwuje za nich, oraz API, z którego mogą korzystać agenci AI.
- Przeniesienie danych: Przenosimy klientów, rezerwacje i historię z Twojego obecnego narzędzia, bez przerwy w przyjmowaniu rezerwacji.
## Czym to się różni od gotowej platformy?
Platformę wynajmujesz razem z innymi firmami. System na zamówienie jest zbudowany dla Ciebie i należy do Ciebie.
- Koszt. Gotowa platforma: Miesięczna opłata za każdego użytkownika albo lokal, często też prowizja od każdej rezerwacji. System na zamówienie: Jedna stała cena za budowę. Bez abonamentu i bez prowizji.
- Zasady rezerwacji. Gotowa platforma: Twoja firma musi zmieścić się w ustawieniach, które daje platforma. System na zamówienie: System działa według Twoich zasad, nawet nietypowych.
- Dane. Gotowa platforma: Twoi klienci i cała historia są na koncie platformy. System na zamówienie: Dane i kod są Twoje, w Twojej chmurze albo w naszej.
- Zmiany. Gotowa platforma: Brakująca funkcja czeka, aż platforma doda ją do planów. System na zamówienie: Budujemy ją. Większość nowych funkcji zajmuje jeden albo dwa dni.
## Kiedy warto zbudować własny system rezerwacji?
Gotowe narzędzie to dobry początek. Jeśli robi wszystko, czego potrzebujesz, zostań przy nim. Własny system ma sens, gdy:
- Abonament albo prowizje rosną szybciej niż Twoja firma.
- Twoje zasady rezerwacji nie mieszczą się w ustawieniach żadnego gotowego narzędzia.
- Ktoś zbudował Ci system rezerwacji, a teraz on się psuje, zwalnia albo nikt nie umie go zmienić.
- Rezerwujesz kilka rzeczy naraz: ludzi, sale, sprzęt albo bilety.
- Rezerwacje muszą współpracować z Twoim CRM, ERP albo aplikacją.
- Chcesz mieć kontrolę nad danymi klientów, RODO i miejscem, gdzie dane są przechowywane.
- Chcesz rezerwacji pod własną marką, a nie na stronie platformy.
## Od briefu do działającego systemu w 6 do 8 tygodni
Sama budowa trwa 2 do 3 tygodni. Rozmawiasz z inżynierami, którzy budują Twój system.
1. Brief (Bezpłatnie): Opisujesz swoją firmę i sposób rezerwacji w krótkim briefie. W ciągu 48 godzin dostajesz klikalny prototyp i wycenę.
2. Rozmowa i plan (Bezpłatnie): Przechodzimy z Tobą przez otwarte pytania. Dostajesz plan systemu i stałą cenę, zanim cokolwiek zbudujemy.
3. Budowa (2 do 3 tygodni): AI pisze powtarzalny kod. Nasi inżynierowie zajmują się zasadami, które wyróżniają Twoją firmę.
4. Start i przekazanie (1 do 2 tygodni): Uruchamiamy system tam, gdzie chcesz, i przekazujemy kod z dokumentacją. Każdy projekt ma 3 lata wsparcia.
## Kto zbuduje Twój system?
Każdy projekt prowadzą dwaj założyciele: Piotr odpowiada za produkt i to, jak wygodnie się z niego korzysta, Mateusz za backend i infrastrukturę. Pracujesz z nimi i z doświadczonymi inżynierami od briefu do przekazania kodu. Timerise Sp. z o.o. to polska spółka, więc rozmowy i umowa mogą być po polsku.
## Ile kosztuje system rezerwacji na zamówienie?
Większość projektów kosztuje od 60 do 200 tys. zł netto. Cenę ustalamy przed budową i płacisz ją raz. Dokładna kwota zależy od tego, jak złożone są Twoje zasady rezerwacji i z iloma systemami trzeba się połączyć.
W cenie:
- Rozmowa i plan Twojego systemu
- Budowa całego systemu rezerwacji
- Przeniesienie danych z obecnego narzędzia
- Uruchomienie tam, gdzie chcesz
- Przekazanie kodu i dokumentacji
- 3 lata wsparcia po starcie
Bez opłaty wstępnej, bez abonamentu, bez prowizji od rezerwacji.
## Systemy, które zbudowaliśmy
Opisy realizacji są po angielsku.
- [Startup Festival Wrocław](/case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw) (Event for startups, entrepreneurs & investors)
- [Risify](/case-studies/risify) (Online psychotherapy platform)
- [Valmont](/case-studies/valmont) (Luxury cosmetics brand)
- [Consulate General of Ukraine](/case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine) (Public Administration & Diplomacy)
## Najczęstsze pytania
- Q: Czym jest system rezerwacji na zamówienie?
A: To system rezerwacji zbudowany dla jednej firmy, a nie wynajmowany od platformy. Ma Twoje zasady rezerwacji, Twoją markę i Twoje integracje. Kod i dane należą do Ciebie.
- Q: Ile kosztuje dedykowany system rezerwacji?
A: Większość projektów kosztuje od 60 do 200 tys. zł netto. Cenę ustalamy przed budową i płacisz ją raz. Nie ma abonamentu ani prowizji od rezerwacji.
- Q: Ile trwa budowa?
A: Klikalny prototyp i wycenę dostajesz w ciągu 48 godzin od briefu. Budowa trwa 2 do 3 tygodni. System działa 6 do 8 tygodni po pierwszej rozmowie, razem z przeniesieniem danych i przekazaniem kodu.
- Q: Własny system czy gotowe narzędzie SaaS?
A: Jeśli gotowe narzędzie robi wszystko, czego potrzebujesz, zostań przy nim. Własny system się opłaca, gdy rosną opłaty i prowizje, gdy Twoje zasady nie pasują do narzędzia albo gdy rezerwacje muszą działać z innymi systemami.
- Q: Do kogo należy system?
A: Do Ciebie. Przekazujemy repozytorium do Twojej organizacji razem z pełną dokumentacją, bez ograniczeń licencyjnych.
- Q: Korzystamy już z narzędzia do rezerwacji. Co z naszymi danymi?
A: Przenosimy klientów, rezerwacje i historię do nowego systemu, nawet gdy obecny dostawca nie ma eksportu. Stare narzędzie działa, dopóki dane się nie zgadzają.
- Q: Gdzie działa system i co z RODO?
A: Tam, gdzie zdecydujesz: na Twoim koncie w chmurze albo u nas. Wtedy hosting rozliczamy według zużycia i kończy się, gdy przeniesiesz system do siebie. Wybierasz też region, w którym są dane.
- Q: Czy rozmawiacie po polsku?
A: Tak. Brief, rozmowy, umowa i wsparcie mogą być po polsku. Strona jest po angielsku, bo budujemy też dla firm z innych krajów.
## Zobacz swój system, zanim za niego zapłacisz
Na pełnej stronie znajdziesz realizacje, cennik i bezpłatny brief. W ciągu 48 godzin od briefu dostaniesz klikalny prototyp i stałą wycenę.
Pełna strona (po angielsku): [timerise.ai](/). Bezpłatny brief: /brief. Napisz do nas po polsku: [hello@timerise.ai](mailto:hello@timerise.ai).
Po angielsku: [Custom booking software](/custom-booking-software), [Pricing](/pricing), [Case studies](/case-studies), [About the team](/about), [Privacy policy](/privacy).
---
## When Calendly is no longer enough
> Calendly is the easiest way to book meetings. Here is when a business outgrows it, and how moving to a booking system you own works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/calendly
Calendly is the easiest way to let people book a meeting, with a strong free plan, payments through Stripe and PayPal, and a mature API. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment your bookings become more than meetings.
When Calendly is the right choice. For booking meetings, Calendly is hard to beat. Stay with it when:
- People book meetings with you or your team: sales calls, consultations, interviews.
- One-on-one and group events cover what you offer.
- Payment at booking through Stripe or PayPal is all the checkout you need.
- A Calendly link, or its page embedded on your site, is fine for your customers.
Signs you have outgrown Calendly:
- You book rooms or equipment: Calendly has no dedicated rooms or resources feature. Its own help suggests workarounds, such as a paid seat for each room.
- Bookings come in through an API: Since April 2026, creating bookings through the API is capped on paid plans below Enterprise: 10 a minute, 50 an hour and 100 a day per user.
- Your rules have no setting: Prices by date, approvals, capacity that depends on staff and space, a process in several steps.
- Your own domain matters: Booking pages live on calendly.com. You can rename the link or embed the page, and Calendly’s help describes no custom domain option.
- Your data must stay in the EU: Calendly stores data in US data centres and transfers EU data under Standard Contractual Clauses. Its help mentions no EU hosting option.
- The bill grows with every seat: From $10 or $16 per seat a month. Enterprise starts at $15,000 a year, with at least 50 seats.
Calendly or a system you own:
| Topic | Calendly | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | Free for one event type. Standard from $10 per seat a month. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | Calendly |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | Calendly |
| Simple meetings | One-on-one and group events, with Stripe or PayPal payment at booking. | Too much for simple meeting links. It pays off when you book more than meetings. | Calendly |
| What gets booked | Meetings with people, one-on-one or in groups. | Anything you rent or sell by time: people, rooms, equipment, places, tickets. | Your own system |
| Cost as you grow | Per seat, every month. Enterprise from $15,000 a year. | One fixed price for the build. No fee per seat. | Your own system |
| API | Bookings through the API capped at 100 a day per user below Enterprise. | Your own API, with the limits you set. | Your own system |
| Data | In US data centres, exported as CSV files. | In your database, in the region you choose, with the full history. | Your own system |
Cost:
Calendly is free for one event type. Standard starts at $10 per seat a month and Teams at $16. For 10 people on Teams that is at least $1,920 a year. Enterprise starts at $15,000 a year.
A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once. For a small team Calendly is cheaper and will stay cheaper. Your own system pays off when Calendly holds the business back: rooms it cannot book, rules it cannot express, or an Enterprise contract you would need only for its limits.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off Calendly. Calendly exports meetings as CSV files, and its API reads event types and bookings, so your upcoming meetings come with you. We move them before the switch.
1. Export: You export meetings from Calendly, or give us API access. We tell you exactly what we need.
2. Map: We match event types, hosts, invitees and upcoming meetings to the new system.
3. Run side by side: The new system runs on your data while Calendly still takes bookings, so you test with no risk.
4. Switch: We point the booking links on your website to the new pages. Then you cancel Calendly.
FAQ:
- Q: Is Calendly a bad tool?
A: No. For booking meetings it is one of the best, and its free plan is generous. We build systems for businesses whose bookings are more than meetings.
- Q: Can Calendly book rooms or equipment?
A: There is no dedicated feature. Calendly’s own help suggests workarounds, such as adding each room as a paid user on a Collective event. A system we build treats rooms, equipment and places as things to book, with their own capacity and rules.
- Q: Can AI assistants book through our own system?
A: Yes. Every system we build has its own API and can include an MCP server, so AI assistants book within the limits you choose.
- Q: Where will our data be?
A: Calendly stores data in the US. A system we build runs in the region you choose, in your cloud or ours, and you hold the keys.
- Q: Do you take a share of our payments?
A: No. There is no commission on bookings. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
Facts about Calendly checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: plans and prices (https://calendly.com/pricing), data storage (https://calendly.com/help/data-storage-and-international-data-transfers), API rate limits (https://developer.calendly.com/api-docs/overview/rate-limits), booking API limits from April 2026 (https://developer.calendly.com/release-notes/2026/4/15), payments (https://calendly.com/help/payments-faq), export (https://calendly.com/help/tracking-and-reporting), conference rooms (https://calendly.com/help/how-to-schedule-with-conference-rooms), booking links (https://calendly.com/help/how-to-customize-your-scheduling-page-links). Calendly is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## When Cal.com is no longer enough
> Cal.com is a strong scheduler for teams that book meetings. Here is when a business outgrows it, and how moving to a booking system you own works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/cal-com
Cal.com is a strong scheduler for teams that book meetings: routing forms, round robin, many integrations and a free plan for one person. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment you need more than meetings.
When Cal.com is the right choice. For teams that book meetings, Cal.com is a very good choice. Stay with it when:
- You book calls and meetings: sales, support, recruiting, consulting.
- Round robin and routing forms decide who takes each meeting.
- Your calendars and your CRM are on its list of integrations.
- You need SOC 2, HIPAA or ISO 27001, and the Organizations plan fits your budget.
Signs you have outgrown Cal.com:
- You book rooms, equipment or places: Cal.com schedules people. It has no dedicated resources module: a room is set up as a separate bookable account linked to a room calendar.
- Capacity is more than seats: “Offer seats” lets several people book one slot, but it turns off guest and opt-in bookings. Classes, tickets and passes need more.
- The bill grows with every user: Teams costs $12 per user a month and Organizations $28, on yearly billing. With dozens of staff that adds up every year.
- You counted on open source: In April 2026 Cal.com moved to closed source. The public code is now Cal.diy, without team features, for personal use.
- Your data must stay in the EU: Cal.eu closes on 1 November 2026. Enterprise customers keep it only until their contract ends.
- Bookings are your product: Customers book, pay and come back, with accounts, passes and prices by date. Cal.com is built around meetings in calendars.
Cal.com or a system you own:
| Topic | Cal.com | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | Free for one person. Teams from $12 per user a month. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | Cal.com |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | Cal.com |
| Integrations | A ready list of calendar and CRM integrations. | Each integration is built for your systems, as part of the project. | Cal.com |
| What gets booked | People's time, in their calendars. | Anything you rent or sell by time: people, rooms, equipment, places, tickets. | Your own system |
| Cost as you grow | Per user, every month: $12 on Teams, $28 on Organizations, yearly billing. | One fixed price for the build. No fee per user. | Your own system |
| Code | Closed source since April 2026. The open Cal.diy has no team features. | Your own repository, with documentation. Any team can work on it. | Your own system |
| Data | On Cal.com's servers. Cal.eu closes on 1 November 2026. | In your database, in the region you choose, with the keys in your hands. | Your own system |
Cost:
Cal.com is free for one person. Teams costs $12 per user a month and Organizations $28, both on yearly billing. For 10 people on Teams that is $1,440 a year. For 50 people on Organizations it is $16,800 a year.
A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once. For a small team Cal.com is cheaper and will stay cheaper. With many users, your own system can cost less within a few years, and it fits your process instead of the other way round.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off Cal.com. What lives in Cal.com is mostly event types, availability and bookings, and your calendars hold the rest. We move what you need before the switch.
1. List: We list your event types, routing rules, availability and integrations, and what each one does for you.
2. Copy: We copy bookings through Cal.com's API, or from your calendars, and map them to the new system.
3. Run side by side: The new system runs on your data while Cal.com still takes bookings, so you test with no risk.
4. Switch: We point the booking links on your website to the new pages. Then you cancel Cal.com.
FAQ:
- Q: Is Cal.com a bad tool?
A: No. For teams that book meetings it is one of the best. We build systems for businesses whose bookings are more than meetings.
- Q: Is Cal.com still open source?
A: Not since April 2026. The public repository is now Cal.diy, under the MIT license, without teams, workflows or SSO. Cal.com recommends it for personal, non-production use.
- Q: Could we host Cal.diy ourselves instead?
A: You can, but Cal.com warns it needs advanced server, database and security skills, and the team features are gone. If you run your own code anyway, it can be code built for your bookings.
- Q: What about keeping data in the EU?
A: Cal.eu closes on 1 November 2026. A system we build runs in the region you choose, in your cloud or ours, and you hold the keys.
- Q: Do you take a share of our payments?
A: No. There is no commission on bookings. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
Facts about Cal.com checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: plans and prices (https://cal.com/pricing), the move to closed source (https://cal.com/blog/cal-com-goes-closed-source-why), the Cal.diy repository (https://github.com/calcom/cal.com), the end of Cal.eu (https://cal.com/blog/cal.eu-to-cal.com-migration), seats (https://cal.com/blog/how-to-use-cal-coms-offer-seats-feature). Cal.com is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## When SimplyBook.me is no longer enough
> SimplyBook.me covers many industries out of the box. Here is when a business outgrows it, and how moving to a booking system you own works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/simplybook
SimplyBook.me covers a lot out of the box: many industries, dozens of custom features, payments with no extra fee and live support on every plan. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment its limits start to cost you.
When SimplyBook.me is the right choice. For many small and medium businesses SimplyBook.me is the better choice. Stay with it when:
- Your bookings fit its plans: up to 2,000 a month and 30 providers on Premium.
- Its custom features cover what you need, from calendar sync to a client app.
- You want live support and a ready setup more than control of the code.
- Your industry is one it serves out of the box: beauty, fitness, education, medical, rentals.
Signs you have outgrown SimplyBook.me:
- You plan around booking caps: Premium allows 2,000 bookings a month. Above that you buy packs of 100 or move to Enterprise, priced after a call.
- Features cost extra one by one: Your own domain is an add-on, SMS and WhatsApp come in credits, and lower plans cap how many custom features you can switch on.
- Your brand is not fully yours: Premium removes the branding in the page footer. Full white label is on Enterprise only.
- Your systems do not talk to it: Its integrations list shows no native ERP or CRM connector, and Zapier works one way: SimplyBook.me sends data out but does not receive it.
- Your rules have no setting: Bookings depend on logic no setting covers: equipment, approvals, prices that change with demand, a process in several steps.
- You run several locations: Access across several locations is listed only on the Enterprise plan.
SimplyBook.me or a system you own:
| Topic | SimplyBook.me | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | €11.90 to €49.90 a month on a yearly plan. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | SimplyBook.me |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | SimplyBook.me |
| Ready setups | Live support and setups for beauty, fitness, education, medical and rentals. | Built from scratch for you. Support comes from the team that built it. | SimplyBook.me |
| Limits | Up to 2,000 bookings a month and 30 providers on Premium. | No caps on bookings, staff or locations. | Your own system |
| Cost as you grow | A plan every month, plus add-ons: your domain, SMS credits, booking packs. | One fixed price for the build, then hosting billed by usage. | Your own system |
| Integrations | Custom features and a one-way Zapier connector. | Direct connections to your ERP, CRM and invoicing, in both directions. | Your own system |
| Brand | Full white label only on Enterprise. Your own domain is an add-on. | Your domain and your design from the first day. | Your own system |
Cost:
SimplyBook.me costs €11.90 to €49.90 a month on a yearly plan, for 100 to 2,000 bookings a month. SMS credits, extra booking packs and your own domain come on top. Premium with a domain and some SMS credits can stay under €1,000 a year. A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once.
So price alone is rarely a reason to leave SimplyBook.me. If cost is your only problem, stay. Your own system pays off when the tool holds the business back: work done by hand around it, caps you plan around, or rules it cannot express.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off SimplyBook.me. SimplyBook.me has an API that reads bookings, clients and services, so your history comes with you. We move it before the switch, so nothing is lost and nobody has to book again.
1. Open access: You switch on the API custom feature in SimplyBook.me. We tell you exactly what to enable.
2. Map: We match services, providers, clients and upcoming bookings to the new system.
3. Run side by side: The new system runs on your data while SimplyBook.me still takes bookings, so you test with no risk.
4. Switch: We import the last changes and point your booking links to the new pages. Then you cancel SimplyBook.me.
FAQ:
- Q: Is SimplyBook.me a bad tool?
A: No. It covers many industries out of the box, and for most small businesses it is the right choice. We build systems for businesses that have outgrown it.
- Q: Does SimplyBook.me take a commission?
A: No. It says it charges no extra transaction fees on bookings or payments. Neither do we: a system we build has no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you keep our SimplyBook.me history?
A: Yes. We read bookings and clients through its API and import them, so the new system starts with your full history.
- Q: Where will our data be?
A: SimplyBook.me stores EU data in the EU but says it may be transferred outside. A system we build runs in the region you choose, in your cloud or ours.
- Q: How long does the move take?
A: The build takes two to three weeks. The system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, migration included. SimplyBook.me keeps taking bookings until the switch.
Facts about SimplyBook.me checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: plans and prices (https://simplybook.me/en/pricing), custom features (https://help.simplybook.me/wiki/Custom_Features), API (https://simplybook.me/en/api/developer-api), privacy policy (https://simplybook.me/en/policy). SimplyBook.me is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## When Acuity Scheduling is no longer enough
> Acuity Scheduling suits solo and small teams. Here is when a business outgrows it, what your own system changes, and how moving off Acuity works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/acuity
Acuity is a mature, affordable scheduler with intake forms, packages and gift certificates. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment it stops fitting: more staff and rooms, your own rules, your own data.
When Acuity Scheduling is the right choice. For many service businesses Acuity is the better choice. It is cheap, ready today and well supported. Stay with it when:
- You work alone or in a small team, and clients book a time with one of you.
- Intake forms, packages and gift certificates cover what you sell.
- You need HIPAA support and the Premium plan, with its signed BAA, is enough.
- A branded booking page on an Acuity address is fine for your customers.
Signs you have outgrown Acuity Scheduling:
- You hit the calendar cap: Every staff member or location is a calendar. Premium stops at 36. Past that is Enterprise, with no published price.
- Your rules have no setting: Bookings depend on things Acuity cannot express: equipment, room capacity, approvals, prices that change with demand.
- Bookings feed other systems by hand: Someone copies bookings into your ERP, CRM or invoicing every day, or keeps a second system in step.
- You want your own domain and brand: Customers book on an Acuity address. Removing the “Powered by Acuity Scheduling” line needs Premium.
- Your data must stay in a region: Acuity belongs to Squarespace, whose privacy policy transfers EU data to its servers in the US. It mentions no option to keep it in the EU.
- You need an API around your data: Acuity lists API access on Premium, and the API does what Acuity exposes. Your own system gets an API built for your data.
Acuity Scheduling or a system you own:
| Topic | Acuity Scheduling | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | $16 to $49 a month on a yearly plan. Under $600 a year even on Premium. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | Acuity Scheduling |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | Acuity Scheduling |
| Ready features | Intake forms, packages, gift certificates, and a signed BAA for HIPAA on Premium. | Each feature is built for you, so every one adds time and cost. | Acuity Scheduling |
| Rules | The settings Acuity offers, the same for every customer. | Your booking logic, written for how you work. | Your own system |
| Growth | Up to 36 calendars on Premium, then an Enterprise plan with no public price. | As many staff, rooms and locations as you have, with no price per calendar. | Your own system |
| Data | Run by Squarespace, which transfers data to its servers in the US. Exported as CSV files. | In your database, in the region you choose, with the full history. | Your own system |
| Brand | Acuity booking pages. The “Powered by” line goes away only on Premium. | Your domain and your design, with no other company's name. | Your own system |
Cost:
Acuity costs $16 to $49 a month on a yearly plan, for 1 to 36 calendars. Even Premium is under $600 a year. A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once.
So price alone is rarely a reason to leave Acuity. If cost is your only problem, stay. Your own system pays off when Acuity holds the business back: work done by hand around it, bookings lost to rules it cannot express, or growth past its plans.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off Acuity Scheduling. Acuity exports appointments and clients as CSV files, so your history comes with you. We move it before the switch, so nothing is lost and nobody has to book again.
1. Export: You export appointments, with intake form answers, and clients from Acuity. We tell you exactly what to tick.
2. Map: We match Acuity's fields to the new system: services, staff, clients and upcoming appointments.
3. Run side by side: The new system runs on your data while Acuity still takes bookings, so you test with no risk.
4. Switch: We import the last changes and point your booking links to the new pages. Then you cancel Acuity.
FAQ:
- Q: Is Acuity Scheduling a bad tool?
A: No. It is a mature, affordable scheduler, and for most small service businesses it is the right choice. We build systems for businesses that have outgrown it.
- Q: Can you keep our Acuity booking history?
A: Yes. Acuity exports appointments and clients as CSV files. We import them, with intake form answers, so the new system starts with your full history.
- Q: How long does the move take?
A: The build takes two to three weeks. The system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, migration included. Acuity keeps taking bookings until the switch.
- Q: Do you take a share of our payments?
A: No. There is no commission on bookings. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
- Q: Can we keep our Squarespace website?
A: Yes. The booking pages run on your own domain and any website can link to them, a Squarespace site included.
Facts about Acuity Scheduling checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: plans and prices (https://acuityscheduling.com/signup.php), payments (https://acuityscheduling.com/features/payments), import and export (https://help.acuityscheduling.com/hc/articles/16676916553485), Squarespace privacy policy (https://www.squarespace.com/privacy). Acuity Scheduling is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## When Fresha is no longer enough
> Fresha brings beauty and wellness businesses clients from its marketplace. Here is when a business outgrows it, and how moving off Fresha works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/fresha
Fresha is a full platform for salons, spas and wellness: bookings, point of sale, payments and a marketplace with millions of people looking to book. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment you want your own brand, data and rules.
When Fresha is the right choice. For many beauty and wellness businesses Fresha is the better choice. Stay with it when:
- New clients from the Fresha marketplace matter to your business.
- Point of sale, payments and client records in one tool are what you need.
- Its low price per team member fits your budget.
- Bookings from your own link, Instagram and Facebook cover the rest.
Signs you have outgrown Fresha:
- The new client fee adds up: Fresha charges a one-time fee on brand new clients who find you on its marketplace. Its own article puts it at 20% of the first appointment. In some countries it is currently free.
- Card details stay behind: You can export your client list to Excel or CSV, but Fresha says card details cannot be exported or transferred.
- Your raw data costs extra: Raw data for your reporting tools comes through the paid Data Connector add-on, priced per location. We found no public API for businesses.
- Your own website is an add-on: A website on your own domain comes through Fresha's paid Smart Website add-on.
- Payments run through Fresha: Fresha's partner terms say cancellation fees for Fresha bookings are collected only through Fresha's payment services.
- Your rules have no setting: Packages across services, prices by stylist and time of day, memberships with your own rules.
Fresha or a system you own:
| Topic | Fresha | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | About $20 a month for one person, by Fresha's own article. Prices vary by country. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | Fresha |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | Fresha |
| Marketplace | The Fresha marketplace brings new clients who search there. | No marketplace. New clients come from your site, Google and social media, or you keep Fresha for them. | Fresha |
| New clients | A one-time fee on each new marketplace client, set by country. | No commission. Clients come through your site, Google and your own campaigns. | Your own system |
| Data | Client list as Excel or CSV, without card details. Raw data through a paid connector. | Your own database and API, with every record. | Your own system |
| Payments | Fresha's payment services, required for cancellation fees on Fresha bookings. | Your own Stripe or Adyen account, with your own rules. | Your own system |
| Brand | A marketplace profile. Your own website is a paid add-on. | Your own site and booking flow from the first day. | Your own system |
Cost:
Fresha's price depends on the country. Its Polish price list shows PLN 29 a month for one person and PLN 19 per team member, plus payment fees. Its own article quotes $19.95 a month for one person and $14.95 per team member.
On top comes the new client fee where it applies. At the 20% Fresha's article names, twenty new marketplace clients a month with a $60 first visit cost $240 a month, or $2,880 a year.
A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once. For a small salon Fresha is cheaper and will stay cheaper. Your own system pays off when fees reach thousands a year, or when you want your own brand, data and rules. You can keep the marketplace for new clients and book regulars on your own system.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off Fresha. Fresha exports your client list to Excel or CSV, so your clients come with you. Card details cannot be exported, so returning clients add their card once.
1. Export: You export the client list from Fresha. We tell you exactly which fields to include.
2. Map: We match services, staff, clients and upcoming appointments to the new system.
3. Run side by side: Your new booking site goes live while Fresha still takes bookings. The marketplace can stay on while it pays.
4. Switch: You point your Instagram, Google and website links to the new site. Then you decide if Fresha stays for new clients.
FAQ:
- Q: Is Fresha a bad tool?
A: No. It is a complete, low-cost platform, and its marketplace brings real clients. We build systems for businesses that want their own brand, data and rules.
- Q: Does Fresha charge for clients who book through our own links?
A: Fresha says no. The new client fee applies to brand new clients who find you on its marketplace, not to those who come through your website, Instagram or Facebook.
- Q: Can we take our client list with us?
A: Yes. Fresha exports it to Excel or CSV and we import it. Card details cannot be exported, so clients add their card again in the new system.
- Q: Can we keep Fresha for new clients and our own system for regulars?
A: Yes. Some businesses keep the marketplace for new clients and book regulars on their own site, with no fee. At the brief we check how to keep the two calendars in step.
- Q: Do you take a share of our payments?
A: No. There is no commission on bookings. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
Facts about Fresha checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: plans and prices (https://www.fresha.com/pricing), Fresha's salon software article (https://www.fresha.com/for-business/salon/best-salon-software), client list export (https://www.fresha.com/help-center/knowledge-base/clients/58-export-your-client-list), partner terms (https://terms.fresha.com/partner-terms). Fresha is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## When Booksy is no longer enough
> Booksy brings salons new clients through its app, for a fee. Here is when a business outgrows it, and how moving to a booking system you own works.
Page: https://timerise.ai/alternatives/booksy
Booksy puts salons and barbers in front of millions of people on its app, with reminders, deposits and marketing in one subscription. If it covers how you work, stay with it. This page is for the moment its fees and limits cost more than the app brings.
When Booksy is the right choice. For many salons and barbers Booksy is the better choice. Stay with it when:
- New clients from the Booksy app are a big part of your bookings.
- Reminders, deposits and cancellation fees solve your no-show problem.
- Text campaigns, loyalty cards and review requests are all the marketing you need.
- A Booksy profile, booked from Instagram, Google or Facebook, is fine for your clients.
Signs you have outgrown Booksy:
- Boost fees add up: In the US, Booksy charges 30% of a new Boost client's first visit, up to $100. In Poland it is 45%, up to 250 zł net.
- The bill grows with your team: In the US it is $29.99 a month, plus $20 for every extra team member.
- Your client list sits in the app: Booksy's help says to contact support to get your client list with contact details. We found no export you run yourself.
- Your brand shares the page: Your booking page lives on Booksy's marketplace, where clients searching nearby also see other salons.
- Your rules have no setting: Packages across services, prices by stylist and time of day, memberships with your own rules.
- You want your own app: A branded app for your regulars, with their history, points and offers, and no other salon in sight.
Booksy or a system you own:
| Topic | Booksy | Your own system | Better choice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cost to start | $29.99 a month in the US, plus $20 for each extra team member. | $15,000 to $50,000, paid once, before the first booking. | Booksy |
| Time to start | Sign up and take bookings the same day. | A prototype in 48 hours. Live in six to eight weeks, with your data moved. | Booksy |
| Marketplace | The Booksy app brings new clients who search there. | No marketplace. New clients come from your site, Google and social media, or you keep Booksy for them. | Booksy |
| New clients | A one-time fee on each new Boost client: 30% up to $100 in the US. | No commission. Clients come through your site, Google and your own campaigns. | Your own system |
| Client data | Kept by Booksy. The client list comes through support. | In your own database, exported whenever you like. | Your own system |
| Brand | A profile on Booksy's marketplace, next to other businesses. | Your own site and booking flow, with nobody else on the page. | Your own system |
| Cost as you grow | A monthly fee, plus a fee for each extra team member. | One fixed price for the build, then hosting billed by usage. | Your own system |
Cost:
In the US, Booksy costs $29.99 a month plus $20 for each extra team member. A salon with five people pays about $110 a month, or $1,320 a year, before Boost and card fees.
Boost is where it grows. Say Boost brings 20 new clients a month with a $60 first visit. At 30%, that is $360 a month, or $4,320 a year. Boost is optional, and it may bring clients you would not find otherwise, so count what it brings as well as what it costs.
A system we build costs $15,000 to $50,000, paid once. It pays off when the fees reach thousands a year, or when you want your own brand and data. If most new clients come from the Booksy app, you can keep Booksy for that and book regulars on your own system.
After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
Moving off Booksy. We found no export you run yourself, so we start with what Booksy support sends you and what your calendar shows. We move it before the switch, so nobody has to book again.
1. Ask for your data: You ask Booksy support for your client list and history. We tell you exactly what to ask for.
2. Map: We match services, staff, clients and upcoming appointments to the new system.
3. Run side by side: Your new booking site goes live while Booksy still takes bookings. Boost can stay on while it pays.
4. Switch: You point your Instagram, Google and website links to the new site. Then you decide if Booksy stays for new clients.
FAQ:
- Q: Is Booksy a bad tool?
A: No. Its app brings real new clients, and for many salons that is worth the fee. We build systems for businesses that want their own brand, data and costs.
- Q: Can we keep Booksy for new clients and our own system for regulars?
A: Yes. Some businesses keep the marketplace for new clients and book regulars on their own site, with no fee. At the brief we check how to keep the two calendars in step.
- Q: Does Booksy charge for clients who book through our own link?
A: Booksy says no. The Boost fee applies to new clients who find you on the marketplace while Boost is on, not to clients who come through your own link.
- Q: Can you get our client history out of Booksy?
A: Booksy's help says to ask support for the client list. We take what they send and import it, so the new system starts with your clients.
- Q: Do you take a share of our payments?
A: No. There is no commission on bookings. Payments go to your own Stripe or Adyen account.
Facts about Booksy checked on 2026-10-12 on its own pages: US plans and prices (https://biz.booksy.com/en-us/pricing), Boost (https://biz.booksy.com/en-us/features/boost), Polish prices (https://biz.booksy.com/pl-pl/cennik), client list (https://support.booksy.com/hc/en-us/articles/16539806017938). Booksy is a trademark of its owner; Timerise is not affiliated with it.
---
## A booking system for your clinic, built around your doctors
> A custom booking system for clinics and medical practices: online appointments, doctor schedules, reminders and payments, with the code and data you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/clinics
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Reception copies patient data between tools, and per-doctor fees grow with the practice. We build booking systems for clinics and medical practices: online appointments for every doctor and location, reminders that cut no-shows, and payments, with the code and patient data owned by you.
What a booking system for clinics can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Online appointments: Patients book by doctor, service or location. Each visit type has its own length, price and rules, such as a first visit that takes longer.
- Doctor schedules: Working hours, breaks, holidays and rooms per doctor and per location, in one calendar for the reception. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Reminders: Email and SMS reminders before the visit, with a link to confirm, move or cancel it, so a freed slot goes back on sale.
- Forms before the visit: The patient fills in the intake form while booking, so the doctor has it before the visit starts.
- Payments and e-invoices: Card payment or a deposit at booking, and the invoice issued after payment. In Poland, invoices go through KSeF. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ksef.
- Reception kiosk: Patients without an appointment book or check in on a touchscreen at the entrance. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Waiting room screens: Screens show who is next and which room to go to, managed from the same admin panel. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Integrations: Google and Outlook calendars, video visits, and your medical records system if it has an API. We check that at the brief. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/google-calendar-sync.
How your team runs it: Reception, doctors and the owner work in one panel: the calendar by doctor, patients, reminders and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- You have several doctors or locations and one calendar is not enough
- Your visit types and rules don't fit what the booking platform offers
- The reception copies patient data between tools
- Per-doctor or per-booking fees grow with the practice
What clinics gain over a SaaS platform:
- Patient data. On a SaaS platform: Records sit with the vendor, under the vendor's terms. With your own system: The data lives in your own database, and you decide who sees it.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees per doctor or per booking grow as the practice grows. With your own system: One fixed price, with no per-doctor fees and no commission on bookings.
- Visit rules. On a SaaS platform: You adapt your visits to the settings the tool offers. With your own system: Visit types, chairs and rooms work the way your clinic does.
- Other tools. On a SaaS platform: Reception copies data between the calendar, billing and records. With your own system: They connect through the API, so nobody types the same thing twice.
Case study: An online psychotherapy marketplace that launched on a booking backend we built, with the privacy rules its patients need. (/case-studies/risify)
FAQ:
- Q: Where is patient data stored?
A: In your own database, in the region you choose, for example inside the EU. The system is built with GDPR in mind from the start, and the data stays yours.
- Q: Will it connect to our medical records system?
A: Yes, if that system has an API. We check it at the brief stage and include the integration in the quote.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
- Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design (/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for spas and wellness centres (/industries/spas)
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for public offices (/industries/public-sector)
---
## A booking system for your gym, with classes, passes and check-in
> A custom booking system for gyms and fitness studios: classes with waitlists, memberships and passes, check-in and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/fitness
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Members wait at the desk, and platform fees grow with every new member. We build booking systems for gyms, fitness studios and sports clubs: class schedules with waitlists, memberships and passes, check-in at the door and payments, with the code and member data owned by you.
What a booking system for gyms and fitness studios can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Classes and waitlists: A weekly class schedule with capacity per class. When a class is full, members join the waitlist and move up when a spot frees. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Memberships and passes: Monthly memberships, class packs and day passes. Each booking takes a credit from the member's balance, and the history is always complete. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Trainers and personal training: Trainer schedules, one-to-one sessions and small groups, booked by members or by the reception.
- Check-in at the door: Members check in on a touchscreen at the entrance, or the kiosk books a walk-in class. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Screens in the club: Today's classes, free spots and announcements on the screens in the club, managed from the admin panel. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Works when the internet drops: A small server in the club keeps check-in and today's bookings running during an outage, then syncs back. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/island-mode-server.
- Several clubs: One system for all locations: shared memberships, per-club schedules and one view of attendance.
- Payments: Card payments for passes and recurring payments for memberships, with invoices issued automatically.
How your team runs it: The team runs the club from one panel: the schedule, members, plans, check-ins and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- You run several clubs or plan to open more
- You sell memberships, packs or company deals the platform can't express
- Members wait at the desk because check-in is slow
- Platform fees grow with every new member
What gyms and fitness studios gain over a SaaS platform:
- Plans. On a SaaS platform: Memberships and packs follow the plans the platform has. With your own system: Plans, packs and company deals are built the way you sell them.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Platform fees grow with every new member. With your own system: No per-member fees and no commission, however many members you have.
- The door. On a SaaS platform: Check-in depends on the vendor's app and the internet. With your own system: Check-in runs on your own screens, and keeps working when the internet drops.
- Your members. On a SaaS platform: Members belong to the platform and its app. With your own system: Your members, your brand and your data stay with you.
FAQ:
- Q: Can members book from their phone?
A: Yes. The booking pages work on any phone, and the system can send the class schedule, reminders and waitlist updates by email or SMS.
- Q: What happens at check-in if the internet goes down?
A: With an on-site fallback server, check-in and today's bookings keep working during an outage and sync back when the connection returns.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space (/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
- From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours (/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for spas and wellness centres (/industries/spas)
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
---
## A booking system for your rental business, item by item
> A custom booking system for rental businesses: availability per item, deposits, pick-up and return, several locations, with the code and data you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/rentals
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Spreadsheets for every item, prices that change by season, and a platform that takes a cut of each rental. We build booking systems for equipment, vehicle and space rentals: availability per item, prices by duration and season, deposits, pick-up and return, with the code and data owned by you.
What a booking system for rental businesses can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Availability per item: Every bike, car, boat or room has its own calendar. Customers see what is free for their dates and book by the hour, day or week. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Prices by duration and season: Hourly, daily and weekly rates, weekend and season prices, and discounts for longer rentals, set by your team in the admin panel.
- Deposits and payments: Payment or a deposit at booking, a card hold for damage, and the invoice issued after payment.
- Pick-up and return: A QR code for pick-up, a checklist at return, and the item back on sale as soon as it is checked in.
- Several locations: Items at different pick-up points, one view of the whole fleet, and transfers between locations.
- Works in the field: A local server at the rental point keeps pick-ups and returns running when the internet drops, then syncs back. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/island-mode-server.
- Self-service point: Customers book or collect a rental on a touchscreen at the counter, without waiting for staff. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Integrations: Calendars, accounting, insurance, telematics or locks, with any tool that has an API.
How your team runs it: Staff and managers see what goes out and comes back today, which deposits are held and where each item is.
When your own system is worth it:
- You rent many items and track them in spreadsheets
- Prices change by season, duration or customer type
- You run several pick-up points
- A booking platform takes a cut of every rental
What rental businesses gain over a SaaS platform:
- Prices. On a SaaS platform: Season and duration pricing is limited to preset rules. With your own system: Prices by season, length and customer type, set as you need them.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: A booking platform takes a cut of every rental. With your own system: 0% commission on bookings, whatever you rent.
- Your items. On a SaaS platform: Items are tracked in a spreadsheet next to the tool. With your own system: Availability, deposits, pick-up and return live in one system.
- Locations. On a SaaS platform: Each pick-up point needs its own setup or plan. With your own system: All locations in one system, with prices per location.
FAQ:
- Q: Can one system handle different kinds of items?
A: Yes. Bikes, vehicles, equipment and spaces can each have their own rules, prices and booking units in the same system.
- Q: Can the system hold a deposit on the customer's card?
A: Yes. A card hold is placed at booking and released at return, or charged if something is damaged.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space (/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces)
- Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide (/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for home service companies (/industries/home-services)
- Booking systems for hotels and guesthouses (/industries/hotels)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
---
## A booking system for your coworking space, desk by desk
> A custom booking system for coworking spaces: desks and rooms on a floor plan, passes and memberships, payments and building access, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/coworking
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
The front desk copies data between tools, and fees grow with every member. We build booking systems for coworking spaces: desks and meeting rooms on a floor plan, passes and memberships, payments and building access, across all your locations, with the code and member data owned by you.
What a booking system for coworking spaces can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Desks and rooms on a floor plan: Members see free desks and rooms on the plan and book by the hour, for the day or as a fixed seat.
- Several locations: One availability and one occupancy view for all your spaces, with prices per location.
- Passes and memberships: Day passes, room hours, monthly memberships and company packages, with different prices for members and guests. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Payments and e-invoices: Card payment at booking or every month, and the invoice issued after payment. In Poland, invoices go through KSeF. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ksef.
- Building access: Members get a QR code on their phone. If your access control has an API, the system opens the gates.
- Screens in the space: Room schedules and announcements on screens next to the rooms and at the entrance. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Operator dashboard: Occupancy, entries and payments in one view, for today and the weeks ahead.
- Integrations: Google and Outlook calendars, Slack, your CRM and Stripe, or any tool with an API. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/microsoft-calendar-sync.
How your team runs it: The operator sees occupancy, passes, access and invoices in one place, for every location.
When your own system is worth it:
- You run several locations or plan to open more
- You sell company packages or member and guest prices the platform can't express
- Your front desk copies data between tools
- Platform fees grow with the number of members
What coworking spaces gain over a SaaS platform:
- Your space. On a SaaS platform: Desks and rooms are a plain list of resources. With your own system: Members book on a floor plan of your own space.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees grow with the number of members. With your own system: No per-member fees and no commission on bookings.
- Access. On a SaaS platform: Door access is a separate system you keep in sync. With your own system: A QR code on the member's phone opens the gates through their API.
- Overview. On a SaaS platform: Members, entries and payments sit in different tools. With your own system: Occupancy, entries and payments in one operator view.
FAQ:
- Q: Will the system connect to our access control?
A: Yes, if your entry system has an API. We check this at the brief stage and include it in the quote.
- Q: Can companies book for their teams?
A: Yes. A company package can cover several people, with one invoice for the company and bookings made by each member.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space (/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces)
- Data Analysis in booking systems + insights to optimize services (/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for hotels and guesthouses (/industries/hotels)
---
## A booking system for your events, from ticket to check-in
> A custom booking system for events, festivals and workshops: tickets and seats with capacity, payments, check-in at the door and refunds, code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/events
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
A ticketing fee on every event, and free seats lost to people who never come. We build booking systems for events, festivals, conferences and workshops: tickets and seats with capacity limits, payments and refunds, check-in at the door, with the code and attendee data owned by you.
What a booking system for events and festivals can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Tickets with capacity: Every event, session or workshop has its own capacity. Paid tickets go through Stripe Checkout, and sales stop when it is full. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/bookable-events.
- Free events without no-shows: A free spot holds a small amount on the card. It is released at check-in and charged only if the guest doesn't come. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/bookable-events.
- Check-in at the door: Staff check guests in from a phone or a kiosk at the entrance, and the list updates live. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Sessions and stages: A multi-day programme with parallel sessions, so attendees book the talks and workshops they want.
- Refunds and cancellations: Refund one ticket or cancel a whole event, and every guest is refunded and told by email. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/bookable-events.
- Screens at the venue: The programme, room changes and announcements on screens around the venue. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Works when the venue Wi-Fi fails: A local server keeps check-in running when the internet drops, then syncs back. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/island-mode-server.
- Integrations: Your website, CRM, newsletter and invoicing, or any tool with an API.
How your team runs it: The organiser follows ticket sales, orders, guests and check-in live, and handles refunds from the same panel.
When your own system is worth it:
- You run events often and pay a ticketing fee on every one
- Your sessions, seats or prices don't fit a ticketing platform
- Free events lose seats to people who never come
- You want the attendee data in your own database
What events and festivals gain over a SaaS platform:
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: A ticketing fee is added to every ticket. With your own system: No ticketing fee and no commission on sales. Only your payment provider charges for cards.
- Your event. On a SaaS platform: Sessions, seats and prices follow the platform's model. With your own system: Parallel sessions, capacity per ticket and prices as your event needs.
- No-shows. On a SaaS platform: Free events lose places to guests who never come. With your own system: A small hold on the card, released at check-in and charged only if the guest doesn't come.
- Attendee data. On a SaaS platform: The attendee list stays with the ticketing platform. With your own system: Attendee data goes straight into your own database.
Case study: A complete seat booking system for a startup festival, built in two days and used by hundreds of participants from day one. (/case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw)
FAQ:
- Q: Is there a fee per ticket?
A: No. You pay once for the system and keep every ticket sale, apart from the card processing fee of your payment provider.
- Q: Can it be ready before our event?
A: Often, yes. The prototype comes within 48 hours, and the festival in our case study had its booking system in two days. Tell us your date in the brief.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours (/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours)
- Agent-Ready Payments: How Bookings Get Paid When Nobody Fills a Form (/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
- Booking systems for shooting ranges (/industries/shooting-ranges)
---
## A booking system for your office, without the queue outside
> A custom booking system for public offices and consulates: visits booked by matter, queue screens, kiosks and reminders, with the code and data you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/public-sector
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
People queue outside or phone to book, and slots are gone in seconds at peak times. We build booking systems for public offices, consulates and agencies: visits booked online by matter, queue screens and kiosks in the hall, and reminders, with the code and citizen data owned by your institution.
What a booking system for public offices can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Visits by matter: Citizens pick the matter first: a passport, a certificate, a registration. Each matter has its own length, counters and documents.
- Counters and staff: Opening hours, counters and who can handle which matter, in one calendar for the whole office. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Documents before the visit: The confirmation lists what to bring, and forms can be filled in before the visit, so nobody is sent home.
- Queue screens: Screens in the hall call the next number to the right counter, managed from the same admin panel. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Self-service kiosk: Visitors without a booking take a number or check in on a touchscreen at the entrance. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Reminders: Email and SMS reminders with a link to cancel, so a freed slot goes to the next person waiting.
- Fair access at peak times: Limits per person and per matter, and a booking flow that stays up when thousands try at once.
- Works when the internet fails: A local server keeps the hall running if the connection drops, and syncs everything when it is back. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/island-mode-server.
How your team runs it: The front desk, counter staff and managers work in one panel: visits by counter, the live queue, matters and reports.
When your own system is worth it:
- People queue outside or phone to book, because there is no online booking
- Your matters, counters and documents don't fit what a booking platform offers
- Demand comes in peaks, and slots are gone in seconds
- Citizen data must stay in your own infrastructure or inside the EU
What public offices gain over a SaaS platform:
- Citizen data. On a SaaS platform: Records sit with a private vendor, under its terms and in its region. With your own system: The data stays in your infrastructure or the region you choose, and you control access.
- Peaks. On a SaaS platform: Shared servers and fixed limits, set by the vendor. With your own system: Built and tested for your peaks, with fair limits per person.
- Licences. On a SaaS platform: A subscription to renew every year, priced per user or per location. With your own system: One fixed price and the code handed over, with no licence to renew.
- Your process. On a SaaS platform: Matters and counters bent to fit the tool's settings. With your own system: Matters, counters and documents work the way your office does.
Case study: A consulate that moved its queues online: more than 50,000 visits booked, with the system built in three weeks. (/case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine)
FAQ:
- Q: Where is citizen data stored?
A: In your own infrastructure or in the region you choose, for example inside the EU. The system is built with GDPR in mind, and the data and the code belong to your institution.
- Q: Can it handle thousands of people booking at once?
A: Yes. We size and test the system for your peaks. The consulate system we built has taken more than 50,000 visits.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design (/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking)
- Timerise Offline: Island Mode for Field Operations (/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for banks and financial advisors (/industries/banking)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
---
## A booking system for your salon, built around your stylists
> A custom booking system for beauty salons and barbers: online booking per stylist, deposits against no-shows, gift cards and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/salons
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Clients book you on a marketplace that shows them your competitors, and the commission grows with every visit. We build booking systems for beauty salons, barbers and nail studios: online booking per stylist, deposits that cut no-shows, gift cards and payments, with the code and client list owned by you.
What a booking system for beauty salons and barbers can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Online booking per stylist: Clients pick a service, a stylist and a time. Each service has its own length and price, and a colour and a cut can be booked as one visit. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Stylist schedules: Working hours, breaks and days off per stylist and per chair, in one calendar for the front desk.
- Deposits and no-show fees: A deposit or a card hold at booking for long services, so a missed visit is still paid for.
- Gift cards and packages: Gift cards and packs of visits, paid online and taken off the client's balance at each visit. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Reminders: SMS and email reminders with a link to confirm or move the visit, so a freed slot goes back on sale.
- Client cards: Each client's past visits, colour formulas, notes and photos, visible to the stylist before the visit.
- Your own booking page: A booking page in your brand, linked from Instagram, Google Maps and your website, with no competitors next to you.
- Several salons: One system for all locations, with clients and gift cards shared between them.
How your team runs it: The front desk and the stylists work in one panel: the day by stylist, clients, deposits and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- Clients book you on a marketplace that lists your competitors
- No-shows cost you hours every week
- You run several salons or rent chairs to stylists
- Commission or per-stylist fees grow with the salon
What beauty salons and barbers gain over a SaaS platform:
- Your clients. On a SaaS platform: The marketplace shows your clients other salons nearby. With your own system: Clients book on your page, in your brand, and stay yours.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Commission on new clients and fees per stylist grow with the salon. With your own system: One fixed price, with no commission and no per-stylist fees.
- No-shows. On a SaaS platform: Deposits follow the rules the platform allows. With your own system: Deposits and no-show fees work the way you set them, per service.
- Client history. On a SaaS platform: Notes and formulas sit in the vendor's app. With your own system: Every client's history lives in your own database.
FAQ:
- Q: Can we keep the clients we have on Booksy or Fresha?
A: Yes. We move your clients and their future visits into the new system, and the old tool keeps running until the data matches.
- Q: Can clients book from Instagram?
A: Yes. Your booking page has its own link, which you put on Instagram, Google Maps and your website. Clients book in a few taps on their phone.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
- Enhancing customer experience with customizable booking pages (/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages)
- How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost? (/blog/custom-booking-software-cost)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for spas and wellness centres (/industries/spas)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
---
## A booking system for your spa, with rooms, therapists and packages
> A custom booking system for spas and wellness centres: treatments with rooms and therapists, spa days, gift vouchers and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/spas
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
A treatment needs a free therapist and a free room at the same time, and most booking tools check only one. We build booking systems for spas, wellness centres and hotel spas: treatments that hold the right room and therapist, spa days and gift vouchers, and payments, with the code and guest data owned by you.
What a booking system for spas and wellness centres can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Treatments, rooms and therapists: Each treatment holds a therapist with the right skills and a free room, with time to prepare the room for the next guest. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Spa days and day passes: Spa days that book several treatments in a row, and day passes for the pool and sauna with a limit per hour.
- Gift vouchers: Vouchers bought online, sent by email and used at booking or at the desk, with the balance always known. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Forms before the treatment: Guests fill in a health form while booking, so the therapist knows about allergies before the guest arrives.
- Reminders: Reminders before the visit with what to bring and when to arrive, and a link to move the booking.
- Hotel guests: Hotel guests book with their room number, and the treatment goes on the room bill if your hotel system has an API.
- Reception kiosk: Guests at the reception book a sauna slot or check in on a touchscreen. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Payments: Card payment or a deposit at booking, and the invoice issued after payment.
How your team runs it: Reception, therapists and the manager work in one panel: the day by room and therapist, guests, vouchers and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- A treatment needs a therapist and a room, and your tool checks only one
- You sell spa days, packages and gift vouchers
- You are part of a hotel and guests book from their room
- Fees grow with every therapist or booking
What spas and wellness centres gain over a SaaS platform:
- Rooms. On a SaaS platform: The tool books the therapist and leaves the room to the reception. With your own system: Every treatment holds the therapist and the room together.
- Vouchers. On a SaaS platform: Vouchers live in a separate tool, or on paper. With your own system: Vouchers are sold, tracked and used in the same system.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees grow with every therapist and every booking. With your own system: One fixed price, with no commission on bookings.
- The hotel. On a SaaS platform: The spa and the hotel run on tools that don't talk. With your own system: Hotel guests book and pay with their room, through the API.
FAQ:
- Q: Can a treatment book a room and a therapist together?
A: Yes. Each treatment says which rooms and which therapist skills it needs, and the system only offers times when both are free.
- Q: Can hotel guests charge treatments to their room?
A: Yes, if your hotel system has an API. We check that at the brief and include the integration in the quote.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for hotels and guesthouses (/industries/hotels)
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
---
## A booking system for your hotel, so guests book you directly
> A custom booking engine for hotels and guesthouses: direct room bookings, extras such as spa, tables and tours, deposits and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/hotels
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Portals take a commission on every night, and guests who book there belong to the portal. We build booking systems for hotels, guesthouses and apartment owners: direct bookings on your own website, extras such as breakfast, spa and tours, and payments, with the code and guest data owned by you.
What a booking system for hotels and guesthouses can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Direct room booking: Guests pick dates, a room type and a rate on your website, and pay without leaving it.
- Rates and seasons: Seasonal prices, minimum stays, early booking and long stay discounts, set by you in the admin panel.
- Extras and experiences: Breakfast, parking, spa, a table in the restaurant or a tour, added to the stay or booked on their own.
- Deposits and payments: A deposit or full payment at booking, the rest at arrival, and the invoice issued automatically. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/invoicing.
- Portal and channel sync: Availability syncs with Booking.com, Airbnb or your channel manager, so a room is never sold twice. We check the API at the brief.
- Online check-in and keys: Guests send their details before arrival and get the door code or a digital key on their phone.
- Guest messages: Emails before arrival with directions and extras to add, and a thank-you after the stay.
- Several properties: One system for all your hotels or apartments, with one view of occupancy.
How your team runs it: Reception and the owner work in one panel: arrivals and departures, rooms by day, extras and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- Portal commission takes a large part of every booking
- You want guests to book on your own website
- You sell extras such as spa, tables or tours
- You run several properties or apartments
What hotels and guesthouses gain over a SaaS platform:
- Commission. On a SaaS platform: Portals take a share of every night they sell. With your own system: Direct bookings on your website carry no commission.
- Your guests. On a SaaS platform: The portal keeps the guest's email and sends them offers from others. With your own system: Guests book with you, and you can invite them back.
- Extras. On a SaaS platform: Extras are an email to the reception, or not sold at all. With your own system: Spa, tables and tours are sold with the room, in one payment.
- Arrival. On a SaaS platform: Guests queue at the desk to fill in a form. With your own system: Check-in is done online, and the key is on the phone.
FAQ:
- Q: Will it replace our property management system?
A: It can, or it can work beside it. We connect to your property management system or channel manager if it has an API, and check that at the brief.
- Q: Can we still sell rooms on Booking.com?
A: Yes. The portals stay a channel, and availability stays in sync. Your own website becomes the place where guests book without a commission.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking API for marketplaces: Guide for leaders & developers (/blog/booking-api-marketplace-integration)
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
- How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost? (/blog/custom-booking-software-cost)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
- Booking systems for spas and wellness centres (/industries/spas)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
---
## A table booking system for your restaurant, with no fee per guest
> A custom table booking system for restaurants and chains: tables on a floor plan, deposits for groups, events and set menus, with code and data you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/restaurants
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Booking platforms charge per guest and keep the guest list. We build table booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains: online booking on your own website, a floor plan for the host, deposits for groups and events, with the code and guest data owned by you.
What a booking system for restaurants and restaurant chains can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Online table booking: Guests pick a date, a time and the number of people. The system finds a table that fits and leaves time to turn it. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Floor plan for the host: The host sees every table on the plan, seats walk-ins and joins tables for groups.
- Deposits for groups: A deposit or a card hold for large tables and busy nights, so a no-show is still paid for.
- Events and set menus: Tasting dinners, brunches and private events with tickets, a limit of places and payment online. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/bookable-events.
- Waitlist: When the night is full, guests join the waitlist and get a message when a table frees.
- Guest notes: Allergies, birthdays and past visits, visible to the host before the guest arrives.
- Reminders: SMS reminders with a link to confirm or cancel, so the table goes back on sale.
- Several restaurants: One system for the whole chain: each place keeps its own plan and hours, and the guest list is shared.
How your team runs it: Hosts, managers and the owner work in one panel: tonight's tables, bookings by hour, guests and deposits.
When your own system is worth it:
- The platform charges you per guest or per booking
- You run several restaurants and want one guest list
- Groups and busy nights bring no-shows
- You sell events, tasting menus or private dining
What restaurants and restaurant chains gain over a SaaS platform:
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: A fee per guest or per booking, every night. With your own system: One fixed price, with no fee per guest.
- Your guests. On a SaaS platform: The platform keeps the guest list and shows guests other places. With your own system: The guest list is yours, in your own database.
- No-shows. On a SaaS platform: Deposits follow the rules the platform allows. With your own system: Deposits work the way you set them, per table size and per night.
- Events. On a SaaS platform: Events are sold in a separate ticket tool. With your own system: Events and tables are booked in the same system.
FAQ:
- Q: Will it work with our POS system?
A: Yes, if the POS has an API. We check that at the brief and include the integration in the quote.
- Q: Can guests book from Instagram and Google Maps?
A: Yes. Your booking page has its own link, which you put on Instagram, Google Maps and your website.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for hotels and guesthouses (/industries/hotels)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
---
## An appointment booking system for your bank and its advisors
> A custom appointment booking system for banks and financial advisors: branch and video meetings, advisor calendars and branch queues on your own servers.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/banking
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Customers wait on the phone to see an advisor, and your IT team won't approve a tool that keeps customer data on someone else's servers. We build appointment booking systems for banks, credit unions and advisory firms: branch and video meetings, advisor calendars and branch queues, on your own infrastructure, with the code and data owned by you.
What a booking system for banks and financial advisors can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Meetings by topic: Customers pick the topic first: a mortgage, an account or an investment. The system offers the advisors who handle it, in a branch or by video. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Advisor calendars: Meetings land in each advisor's Outlook calendar, and their busy time blocks the slots. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/microsoft-calendar-sync.
- Video meetings: A Teams or other video link in every remote meeting, sent with the confirmation.
- Branch queues: Walk-in customers take a number at a kiosk, and a screen calls them to the right desk. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Documents before the meeting: The confirmation lists what to bring, and customers can upload documents in advance.
- Your security rules: Single sign-on for staff, a log of who saw what, and data in the region you choose.
- Connection to your systems: Customer data comes from your CRM or core system through its API, so nobody types it twice.
- Reports: Meetings by branch, topic and advisor, and how long customers wait.
How your team runs it: Branch staff and managers work in one panel: meetings by advisor, the branch queue and reports.
When your own system is worth it:
- Your IT team needs the system on your own infrastructure
- Customers wait on the phone to book a meeting
- Advisors work across branches and video
- You need single sign-on and a log of every access
What banks and financial advisors gain over a SaaS platform:
- Customer data. On a SaaS platform: Data sits on the vendor's servers, under the vendor's terms. With your own system: The system runs on your infrastructure, and the data never leaves it.
- Security review. On a SaaS platform: Your IT team reviews a tool it cannot change. With your own system: The system is built to the rules your security team sets.
- Calendars. On a SaaS platform: Advisors keep a second calendar beside Outlook. With your own system: Meetings land in Outlook, and busy time blocks the slots.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees per advisor or per branch grow with the network. With your own system: One fixed price, however many advisors and branches you have.
FAQ:
- Q: Can it run on our own infrastructure?
A: Yes. The system can run in your own cloud account or data centre, and the code and documentation are handed over to your IT team.
- Q: Will it pass our security review?
A: We build to the rules your security team sets, such as single sign-on, access logs, encryption and data region, and answer their questions before the build starts.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design (/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking)
- Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide (/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for public offices (/industries/public-sector)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
---
## A booking system for your range, with lanes, instructors and waivers
> A custom booking system for shooting ranges: lanes by the hour, instructors, online waivers, ID checks, packages and payments, with code and data you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/shooting-ranges
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
A lane, an instructor and a rental gun all have to be free at the same time, and every guest needs a signed waiver before they shoot. We build booking systems for shooting ranges and clubs: lanes by the hour, instructor sessions, waivers and ID checks, and payments, with the code and member data owned by you.
What a booking system for shooting ranges can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Lanes by the hour: Guests book a lane for a set time, alone or as a group. Each lane type has its own length, price and limits. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Instructors: Sessions with an instructor, booked with a lane, so both are free at the same time.
- Waivers and ID checks: Guests sign the waiver while booking. Staff check the ID or licence at the desk, and the system keeps the record.
- Experience packages: Gift packages with a set of guns and rounds, sold online and used at booking. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Gun and ammunition rental: Rental guns and ammunition added to the booking, with stock counted per day.
- Members and clubs: Members book at their own price, with their licence and training history on file.
- Check-in at the desk: Guests check in on a touchscreen, and the lane is assigned at once. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/booking-kiosk.
- Payments: Card payment or a deposit at booking, and invoices for companies.
How your team runs it: Range officers and the manager work in one panel: lanes by hour, instructors, waivers and rentals.
When your own system is worth it:
- A lane, an instructor and a rental gun must all be free at once
- Every guest signs a waiver and shows an ID
- You sell gift packages and company events
- Members and walk-in guests pay different prices
What shooting ranges gain over a SaaS platform:
- Your rules. On a SaaS platform: The tool books a time slot and knows nothing about lanes or guns. With your own system: Lanes, instructors and rentals are booked together, by your rules.
- Paperwork. On a SaaS platform: Waivers are signed on paper at the desk while the lane waits. With your own system: Waivers are signed online, and the desk only checks the ID.
- Packages. On a SaaS platform: Gift packages are sold in a separate shop. With your own system: Packages are sold, booked and used in the same system.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees grow with every booking and every lane. With your own system: One fixed price, with no commission on bookings.
FAQ:
- Q: Can guests sign the waiver online?
A: Yes. Every guest in the booking signs the waiver on their phone before they arrive, and the desk sees who has signed.
- Q: Do you handle licence and ID checks?
A: The system records what staff checked and when. The rules come from you and your local law, and we build them in.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
- From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours (/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
---
## A booking system for your escape rooms, from booking to the last clue
> A custom booking system for escape rooms: games by the slot, prices per group, gift vouchers, game master shifts and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/escape-rooms
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Groups book late at night, ask for a voucher and want a price for six people, not one. We build booking systems for escape rooms and other games: rooms by the slot, prices per group size, vouchers and team events, with the code and player data owned by you.
What a booking system for escape rooms can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Rooms by the slot: Each room has its own game length and reset time. Players see the free slots of every room on one page. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Prices per group: The price changes with the number of players and the day, and the group pays together or each player pays a share.
- Gift vouchers: Vouchers bought online, sent by email and used at booking. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/ledger-wallet.
- Game masters: Shifts for game masters, matched to the rooms that are booked.
- Players and waivers: Players add their names and sign the waiver before the game, so the leaderboard and photos are ready.
- Leaderboard screen: Best times and today's teams on a screen in the lobby, managed from the admin panel. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/digital-signage.
- Team events: Companies book several rooms at once for one group, with one invoice. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/invoicing.
- Reminders: Emails before the game with the address and how to get in, so teams arrive on time.
How your team runs it: Game masters and the owner work in one panel: the day by room, teams, vouchers and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- You run several rooms or several locations
- Group pricing doesn't fit the tool you use
- You sell vouchers and team events
- Fees grow with every booking
What escape rooms gain over a SaaS platform:
- Prices. On a SaaS platform: The tool prices per person or per room, not both. With your own system: Prices follow the group size and the day, the way you set them.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: A fee on every booking and every voucher. With your own system: One fixed price, with no commission on bookings.
- Vouchers. On a SaaS platform: Vouchers are sold in a separate shop. With your own system: Vouchers are sold and used in the same system.
- Your brand. On a SaaS platform: The booking page looks like every other room on the platform. With your own system: The booking page is part of the game, in your own style.
FAQ:
- Q: Can a group split the payment?
A: Yes. One player books and pays a deposit, and the others get a link to pay their share before the game.
- Q: Can we run several locations in one system?
A: Yes. Each location keeps its own rooms and hours, and vouchers and players are shared between them.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
- Enhancing customer experience with customizable booking pages (/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages)
- How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost? (/blog/custom-booking-software-cost)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for shooting ranges (/industries/shooting-ranges)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
---
## A booking system for your home service team, from booking to the job
> A custom booking system for home service companies: jobs by area and skill, technician schedules, quotes, a field app and payments, with code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/home-services
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-19.
Customers want a time window, the office wants a sensible route, and the technician needs the job details on the phone. We build booking systems for cleaning, repair and installation companies: jobs booked by area and skill, technician schedules, a field app and payments, with the code and customer data owned by you.
What a booking system for home service companies can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Booking by area: Customers enter their address and pick a time window. The system only offers windows when a technician is nearby.
- Technician schedules: Skills, working hours and areas per technician, so a boiler job goes to someone who services boilers. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Quotes before the job: Customers describe the job and add photos, and the office sends a quote they accept online.
- Field app: Technicians see the day's jobs, addresses and notes, take photos and collect a signature. It keeps working without signal.
- Recurring visits: Weekly cleaning or a yearly service, booked once and repeated, with the same technician when possible.
- Reminders and arrival: A reminder the day before and a message when the technician is on the way.
- Payments and invoices: Card payment after the job, and the invoice sent at once. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/invoicing.
- Calendar sync: Jobs land in each technician's Google or Outlook calendar. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/google-calendar-sync.
How your team runs it: The office works in one panel: jobs on a map and by technician, quotes, recurring visits and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- Your technicians drive between jobs all day
- Jobs need a quote before they can be booked
- You offer recurring visits
- The office copies jobs from email and phone calls into a calendar
What home service companies gain over a SaaS platform:
- Routes. On a SaaS platform: Customers pick any hour, wherever the technician is that day. With your own system: Customers see the windows when a technician is nearby.
- The office. On a SaaS platform: Jobs come by phone and email and are typed in by hand. With your own system: Customers book and accept quotes online, and the job is ready.
- In the field. On a SaaS platform: Technicians call the office for the address and the notes. With your own system: Everything is in the field app, even without signal.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees per technician grow with the team. With your own system: One fixed price, however many technicians you have.
FAQ:
- Q: Can customers book a time window instead of an exact hour?
A: Yes. You set the windows, such as morning or afternoon, and the system offers only those when a technician with the right skills is nearby.
- Q: Does the field app work without signal?
A: Yes. The app keeps the day's jobs on the phone and syncs photos and signatures when the signal returns.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Timerise Offline: Island Mode for Field Operations (/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations)
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
- Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting (/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for rental businesses (/industries/rentals)
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
---
## A consultation booking system for your law firm
> A custom booking system for law firms: paid consultations, a conflict check before the meeting, lawyer calendars and client data that stays yours.
Page: https://timerise.ai/industries/legal
At a glance:
- Who builds it: Timerise, a software studio that builds custom booking systems its clients own.
- Price: one fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, agreed before the build.
- Timeline: a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief; live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
- Running costs: After the build there is no subscription and no commission on bookings. Hosting is billed by usage, and three years of support come with the project.
- Ownership: the code, the data and the documentation belong to the client.
- How to start: a free brief at https://timerise.ai/brief. An AI agent can write and submit the brief through the MCP server at https://timerise.ai/api/mcp (setup: https://timerise.ai/help/development/tim-mcp-server).
- Last updated: 2026-10-22.
Clients phone to book a first consultation, someone takes their details by hand, and a conflict of interest shows up only after the meeting is set. We build booking systems for law firms and legal practices: paid consultations, an intake form and a conflict check before the meeting, lawyer calendars and secure documents, with the code and client data owned by you.
What a booking system for law firms can do. Start with booking and payments; add the rest when you need it.
- Consultations by matter: Clients pick the matter first: family, employment, property or business. The system offers the lawyers who handle it, at the office or by video. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/time-slot-generator.
- Intake and conflict check: The client describes the matter and names the other party. The time is held until the firm checks for a conflict, then confirmed or declined.
- Paid consultations: The client pays for the first consultation when booking. Your cancellation rules decide what is refunded. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/bookable-events.
- Lawyer calendars: Consultations land in each lawyer's Outlook calendar, and court dates and other busy time block the slots. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/microsoft-calendar-sync.
- Video consultations: A Teams or other video link in every remote consultation, sent with the confirmation.
- Secure documents: Clients upload documents before the meeting to a private space, not to an email inbox.
- Invoices: An invoice for every paid consultation, numbered in order and sent as a PDF. Built from the Agent Skill at /skills/invoicing.
- Client confidentiality: Single sign-on for staff, a log of who opened which matter, and data in the region you choose.
How your team runs it: Reception and lawyers work in one panel: requests waiting for a conflict check, each lawyer's day and payments.
When your own system is worth it:
- Lawyers and staff spend time on the phone just to set up a first meeting
- You must check for a conflict of interest before you meet a client
- First consultations are paid, or no-shows cost you hours
- Client data must stay private, in a region you choose
What law firms gain over a SaaS platform:
- Conflict check. On a SaaS platform: A booking tool confirms the time at once, before anyone checks for a conflict. With your own system: The request waits for your conflict check, and the client hears back after it.
- Client data. On a SaaS platform: Client names and matters sit on the vendor's servers, under the vendor's terms. With your own system: The system runs where you choose, and your firm decides who can read the data.
- Calendars. On a SaaS platform: Lawyers keep a second calendar beside Outlook. With your own system: Consultations land in Outlook, and busy time blocks the slots.
- Cost. On a SaaS platform: Fees per lawyer grow with the firm. With your own system: One fixed price, however many lawyers you have.
FAQ:
- Q: Who can see our clients' data?
A: Your firm decides who has access. The system runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, in the region you choose, and the code and data belong to you.
- Q: Can we check for a conflict before a consultation is confirmed?
A: Yes. The booking waits as a request with the matter and the other party. Someone at the firm checks it, and the client gets a confirmation or a polite decline.
- Q: Can it connect to our case management software?
A: Yes, when the software has an API. Client and matter details then come from it, so nobody types them twice.
- Q: How much does it cost?
A: The price depends on the scope and is fixed before the build starts. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time cost, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: How long does it take?
A: You get a clickable prototype and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. The build takes two to three weeks, and the system is live six to eight weeks after the first call, including migration and handover.
- Q: We already use a booking tool. What happens to our data?
A: We move your customers, bookings and history into the new system, even when the current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
- Q: Who owns the system?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over. It runs in your own cloud account or on our infrastructure, and 3 years of support are included.
Read more:
- Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design (/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking)
- Build Your Own Calendly with One Agent Skill (/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill)
- Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide (/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software)
Nearby industries:
- Booking systems for banks and financial advisors (/industries/banking)
- Booking systems for public offices (/industries/public-sector)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
---
## Deposits and payments that follow your rules
> A booking system that takes deposits, full payments and refunds by your own rules, through the payment provider you choose. Built for you, owned by you.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/deposits-and-payments
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Customers book and then do not come, and your booking tool only takes payment the one way it was built to. We build payments into your booking system the way your business charges: a deposit, the full price, a card hold or nothing at all.
What goes wrong without it:
- A no-show costs you the slot and the work you could have sold. A deposit stops most of them, but only when it fits the booking: a small one for a haircut, a larger one for a party of twelve.
- Ready-made tools offer one or two payment settings, a fixed provider, and often a fee on top of the provider's. Refunds, partial payments and payouts to several people are done by hand.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Deposit or full payment: A fixed amount or a share of the price, per service, per day or per group size. The rest is paid at the venue or online later.
- Card hold instead of a charge: The card is held at booking and released on arrival. On a no-show the hold is captured, so free bookings stop going to waste.
- Cancellation rules: Full refund up to a deadline, part of it after, nothing on the day. Refunds go back to the card without anyone at the desk.
- Your payment provider: Stripe, a local provider or the one your bank gives you. The system has no fee of its own on top.
- Split payouts: One payment split between the venue and the stylist, trainer or partner who did the work, with a ledger that matches the bank.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Fees. In a SaaS tool: The platform adds its own fee or commission to every payment. In your own system: You pay only the payment provider. The system takes nothing.
- Rules. In a SaaS tool: One deposit setting for the whole account. In your own system: A different rule per service, day, group size or customer.
- Provider. In a SaaS tool: You use the provider the platform chose. In your own system: You choose the provider and keep the contract with it.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/bookable-events
- /skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions
- /skills/ledger-wallet
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
- Booking systems for rental businesses (/industries/rentals)
Case study: Valmont's event booking runs paid and free sessions side by side, each with its own rules. (/case-studies/valmont)
FAQ:
- Q: Which payment providers can it use?
A: The one you choose: Stripe, a local provider or the payment gateway your bank offers.
- Q: Do we store card data?
A: No. The payment provider holds the card data. Your system keeps the payment status and the amount, which keeps you out of most card security rules.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
Often built together:
- Reminders that cut no-shows (/features/reminders)
- Memberships and passes (/features/memberships-and-passes)
- Invoices and e-invoicing (/features/invoicing)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Reminders your customers actually read
> Booking confirmations and reminders by email and text message, sent when and how your customers need them, with rescheduling in one tap. Code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/reminders
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
People forget, and an empty slot is lost money. We build confirmations and reminders into your booking system: sent at the right time, in your words, with a link to move or cancel the booking.
What goes wrong without it:
- Without a reminder some customers simply forget. Your team calls them one by one, or the slot stays empty.
- Ready-made tools send one template at one time, often charge extra for text messages and show their own brand in the message.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Email and text message: Each customer gets the channel that works for them, through the email and SMS provider you choose.
- Timed to the booking: A week before a surgery, two hours before a haircut, the evening before a class. The timing follows the service.
- Move or cancel in one tap: The reminder carries a link to reschedule or cancel inside your rules, so the slot goes back on sale at once.
- Your words, your brand: Messages written the way you talk to customers, with what they need to bring and how to find you.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Cost. In a SaaS tool: Text messages cost extra on top of the plan. In your own system: You pay your SMS provider's rate and nothing more.
- Timing. In a SaaS tool: One reminder time for every booking. In your own system: A different schedule per service or customer group.
- Brand. In a SaaS tool: The platform's name and links in every message. In your own system: Only your name, your domain and your words.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/calendar-scheduling-links
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for home service companies (/industries/home-services)
FAQ:
- Q: Can a reminder ask the customer to confirm?
A: Yes. The customer confirms with one tap, and your team sees who has not. You can release unconfirmed slots automatically.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses (/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations)
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
Often built together:
- Deposits and online payments (/features/deposits-and-payments)
- Waitlist (/features/waitlist)
- Google and Outlook calendar sync (/features/calendar-sync)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## A waitlist that fills cancelled slots for you
> A booking waitlist that fills cancelled slots on its own: customers join a full class or day, and the next one gets the place by your rules. Code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/waitlist
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
A class is full on Monday and has three empty places on Friday. We build a waitlist into your booking system: customers join a full slot, and when someone cancels the next person gets the place by your rules.
What goes wrong without it:
- Popular slots sell out, and people who wanted them go elsewhere. When someone cancels late, nobody knows who to call.
- Many tools have no waitlist, or one that only sends an email and leaves the rest to your team.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Join a full slot: Customers join the list for a class, a table, a day or a specific person, and see their place in the queue.
- Automatic or offered: The freed place goes to the next person at once, or is offered for a set time before it moves down the list.
- Priority rules: Members first, regulars first or first come first served. The order follows how you run the business.
- Payment on promotion: The customer pays or leaves a deposit only when they get the place, not when they join the list.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Rules. In a SaaS tool: First come first served, or no waitlist at all. In your own system: Your own order: members, regulars or any rule you use.
- Work. In a SaaS tool: Your team calls people from a list by hand. In your own system: The system offers the place and books it.
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
FAQ:
- Q: What if nobody on the list takes the place?
A: It goes back on sale for everyone. You choose how long each person has to accept before it moves on.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
Often built together:
- Reminders that cut no-shows (/features/reminders)
- Memberships and passes (/features/memberships-and-passes)
- Recurring bookings (/features/recurring-bookings)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Book the whole series once
> Recurring bookings for weekly classes, regular visits and service rounds: one booking for the whole series, with changes and skips handled by your rules.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/recurring-bookings
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Your customers come every week, but book every visit one by one. We build recurring bookings into your system: one booking for the whole series, with skips, changes and payments handled by your rules.
What goes wrong without it:
- Regular customers book the same slot again and again, and sometimes find it taken. Your team books series by hand and fixes them after holidays.
- Ready-made tools repeat a booking a fixed number of times and stop there. Moving one visit or pausing a month breaks the series.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Any pattern: Every week, every other Tuesday, the first Monday of the month or a course of ten sessions.
- Change one, keep the rest: Move or skip one visit without touching the series. Holidays and closed days are taken out on their own.
- Same person, same place: The series keeps the same therapist, trainer, technician or room, and warns early when one is away.
- Pay per visit or for the series: Charge each visit, the whole course up front or monthly. The rule follows the service.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Patterns. In a SaaS tool: A fixed number of weekly repeats. In your own system: Any pattern your customers use, with exceptions.
- Changes. In a SaaS tool: One change often breaks the whole series. In your own system: Each visit can change while the series stays.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/time-slot-generator
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
- Booking systems for home service companies (/industries/home-services)
FAQ:
- Q: What happens on a public holiday?
A: The visit is skipped or moved, by the rule you choose, and the customer gets a message about it.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- The hidden costs of bad scheduling (/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling)
Often built together:
- Memberships and passes (/features/memberships-and-passes)
- Google and Outlook calendar sync (/features/calendar-sync)
- Waitlist (/features/waitlist)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Memberships and passes, booked in one place
> Memberships, class passes, packages and prepaid credit inside your booking system: customers book with what they bought, by your rules. Code you own.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/memberships-and-passes
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Customers buy a pass in one tool and book in another, and your team counts entries by hand. We build memberships, passes and prepaid credit into your booking system, so a booking uses what the customer already bought.
What goes wrong without it:
- A ten-entry pass, a monthly membership and a gift voucher are three different things, and most tools handle only one of them.
- When passes live outside the booking system, staff check balances by hand and customers book classes they cannot use.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Passes and packages: Ten entries, five massages or a course. Each booking uses one, and the customer sees what is left.
- Memberships: Monthly or yearly, with what each level may book, how often and how far ahead.
- Prepaid credit: A wallet topped up by card, paid from at booking, with refunds back to it and a full history.
- Gift vouchers: Bought online, sent by email, used at booking for a service or an amount.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- One place. In a SaaS tool: Passes in one tool, bookings in another. In your own system: Passes, memberships and bookings in one system.
- Rules. In a SaaS tool: Fixed pass types from the platform's list. In your own system: Any pass, limit or expiry your business uses.
- Money. In a SaaS tool: A fee on every pass sold. In your own system: No fee from the system on any sale.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/ledger-wallet
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
- Booking systems for spas and wellness centres (/industries/spas)
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
FAQ:
- Q: Can passes expire or be frozen?
A: Yes. A pass can expire after a set time, and a membership can be paused, for example during an injury. The rules are yours.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
Often built together:
- Recurring bookings (/features/recurring-bookings)
- Deposits and online payments (/features/deposits-and-payments)
- Waitlist (/features/waitlist)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Book the things, not only the people
> A booking system for rooms, desks, vehicles and equipment: each has its own calendar and rules, and one booking can hold several at once.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/resources
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
You rent rooms, desks, cars or lanes, and a tool built for appointments does not know what to do with them. We build booking systems where every thing you rent has its own calendar, rules and price.
What goes wrong without it:
- Appointment tools think in people and hours. A meeting room, a rental car or a shooting lane needs other rules: by the hour, by the day, with set-up time, with a deposit.
- When one booking needs a room, a person and a projector together, ready-made tools cannot hold all three, so double bookings happen.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Anything you rent: Rooms, desks, vehicles, lanes, boats or tools. Each one with its own calendar, capacity and price.
- Several at once: One booking holds a room, the person who runs it and the equipment, or none of them.
- Floor plan or map: Customers pick a desk on a floor plan or a car on a map, and see what is free right now.
- Time around the booking: Cleaning, set-up and handover time blocked before and after each booking.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Model. In a SaaS tool: Built for appointments, with rooms added as a workaround. In your own system: Built around what you actually rent.
- Combinations. In a SaaS tool: One resource per booking. In your own system: Any mix of rooms, people and equipment in one booking.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/time-slot-generator
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
- Booking systems for rental businesses (/industries/rentals)
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
FAQ:
- Q: Can the price change by hour, day or season?
A: Yes. Each resource can have its own price by hour, day, season or customer group.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space (/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces)
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
Often built together:
- Several locations (/features/multi-location)
- Deposits and online payments (/features/deposits-and-payments)
- Self-service kiosk and check-in (/features/kiosk-and-check-in)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Every location in one system
> One booking system for all your locations: each with its own hours, staff and prices, one view for the head office, and no fee for each new location.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/multi-location
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Each new salon, club or restaurant adds a fee and another account. We build one booking system for all your locations: each with its own hours, team and prices, and one view for the people who run the whole business.
What goes wrong without it:
- Per-location pricing grows with every opening. Reports come from several accounts and nobody sees the whole business at once.
- Customers want to book at any location and move between them, and staff work at more than one.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Own hours and prices: Each location keeps its opening hours, services, prices and holidays.
- Shared team: People who work at several locations have one schedule that never double books them.
- One view for head office: Bookings, revenue and no-shows for every location side by side, or one at a time.
- Roles per location: A manager sees their own location, head office sees all of them.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Cost. In a SaaS tool: A new fee for every location you open. In your own system: One system. A new location is a setting, not a new plan.
- Overview. In a SaaS tool: Separate accounts and reports per location. In your own system: The whole business in one view.
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for restaurants and restaurant chains (/industries/restaurants)
- Booking systems for beauty salons and barbers (/industries/salons)
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
FAQ:
- Q: Can each location have its own booking page?
A: Yes. Each location can have its own page and address, and the brand stays the same across all of them.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Data Analysis in booking systems + insights to optimize services (/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems)
Often built together:
- Rooms, desks and equipment (/features/resources)
- CRM, ERP and API integrations (/features/integrations)
- Reminders that cut no-shows (/features/reminders)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Bookings in the calendar your team already uses
> Two-way Google Calendar and Outlook sync in your own booking system: busy time blocks availability and every booking lands in the right calendar.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/calendar-sync
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Your team lives in Google Calendar or Outlook, and the booking tool does not see it. We build two-way calendar sync into your booking system, so busy time blocks availability and every booking lands where people look.
What goes wrong without it:
- A private appointment in someone's calendar does not stop a customer from booking them at the same time.
- Ready-made sync is often one way, slow, or limited to one calendar per person.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Two-way sync: Busy time in the calendar blocks booking, and confirmed bookings appear in the calendar within seconds.
- Google and Microsoft: Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 calendars, each person connected with their own account.
- Meeting links: A Google Meet or Teams link added to the booking when the meeting is online.
- Time zones: Customers see times in their own zone, your team in theirs.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Direction. In a SaaS tool: Often one way, or one calendar per person. In your own system: Two-way, with as many calendars as each person needs.
- Speed. In a SaaS tool: Changes appear after minutes. In your own system: Push updates, so changes appear within seconds.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/google-calendar-sync
- /skills/microsoft-calendar-sync
- /skills/calendar-scheduling-links
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for banks and financial advisors (/industries/banking)
- Booking systems for law firms (/industries/legal)
- Booking systems for home service companies (/industries/home-services)
FAQ:
- Q: Does the system see everything in our calendars?
A: Only what it needs: when each person is busy. It does not read the titles or details of private events.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Build Your Own Calendly with One Agent Skill (/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill)
- Time Zones in Booking Systems: Six Rules That Prevent Wrong Bookings (/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis)
Often built together:
- Reminders that cut no-shows (/features/reminders)
- Recurring bookings (/features/recurring-bookings)
- CRM, ERP and API integrations (/features/integrations)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Let walk-in customers serve themselves
> A self-service booking kiosk and check-in for your venue: walk-up bookings, QR check-in and queue screens, connected to the same booking system.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/kiosk-and-check-in
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
A queue at the desk while your team answers the phone. We build a self-service kiosk and check-in into your booking system: walk-up bookings, arrival by QR code and screens that call the next person.
What goes wrong without it:
- Walk-in customers wait for someone to be free. Booked customers stand in the same queue just to say they have arrived.
- Kiosks bought off the shelf have their own booking data, so the desk and the kiosk do not agree.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Walk-up booking: A touchscreen with a few large steps, an on-screen keyboard and a reset when the customer walks away.
- Check-in by QR code: The customer scans the code from their confirmation, and your team sees they have arrived.
- Queue screens: Screens in the waiting area call the next number and show where to go.
- Pay at the kiosk: Payment by card, by QR code on the customer's phone or at the counter.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- One system. In a SaaS tool: The kiosk keeps its own copy of the bookings. In your own system: Kiosk, desk and online booking share the same data.
- Hardware. In a SaaS tool: Only the screens the vendor sells. In your own system: Any touchscreen or tablet you choose.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/booking-kiosk
- /skills/digital-signage
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for public offices (/industries/public-sector)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
FAQ:
- Q: What hardware do we need?
A: Any touchscreen or tablet with a browser. We can help you choose, but you buy it where you want.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Often built together:
- Works when the internet fails (/features/offline-mode)
- Tickets and events with capacity (/features/tickets-and-events)
- Rooms, desks and equipment (/features/resources)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Keep checking people in when the internet drops
> A booking system that keeps working when the venue loses internet: a local server takes over check-in and bookings, then syncs when the line returns.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/offline-mode
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
The Wi-Fi fails on the busiest day and the queue stops. We build an offline mode into your booking system: a small server at the venue takes over check-in and bookings, and syncs everything when the line returns.
What goes wrong without it:
- Festivals, ranges and field sites lose internet at the worst moment. A cloud-only system stops, and so does the door.
- Paper lists as a backup mean double entry later and mistakes nobody can trace.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Local server: A small computer at the venue keeps a live copy of the bookings and takes over the local network.
- Check-in without internet: Tickets and bookings are scanned and checked in against the local copy.
- Safe sync: When the line returns, everything done offline goes back to the cloud, with no duplicates.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Outage. In a SaaS tool: No internet, no system. In your own system: The venue keeps working on its own server.
- After. In a SaaS tool: Paper lists typed in by hand. In your own system: Offline work synced on its own.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/island-mode-server
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for gyms and fitness studios (/industries/fitness)
- Booking systems for public offices (/industries/public-sector)
FAQ:
- Q: How long can it run offline?
A: As long as the local server has power. It holds the bookings for the day and keeps working until the internet returns.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Timerise Offline: Island Mode for Field Operations (/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations)
Often built together:
- Self-service kiosk and check-in (/features/kiosk-and-check-in)
- Tickets and events with capacity (/features/tickets-and-events)
- Rooms, desks and equipment (/features/resources)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Invoices straight from the booking
> VAT invoices issued from bookings, with correcting invoices, a register and national e-invoicing such as KSeF in Poland, inside your own booking system.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/invoicing
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Your accountant retypes every booking into another program. We build invoicing into your booking system: VAT invoices from each sale, corrections, a register and e-invoicing where the law asks for it.
What goes wrong without it:
- Business customers want an invoice for every booking. Someone copies the data by hand, and mistakes reach the tax office.
- E-invoicing laws, such as KSeF in Poland, make a separate invoicing tool one more system to connect.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Invoice from a booking: A VAT invoice issued when the booking is paid, with the customer's company details from the booking form.
- Numbering and corrections: Gapless numbers per series and year, correcting invoices and a register for your accountant.
- National e-invoicing: Invoices sent to Poland's KSeF and similar systems, with receipts kept beside each invoice.
- Your accounting tool: Invoices exported to the accounting program you already use.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Work. In a SaaS tool: Invoices issued in a separate tool, by hand. In your own system: Issued from the booking, with no retyping.
- Law. In a SaaS tool: E-invoicing waits for the platform to support your country. In your own system: Built for the rules where you operate.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/invoicing
- /skills/ksef
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
- Booking systems for shooting ranges (/industries/shooting-ranges)
- Booking systems for clinics (/industries/clinics)
FAQ:
- Q: Do you support KSeF?
A: Yes. We build KSeF e-invoicing for Polish businesses into the booking system, with the same module your developers can use as an Agent Skill.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Often built together:
- Deposits and online payments (/features/deposits-and-payments)
- CRM, ERP and API integrations (/features/integrations)
- Memberships and passes (/features/memberships-and-passes)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Events, workshops and tickets in your own system
> Event booking with tickets and capacity: paid and free sessions, seat limits, check-in at the door and refunds, built for your events and owned by you.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/tickets-and-events
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Ticket platforms take a fee per ticket and keep your guest list. We build event booking into your system: paid and free sessions, seat limits, check-in at the door and the guest data in your hands.
What goes wrong without it:
- A fee on every ticket adds up over a season. The guest list stays on the ticket platform, and your brand sits under theirs.
- Workshops, masterclasses and tours need more than a ticket: sessions, stages, groups and a limit per room.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Capacity per session: Seats per session, room or time, with sold out shown at once and a waitlist when you want one.
- Paid and free: Paid tickets and free places side by side. A card hold on free places cuts no-shows.
- Check-in at the door: Staff scan tickets on their phones and see who has arrived.
- Sessions and stages: A programme of talks, workshops and stages, where guests book the parts they want.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Fees. In a SaaS tool: A fee on every ticket sold. In your own system: No fee per ticket. You pay only the payment provider.
- Guests. In a SaaS tool: The guest list belongs to the platform. In your own system: The guest data is yours.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/bookable-events
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for events and festivals (/industries/events)
- Booking systems for escape rooms (/industries/escape-rooms)
- Booking systems for shooting ranges (/industries/shooting-ranges)
Case study: Valmont's guests book product shows, masterclasses and workshops, some paid and some free, in one system built in five days. (/case-studies/valmont)
FAQ:
- Q: Can we sell tickets for a one-off event?
A: Yes. Startup Festival Wrocław had its booking system live in two days, from day one of registration.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Booking for experiences, not just services (/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services)
Often built together:
- Works when the internet fails (/features/offline-mode)
- Self-service kiosk and check-in (/features/kiosk-and-check-in)
- Deposits and online payments (/features/deposits-and-payments)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Let AI answer customers and book for them
> An AI assistant that answers customers and books for them, and an API that AI agents such as ChatGPT and Claude can use to book in your system.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/ai-booking-assistant
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Customers ask the same questions all day, and more of them now book through AI assistants. We build an AI assistant into your booking system that answers from your own facts and books inside your rules, and an API that AI agents can use.
What goes wrong without it:
- Your team answers the same questions about prices, parking and free slots, by phone and chat, all day.
- AI assistants such as ChatGPT and Claude are starting to book for people. A system they cannot read is one they skip.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- Assistant on your site: Answers from your own services, prices and rules, and books a slot without sending the customer to a form.
- Assistant for your team: Your staff ask about the day, a customer or a report in Slack, and approve changes with a button.
- Bookings by AI agents: An MCP server and an API that AI agents can use to check slots and book for their users.
- Within your rules: The assistant can only do what a customer or staff member may do. Every action is logged.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Knowledge. In a SaaS tool: A generic chatbot that guesses. In your own system: An assistant that reads your own facts and live slots.
- Agents. In a SaaS tool: AI agents see only the platform's public page. In your own system: An API built for agents to book in your system.
Agent Skills that build it:
- /skills/slack-ai-bot
FAQ:
- Q: Which AI model does it use?
A: The one that fits your data and budget. The assistant is built so the model can change later without rebuilding it.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- MCP Server: Your AI Agent Just Learned to Book (/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book)
- Your Customers Will Soon Book With AI, Not Forms - What This Means for Your Business (/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business)
- Agent-Ready Payments: How Bookings Get Paid When Nobody Fills a Form (/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings)
Often built together:
- CRM, ERP and API integrations (/features/integrations)
- Reminders that cut no-shows (/features/reminders)
- Google and Outlook calendar sync (/features/calendar-sync)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Bookings that reach every system you run
> A booking system connected to your CRM, ERP, single sign-on and your own app, with an API for every function, so nobody types a booking twice.
Page: https://timerise.ai/features/integrations
A booking feature Timerise builds into custom booking systems its clients own. One fixed project price, typically $15,000 to $50,000, with this feature part of it. Last updated: 2026-10-20.
Bookings are typed into the CRM by hand, and your app cannot book on its own. We build booking systems that connect to your CRM, ERP and sign-on, with an API for every function.
What goes wrong without it:
- Each booking is copied into two or three other systems, and the copies drift apart.
- Ready-made tools offer a few fixed connectors. Anything else waits for their roadmap or costs a middleware subscription.
How we build it, to the client's rules:
- CRM and ERP: Customers, bookings and payments kept in step with Salesforce, HubSpot, SAP or the system you run.
- Single sign-on: Staff and business customers sign in with the company account they already have.
- API for every function: Your developers and your own app can do anything the booking system does.
- Events to other systems: Webhooks tell your other systems the moment a booking is made, moved or cancelled.
Compared with a SaaS tool:
- Connectors. In a SaaS tool: A fixed list of integrations. In your own system: Connected to whatever you run.
- API. In a SaaS tool: A partial API, often on a higher plan. In your own system: An API for every function, included.
Industries that use it:
- Booking systems for banks and financial advisors (/industries/banking)
- Booking systems for coworking spaces (/industries/coworking)
- Booking systems for rental businesses (/industries/rentals)
Case study: Risify's psychotherapy platform got booking with custom API extensions built for how it works. (/case-studies/risify)
FAQ:
- Q: Our CRM is custom. Can you connect it?
A: Yes, if it has an API, a database we may read or a file export. We agree how before the build starts.
- Q: What does this feature add to the price?
A: It is part of the one fixed price for your system, and you see it in the quote before the build starts. Most projects cost $15,000 to $50,000 in total, paid once, with no subscription and no commission on bookings.
- Q: Can you add it to a system we already run?
A: Yes. We build it into a new system or into the one you already run, with its own quote. When the feature has an Agent Skill, your own developers can also build it with the skill.
- Q: Who owns the code?
A: You do. The code, the data and the documentation are handed over, and the system runs in your cloud account or on ours. Every project includes 3 years of support.
Read more:
- Booking API for marketplaces: Guide for leaders & developers (/blog/booking-api-marketplace-integration)
- Booking APIs made simple: A beginner's guide to getting started (/blog/booking-apis-made-simple)
Often built together:
- Google and Outlook calendar sync (/features/calendar-sync)
- Invoices and e-invoicing (/features/invoicing)
- AI assistant and agent bookings (/features/ai-booking-assistant)
All features: /features. Start with a free brief: /brief.
---
## Startup Festival Wrocław
> Event for startups, entrepreneurs & investors. The organisers had three weeks to set up the event and needed a booking site that participants could use to reserve a seat from day one.
Page: https://timerise.ai/case-studies/startup-festival-wroclaw
Industry: Event for startups, entrepreneurs & investors
Challenge: The organisers had three weeks to set up the event and needed a booking site that participants could use to reserve a seat from day one.
Solution: We built a custom booking system for the event in 2 days. It was live from day one and handled more than 300 registrations.
Delivery: 2 Days. Scale: 300+ Users. Outcome: 2-Day Launch.
Quote: "Building a custom frontend for event bookings in just 2 days seemed impossible. Timerise proved it was achievable." (Marek Aureliusz & Wojtek Błażałek, Founders)
Startup Festival Wrocław brings startups and investors together. Its motto is "Bridge between ideas and capital".
### Key facts about the event
- **DATE**: 2025-11-28
- **TIME**: 4:00 PM - 9:00 PM
- **LOCATION**: Ace of Space, Renoma, Świdnicka 40, Wrocław, Poland
### The event in 3 weeks, the booking system in 2 days
The organisers set up the whole event in three weeks. We built its booking system from scratch, for this event only, and it was live in two days. The result:
- 300+ people registered on the booking site
- 120+ attendees in the room
- 3 VC representatives and 2 angel investors
- 14 startups in the contest
### Built for one client
This was not a template or a platform account: we built the system for this event and its registration. It is how we work for every client today.
The event was hosted with partners and sponsors **Ace of Space** and **DataWorkshop**.
More details in the [LinkedIn post](https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupfestival/posts/?feedView=all).
---
## Risify
> Online psychotherapy platform. Risify needed booking that fit how online therapy works, with custom features their platform depended on and no cut taken from each session.
Page: https://timerise.ai/case-studies/risify
Industry: Online psychotherapy platform
Challenge: Risify needed booking that fit how online therapy works, with custom features their platform depended on and no cut taken from each session.
Solution: We built Risify's booking backend on the Timerise platform's booking engine and extended it with the features their psychotherapy marketplace needed, so Risify got the features it needed, fast, and kept control of its own product.
Delivery: 3 Weeks. Scale: Custom API extensions. Outcome: Zero Commission.
Quote: "We needed a flexible API to build our own specific features. Timerise gave us the core and the freedom, without the burden of commissions." (Risify Team, Product Owner)
Risify is an online platform dedicated to connecting patients with qualified psychotherapists in a secure and intuitive environment.
### Trust as a Foundation
In mental health services, privacy is not just a feature - it's the core of the business. Risify needed:
- End-to-end encryption for session metadata.
- Automated therapist onboarding and scheduling.
- A booking backend that scales without taking a cut of every session.
### What we built
We extended the booking engine of the Timerise platform with the features Risify's marketplace needed: therapist onboarding, scheduling and the metadata handling their privacy requirements called for. Risify built its own product on top, with full control over the architecture. That control, combined with a booking core that was already running, allowed Risify to launch their marketplace months ahead of schedule.
---
## Valmont
> Luxury cosmetics brand. Valmont needed one booking system for a series of brand events: guests book product shows, masterclasses and workshops at the venue the organiser chose, some paid and some free.
Page: https://timerise.ai/case-studies/valmont
Industry: Luxury cosmetics brand
Challenge: Valmont needed one booking system for a series of brand events: guests book product shows, masterclasses and workshops at the venue the organiser chose, some paid and some free.
Solution: We built a dedicated booking system for Valmont's events, masterclasses and workshops: the Timerise platform's booking engine and booking pages, extended to the workflows of a premium brand, with paid and free sessions side by side.
Delivery: 5 Days. Scale: Paid & Free Events. Outcome: 100% Bespoke UX.
Quote: "The bespoke user experience Timerise delivered perfectly mirrors our boutique standards." (Valmont Digital, Global Management)
World-renowned for its cellular cosmetics and luxury treatments, Valmont needed a booking system that felt as premium as its products.
### Elevating the Client Journey
In the world of luxury, every touchpoint matters. Valmont required a system that could:
- Take bookings for several days of events at one venue.
- Provide a seamless booking experience in the Valmont brand.
- Offer paid and free sessions in the same booking flow.
### What we built
We extended the Timerise platform's booking engine and booking pages to Valmont's workflows: one venue chosen by the organiser, several days of product shows, masterclasses and workshops, a capacity for each session, and paid and free sessions in the same flow. Because the platform's core was already in place, Valmont had a production-ready booking system in 5 days. Guests saw one booking page for the whole programme, with paid and free sessions side by side and a place limit on each.
---
## Consulate General of Ukraine
> Public Administration & Diplomacy. Developing a booking system capable of handling thousands of visitors for various official and diplomatic matters required by Ukrainian citizens.
Page: https://timerise.ai/case-studies/consulate-of-ukraine
Industry: Public Administration & Diplomacy
Challenge: Developing a booking system capable of handling thousands of visitors for various official and diplomatic matters required by Ukrainian citizens.
Solution: We built the consulate's booking system on the Timerise platform's booking engine, extended for its case types, availability rules and traffic peaks. Appointments went digital and the physical queues disappeared.
Delivery: 3 Weeks. Scale: 50k+ Visits. Outcome: Zero Queues.
Quote: "The scale of demand was immense. Thanks to Timerise, we were able to manage the chaos and create a transparent booking system for our citizens." (Project Team, Digital Coordination)
The Consulate General of Ukraine needed a booking system to streamline citizen services across a wide range of administrative matters.
### Digital Transformation of Diplomacy
The challenge was to handle a very large number of visitors while maintaining maximum security and order. The system had to:
- Handle many different types of cases (passports, legal, visas).
- Dynamically manage appointment availability.
- Be resilient to extremely high traffic.
### What we built
We built the system on the booking engine of the Timerise platform and extended its API, the admin panel and the booking pages for the consulate's case types, its availability rules and the traffic peaks it faces. The booking process became fully digital. Citizens can now plan their visit in advance, which has completely eliminated the need for long queues in front of the consulate.
---
## Custom booking vs SaaS
> This is not about cost. It is about fit, and about what breaks first as you grow. SaaS booking tools earned their place: live in a day, nobody on your side runs a server, costs that start small. When booking is a side channel, that is the…
Page: https://timerise.ai/custom-booking-vs-saas
This is not about cost. It is about fit, and about what breaks first as you grow.
SaaS booking tools earned their place: live in a day, nobody on your side runs a server, costs that start small. When booking is a side channel, that is the right trade. We start from it.
A booking system you own optimizes for something else: workflows that match your business, control over logic and data, and costs that track usage instead of revenue.
> The question is not "How much does it cost today?"
> The question is "What breaks first as we grow?"
### Side by side
| Area | SaaS booking | A system you own |
| :------------------- | :------------------------------- | :------------------------------------------- |
| Time to launch | Days | **Prototype in 48 hours, live in 6–8 weeks** |
| Long-term cost | Grows with scale and commissions | **Hosting billed by usage, 0% commission** |
| Workflow flexibility | Platform rules | **Your rules** |
| Data ownership | Their schema, partial export | **Yours, in full** |
| Servers to run | None | **None by default** |
| Switching in | Sign up | **Migrated with zero downtime** |
| Switching out | Expensive, risky | **Standard code, handed over in hours** |
SaaS feels cheaper because the risk is deferred. Custom feels expensive because the risk is addressed early. Owning your system no longer means the old pain: you still run no servers, and you click through a prototype of your system within 48 hours of your brief. The finished system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
### Where a shared platform stops fitting
A SaaS platform is built for the average business. The fit ends when:
- availability logic becomes conditional
- pricing depends on context
- resources are shared across teams or locations
- internal systems need reliable booking data
Teams compensate with manual overrides, spreadsheets and a second tool. The system still works. The business has stopped being average.
Custom is not cheaper on day one. It is cheaper the day your business stops being average.
### The two fears, answered
**"Migration will hurt."** Your bookings, customers and history move with you. Every record is validated against the source, and the old system keeps running until the numbers match. Zero downtime.
**"We will end up running servers."** You will not, unless you want to. We host the system and keep it running. If you have your own ops team, it can run on your servers instead. The code is yours either way. Your IT team will find the stack and hosting options on [Hosting, stack and architecture](/infrastructure).
The detail is in [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
### Bottom line
SaaS is a great starting point, and for many businesses it stays the right one. When booking becomes core, own the system, keep the convenience, and let us keep the infrastructure healthy: delivered in 6 to 8 weeks, with full code ownership and 0% commission.
What that looks like in practice, with the price and the parts you can order: [custom booking software](/custom-booking-software).
---
## Ownership vs commission models
> Commissions are a hidden tax. Most booking platforms advertise low entry costs. What they rarely highlight is how much they take every time your business works. Commissions are not pricing. They are a tax on growth. How commission models…
Page: https://timerise.ai/ownership-vs-commission
Commissions are a hidden tax.
Most booking platforms advertise low entry costs.
What they rarely highlight is how much they take every time your business works.
Commissions are not pricing.
They are a tax on growth.
---
### How commission models actually work
Commission-based booking platforms typically charge:
- per booking
- per transaction value
- per resource or staff member
- per location or account tier
At low volume, this feels negligible.
At scale, commissions become:
- unpredictable
- uncapped
- disconnected from platform value delivered
You pay more because you succeed, not because the platform improves.
---
### The problem with "success-based pricing"
Commission models align incentives poorly.
The platform benefits from:
- higher volume
- higher prices
- more operational complexity
You carry:
- rising costs
- margin pressure
- dependency on vendor policies
This is not partnership.
It is rent extraction.
---
### Commission vs ownership, side by side
| Aspect | Commission model | A system you own |
| :---------------- | :-------------------- | :------------------------------------------------ |
| Upfront cost | Low | Higher initial investment |
| Cost at scale | Grows with revenue | **Predictable** |
| Margin impact | Increases over time | **Stable** |
| Vendor dependency | High lock-in | **None** |
| Pricing control | Platform decides | **You decide** |
| Data ownership | Partial or restricted | **Full ownership** |
| Migration risk | High | **Low: data moved and checked before the switch** |
| Long-term TCO | Often exceeds custom | **Often lower within a few years** |
---
### Vendor lock-in is not accidental
Commission models rely on lock-in.
Once:
- booking logic is embedded in the platform
- workflows depend on proprietary features
- historical data is hard to migrate
Leaving becomes:
- risky
- expensive
- operationally painful
At that point, pricing changes are no longer negotiable.
Lock-in is not a side effect.
It is the business model.
---
### Total cost of ownership over a few years
Let's simplify.
What companies usually calculate:
- monthly subscription fee
What they forget:
- per-booking commissions
- internal time spent on workarounds
- additional tools to fill gaps
- engineering cost of future migration
- lost optionality
Over a few years, commission-based systems often exceed:
- the cost of a custom system
- without delivering ownership or control
The cost curve is slow at first.
Then it compounds.
---
### Ownership changes the economics
With owned booking infrastructure:
- costs are predictable
- growth does not increase platform fees
- margins remain under your control
- systems can evolve without renegotiation
You pay once for the system.
You do not pay forever for permission to use it.
---
### Ownership as a strategic advantage
Ownership is not just about cost.
It gives you:
- freedom to change pricing models
- ability to adapt workflows quickly
- leverage in partnerships
- resilience against vendor decisions
- long-term optionality
For founders, this means strategic control.
For CFOs, this means financial predictability.
---
### When commissions might still make sense
Commission models can work when:
- booking volume is low
- margins are high
- growth is capped
- dependency risk is acceptable
They are a shortcut.
Not a foundation.
---
### Why Timerise does not charge commissions
Timerise builds systems, not platforms.
We:
- design and deliver booking infrastructure
- hand over full ownership
- do not participate in your transaction flow
- do not tax your growth
AI helps us build faster.
Ownership ensures you are not dependent on us to operate.
---
### The real decision
The question is not:
"How much does the platform cost per month?"
The real question is:
"How much of our future are we giving away?"
Commissions feel small.
Until they are not.
---
### Bottom line
Commission-based models optimize for vendors.
Ownership optimizes for businesses that plan to grow.
If booking is core to your revenue,
ownership is not an upgrade. It is a safeguard.
---
## Hosting, stack and architecture
> For the business owner, in one paragraph: you choose where your booking system runs, and the code is yours in every case. If you do not want to run anything, we host it and keep it healthy. The rest of this page is for your IT team. Where…
Page: https://timerise.ai/infrastructure
For the business owner, in one paragraph: you choose where your booking system runs, and the code is yours in every case. If you do not want to run anything, we host it and keep it healthy. The rest of this page is for your IT team.
---
### Where the system runs
Ownership settles who the code belongs to. Hosting is a separate decision, and it is yours. We work in three models:
1. **Your cloud, managed by us.** The system runs in your cloud accounts, under your contracts and your billing. We handle setup, deployment, monitoring and keeping it healthy.
2. **Our cloud.** We provide the hosting and run everything on our side, billed by actual usage. Nothing to configure on your end. You can move to your own cloud whenever you decide: give us 90 days’ notice and we move the system and all your data for you.
3. **Your servers, your ops team.** The infrastructure is already configured by your people. We build the system and deploy it on what you have.
---
### The stack
We build on **Next.js on Vercel**, with **Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud** as the database. That is the stack we recommend: quick to set up, costs that track usage instead of revenue, and a handover that takes hours rather than a migration project. We maintain it across every system we deliver.
If your organization runs on AWS, GCP, Azure, on-premise hardware or needs a specific data region (EU regions such as Frankfurt are available), we build there instead.
---
### What the system is made of
- **A data model** for your availability, resources, prices and rules: people, rooms, equipment, seats or vehicles, booked alone or together.
- **An API** for every function, REST or GraphQL, so your CRM, ERP, app or website can read and write bookings.
- **Booking pages** in your brand, on your domain.
- **An admin panel** for your staff: calendars, customers, payments and settings.
- **Integrations** with the tools you already use: CRMs such as Salesforce and HubSpot, payments through Stripe or Adyen (both PCI-DSS certified), and calendars.
---
### Security and data
- Data is encrypted at rest and in transit.
- It is stored in the region you choose.
- GDPR is part of the design. Where we host the system, we process data as your processor under our [Data Processing Agreement](/dpa).
---
### What your team gets at handover
- the source code in your own repository
- API documentation and TypeScript types
- a staging environment
- documentation of the system and how it runs
Any web developer can take it over. The code uses common technology and nothing in it depends on us.
---
### Moving data in
If you are on another booking system, rented or built for you, we move your bookings, customers and history while the old system keeps taking bookings. Before the switch we check every record against the source: counts and checksums, record by record. [How migration works](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
---
### When you do not need any of this
If a ready-made tool does everything you need, stay with it. [Custom booking vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas) covers when owning a system starts to pay off.
---
## How we build
> For the business owner, in one paragraph: we agree one fixed price before we start, you click through a prototype of your system within 48 hours of your brief, and the system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call. You talk to the…
Page: https://timerise.ai/how-we-build
For the business owner, in one paragraph: we agree one fixed price before we start, you click through a prototype of your system within 48 hours of your brief, and the system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call. You talk to the engineers who build it.
The phases below are for your technical team: what we do in each one and what you receive.
---
### The problem with traditional custom development
Most custom software projects fail predictably:
- Requirements are never final
- Scope expands continuously
- Timelines slip by months
- Costs multiply
- What gets delivered rarely matches what was needed
This happens when the work is billed by the hour: the longer the project runs, the more it earns.
We work at one fixed price per project, agreed before we start. Our incentive is to deliver.
---
### Our process: a free start, then five phases
Before any phase, and free of charge: you describe the project to Tim, our AI interviewer, and within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype of your booking flow and a quote.
Then:
1. **Discovery:** understand your booking logic
2. **System design:** design the system and its data
3. **AI-assisted build:** build the core system
4. **Delivery:** integrate, test and deploy
5. **Handover:** transfer ownership and knowledge
Each phase has clear inputs, outputs and success criteria.
---
### Phase 1: Discovery
**Goal**: Map your booking requirements to system specifications.
**What we do**:
- Interview stakeholders
- Document booking flows
- Identify edge cases
- Define data models
- Establish success metrics
**What we deliver**:
- Technical specification document
- Data architecture diagram
- Integration requirements
- Timeline and cost estimate
**Duration**: 3 to 5 days
---
### Phase 2: System design
**Goal**: Design infrastructure that handles your booking logic at scale.
**What we do**:
- Design database schema
- Define API contracts
- Plan authentication and authorization
- Architect notification systems
- Design for observability
**What we deliver**:
- System architecture document
- Database schema
- API specification
- Security model
- Deployment architecture
**Duration**: 5 to 7 days
We design for production from day one.
The clickable prototype from your brief shows the flow; the system we build is made for production, not an MVP that has to be rebuilt.
---
### Phase 3: AI-assisted build
**Goal**: Generate production-ready code for core booking logic.
**What we do**:
- Generate database migrations
- Build API endpoints
- Implement booking logic
- Create admin interfaces
- Set up testing infrastructure
**What we use**:
- AI code generation for repetitive patterns
- Human oversight for business logic
- Automated testing for validation
- Code review for quality assurance
**What we deliver**:
- Working booking system
- Test coverage
- API documentation
- Admin dashboard
**Duration**: 2 to 3 weeks
Agents write the repetitive code. A senior engineer reviews every pull request. [How we use AI](/ai-systems).
---
### Phase 4: Delivery
**Goal**: Integrate with your systems and deploy to production.
**What we do**:
- Integrate with existing systems
- Set up production infrastructure
- Configure monitoring and alerts
- Load test the system
- Deploy to production
**What we deliver**:
- Production deployment
- Monitoring dashboards
- Runbook documentation
- Performance benchmarks
**Duration**: 1 to 2 weeks
We do not hand over code that has never seen production load.
---
### Phase 5: Handover
**Goal**: Transfer full ownership and operational knowledge.
**What we do**:
- Train your team
- Document operational procedures
- Transfer infrastructure access
- Provide support during transition
- Ensure you can operate independently
**What we deliver**:
- Complete source code
- Infrastructure as code
- Operational documentation
- Training materials
- 3-year post-delivery support
**Duration**: 1 week
After handover, the system is yours.
We include 3 years of support in every project. No retainer needed to stay covered.
We do not charge commissions. We do not retain control.
---
### Timeline: 6 to 8 weeks in total
| Phase | Duration | Deliverable |
| :---------------- | :----------- | :---------------------------- |
| Discovery | 3 to 5 days | **Technical specification** |
| System design | 5 to 7 days | **Architecture & API design** |
| AI-assisted build | 2 to 3 weeks | **Working booking system** |
| Delivery | 1 to 2 weeks | **Production deployment** |
| Handover | 1 week | **Full ownership transfer** |
Total: **6 to 8 weeks** from the first call to a live system.
---
### Why this works
**Constraints create speed**:
- We build booking systems. Not everything.
- We have templates. Not blank slates.
- We use AI for patterns. Not for decisions.
**Ownership creates alignment**:
- You own the code. We have no recurring revenue incentive.
- We optimize for your long-term success, not our billable hours.
**Repeatability creates predictability**:
- We have built booking systems since 2021.
- We know what breaks, and we design around it.
---
### What we do not do
We do not:
- Run discovery workshops that last months
- Build features you do not need
- Optimize for billable hours
- Retain control after handover
- Charge commissions on your bookings
---
### What you get
At the end of the process:
- Production-ready booking infrastructure
- Full source code ownership
- Complete documentation
- Operational knowledge
- Independence from us
You can modify, extend, or replace any part of the system.
You are not locked in.
---
### Cost structure
We charge:
- Fixed price for the project
- Based on complexity, not time
- No commissions
- No license or subscription fees (hosting, if we run it for you, is billed by actual usage)
You know the total cost before we start.
---
### When this process does not fit
This process works when:
- You need booking infrastructure
- You value speed and predictability
- You want ownership
This process does not work when:
- Requirements are undefined
- You want open-ended work billed by the hour
- You prefer SaaS convenience over control
We are explicit about fit.
We do not take projects we cannot deliver.
---
### Bottom line
Most custom development is unpredictable because it is unstructured.
We have a repeatable process.
We have worked on booking systems since 2021.
We use AI to accelerate, not to replace engineering judgment.
The result: a live system 6 to 8 weeks after the first call, at the price agreed before we started.
---
## How we use AI to build booking systems
> For the business owner, in one paragraph: AI writes the repetitive parts of your system, so the build takes weeks instead of months and the fixed price stays lower. A senior engineer still makes every decision and reviews every change. The…
Page: https://timerise.ai/ai-systems
For the business owner, in one paragraph: AI writes the repetitive parts of your system, so the build takes weeks instead of months and the fixed price stays lower. A senior engineer still makes every decision and reviews every change. The finished system does not depend on AI to run, unless you ordered an AI feature.
The rest of this page is for your technical team.
---
### Where AI works in a project
**1. The brief.** Tim, our AI interviewer, asks about your booking rules, volumes and the systems to connect, and turns the answers into a structured brief. It runs mainly on Google Gemini models, and your conversation is not used to train models.
**2. The prototype.** Within 48 hours of the brief you click through your own booking flow. AI helps us draft it; an engineer decides what it shows.
**3. The build.** Coding agents write the repetitive code: data models, API endpoints, admin screens, migrations and tests. They start from our [Agent Skills](/skills): 21 open-source modules (payments, invoicing, kiosks, event tickets and more), each with instructions an agent follows and an evaluation we run in Claude Code, Codex and Gemini CLI.
**4. The review.** Every pull request goes through three checks before it is merged: CI runs the tests, an agent reviews the change, and a senior engineer approves it. Nothing reaches your system without a human sign-off.
---
### What AI does and what people decide
**Written by agents, checked by people:**
- schema and API scaffolding
- CRUD screens in the admin panel
- data migration scripts
- unit and integration tests
- documentation drafts
**Decided by people only:**
- the architecture and where the system runs
- your business rules and their edge cases
- security, access and data protection
- what goes into production, and when
---
### Why this makes the build faster
Most of a booking system is not unique: calendars, slots, payments, reminders, an admin panel. Agents write those parts quickly from modules we have shipped many times. Engineers spend their hours on what is unique to you: your rules, your integrations, your edge cases.
That is how the build takes 2 to 3 weeks, and the system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call.
---
### What you receive
- the source code in your own repository
- the tests that run in CI
- documentation for your developers
- no AI service the system needs in order to run
You own all of it. Any good developer can take it over, with or without AI tools.
---
### AI inside your system, if you want it
Separate from how we build: an assistant that answers your customers and takes bookings for them is a feature we can add, like payments or calendar sync. It is scoped and priced with the project, and it is part of the system you own.
---
## Build Your Own Calendly with One Agent Skill
> One developer rebuilt Adobe's apps with AI. Our new skill builds your own Calendly on Next.js, with Supabase or Firestore, plus a tutorial to set it up.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill
In early October a software engineer, Brandon Thomas, published ArtCraft: free, open-source rebuilds of seven Adobe apps, Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, Lightroom, Acrobat, After Effects and InDesign, written from scratch in Rust with Claude ([PetaPixel](https://petapixel.com/2026/10/07/someone-rebuilt-free-open-source-versions-of-photoshop-premiere-and-lightroom-using-ai/)). Five days later he followed with Word, Excel and PowerPoint, as WordCraft, GridCraft and DeckCraft ([PetaPixel](https://petapixel.com/2026/10/12/there-are-free-open-source-versions-of-microsoft-office-apps-thanks-to-ai/)). An AutoCAD clone and an audio mixer are announced next.
The apps are early. Reviewers call them alpha, rough in places and not ready for client work. But the direction is clear: rebuilding software that took decades now takes weeks, and the subscription you pay every month is starting to look like a choice.
So we are making one. Today we publish [`calendar-scheduling-links`](/skills/calendar-scheduling-links), an Agent Skill that lets anyone build their own Calendly: booking pages, availability, calendar sync, invitations, reminders and self-service reschedule, on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore, under your own accounts. You own the code. You extend it yourself, with your agent, or with us.
This post covers why scheduling, what is in the skill, why it beats reverse engineering, and a tutorial that takes you from an empty folder to a live booking page.
## Why scheduling links
Calendly is very good at what it does. Its free plan covers one event type, and for many people that is all they will ever need. If that is you, stay with it.
The cost starts with the team. Calendly charges per seat, every month: from $10 a seat on Standard and $16 on Teams, and round robin is on Teams only ([Calendly pricing](https://calendly.com/pricing), checked 15 October 2026). Ten people on Teams pay at least $1,920 a year, for meeting links on someone else's domain, sending someone else's emails, and doing what the vendor's roadmap allows.
A scheduling link is also the ideal size for owning. It is small enough to understand end to end. It sits at the front of your sales, support and onboarding. And once it is yours, the next feature is a prompt away: a question that routes leads to the right person, a payment before the call, a note to your CRM after it. We wrote more about that moment in [When Calendly is no longer enough](/alternatives/calendly).
## What is in the skill
A scheduling page looks simple: a calendar, some free times, a button. The hard part is everything around the button: two people picking the same time, a calendar that changed a minute ago, the night the clocks go forward, a meeting that moved while its reminder still goes out for the old time. The skill carries the core with those cases handled.
| Area | What your agent builds |
| ------------ | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Event types | One-on-one and group sessions with seats, durations, slot steps, custom questions |
| Availability | Weekly hours per day, date overrides and days off, any IANA time zone |
| Rules | Buffers before and after, minimum notice, daily limits, a rolling booking window |
| Calendars | Google Calendar and Microsoft 365 or Outlook: busy time hidden, bookings written in, Meet or Teams links |
| Emails | Confirmation with a calendar invite, a note to the host, reminders a day and an hour before |
| Self-service | Reschedule and cancel from a private link, with the invite in the guest's calendar updated, not duplicated |
| Integrations | Signed webhooks for created, rescheduled and cancelled bookings, and an embed for any website |
| Data | Supabase by default, Firestore supported, every table server-only |
Five rules hold it together, and the skill makes the agent keep them. The booking is checked by the same function that listed the free times. Every booking is written under a lock per host, with a database constraint that refuses a double booking even if something else goes wrong. Emails, calendar writes, reminders and webhooks are queued in the same transaction as the booking and retried until they go through. Times are stored as instants and converted with an explicit time zone. And every link and token is either hashed, encrypted or signed.
It is not the whole of Calendly. Round robin, collective events, routing forms and payments are not built in yet. The skill describes how each one attaches to the core, and which of our other skills covers it, so your agent extends the core instead of working around it.
## Why not just reverse engineer it
The same week, a tool called Reverse Engineer Anything went viral for helping agents pull apart compiled software. Fireship's The Code Report on 12 October showed the whole route: decompile a desktop app with Ghidra, read back C-like pseudocode, then hand it to a coding agent to rewrite in Rust. It works, in the sense that you get code. The host's verdict on the ArtCraft video editor he tried was that it was close to unusable: laggy playback, weaker transitions, the cracks visible within minutes.
That is what reverse engineering gives you: code that does roughly what the original does, without the reasons it does it. For a scheduling product it is worse, because a web service like Calendly has no binary on your machine to decompile. All you can observe is its pages and its network traffic, and an agent guessing a booking engine from the outside pays for every guess twice: once in tokens, once in bugs.
### Fewer tokens
Reverse engineering spends most of its budget before a single line of your product exists. The agent reads decompiled output or captured traffic, reconstructs the behaviour, writes a version, runs it, finds what it got wrong, and goes round again. Every round re-reads code and logs, and the rounds stop when the visible behaviour looks right, not when the edge cases are covered.
A skill turns that around. The agent reads a short entry file, about 3,000 tokens, and then only the reference for the step it is on: the slot engine when it builds slots, the migration when it builds the database. The largest single reference is around 6,000 tokens. The decisions in them are already made, so the agent writes the module once, from a design, instead of discovering the design by trial.
| | Reverse engineering | The skill |
| ---------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------ |
| What the agent reads first | Decompiled code or captured traffic, as much as it takes | A 3,000-token entry file with the architecture and the rules |
| How it learns the edge cases | By running, failing and reading the failure | They are written down, with the test that checks each one |
| When it stops | When it looks right on the happy path | When the shipped tests pass |
| What your tokens buy | A reconstruction of someone else's product | Your product, on a core that is already designed |
### Fewer bugs
The bugs that matter in scheduling do not show on the happy path. They show on the second booking in the same second, on the night the clocks change, and three weeks later when a reminder fires. Pseudocode does not record them, and a rewrite from observed behaviour cannot see them at all. These are the failure classes the skill is written against, and how it handles each:
| Failure | What a reconstruction tends to do | What the skill ships |
| ------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Two people book the same time in the same second | Check, then write: both succeed | One lock per host and a database constraint that refuses the second; tested with four simultaneous requests on Supabase and the Firestore emulator |
| The clocks go forward overnight | Add 24 hours to step days, and skip a whole day of slots | Walks local calendar dates; tested across both clock changes and a UTC+5:45 zone |
| A meeting is moved | A new calendar event and a new invitation next to the old ones | The same event and the same invitation, updated in place; tested on a reschedule chain |
| A reminder after a reschedule or cancel | Sent for the old time | Deleted with the change and re-checked before sending; tested with a stale reminder that must stay silent |
| An email or webhook provider is down | The rest of the booking flow stops, or the message is lost | Every side effect is a queued job, retried with backoff on its own |
| A cancel link | The booking id is the key, so anyone who sees it can cancel | A signed token, stored only as a hash |
| Connecting a calendar | An unsigned callback that lets one account bind to another | Signed state tied to the signed-in host, PKCE, tokens encrypted at rest |
| The host marks time as free or declines a meeting | Still blocks the slot | Free, cancelled and declined events stay bookable; tested against both providers' formats |
They are invisible until they cost someone a meeting, and the way to know them is to have built and run a booking engine for years, which is what we do. The skill is written from the booking engine we have run in production, with each fix recorded in its [provenance file](https://github.com/timerise-ai/calendar-scheduling-links/blob/main/references/provenance.md) and 47 tests that hold the rules. Before release, the code in the skill itself was compiled, tested and run: a full booking, reschedule and cancel over HTTP against a local Supabase database.
Your agent's tokens go into your product, not into rediscovering ours.
## Tutorial: your own scheduling links in an afternoon
You need Node.js, a Vercel account, a Supabase project and a coding agent: Claude Code, Codex CLI or Gemini CLI. Google and Microsoft calendar sync is optional; the rest works without it.
**1. Create the app and install the skill.**
```bash
npx create-next-app@latest my-scheduling --ts --app --eslint
cd my-scheduling
npx skills add timerise-ai/calendar-scheduling-links
```
**2. Connect Supabase.** Link the project to Vercel and add Supabase from the Vercel Marketplace, which sets the Supabase environment variables for you. Then pull them locally.
```bash
vercel link
vercel integration add supabase
vercel env pull .env.local
```
For local work, `supabase start` gives you a full stack on your machine instead.
**3. Ask your agent to build it.** Start the agent in the folder and paste:
```text
Add Calendly-style booking links to this Next.js app on Supabase: hosts set their weekly availability and event types, visitors book a free time on a public page, both get an e-mail with a calendar invite, and the visitor can reschedule or cancel from a link in that e-mail.
```
The agent reads the skill, maps it onto your app, and builds the slot engine, the migration, the booking service, the jobs, the routes and the pages. It finishes with the list of what you still have to set up.
**4. Apply the migration.**
```bash
supabase link
supabase db push
```
**5. Set the secrets.** Generate them once and add them to Vercel for Production and Preview.
```bash
openssl rand -base64 32 # SCHEDULING_ENCRYPTION_KEY
openssl rand -base64 48 # SCHEDULING_TOKEN_SECRET
openssl rand -base64 24 # CRON_SECRET
vercel env add SCHEDULING_ENCRYPTION_KEY
```
Do the same for `SCHEDULING_TOKEN_SECRET`, `CRON_SECRET`, `APP_URL` (your public address), and your email provider's key. The skill ships a SendGrid adapter; any provider fits behind the same interface.
**6. Schedule the background work.** One route sends queued emails, retries failures, renews calendar subscriptions and re-reads calendars. On Vercel Pro, run it every five minutes from `vercel.ts`. On Hobby, where crons run once a day, the skill schedules it from Supabase with `pg_cron` instead.
**7. Connect calendars, if you want them.** Create a Google OAuth client and a Microsoft Entra app, add the redirect addresses the skill lists, and put the client ids and secrets in the environment. Google asks you to verify the app before anyone outside your test users can connect a calendar, so start that early.
**8. Deploy and embed.**
```bash
vercel deploy --prod
```
Create your host profile, a schedule and an event type, open `/your-handle/intro` in a private window and book yourself. Check the email, the invite, the reschedule link and the cancel link. Then put the page on any website:
```html
```
That is a working core you own. From here, it grows with you.
## Extending it
There are three ways, and you can mix them.
**With our other skills.** [`time-slot-generator`](/skills/time-slot-generator) adds slots from richer rules, such as a class on the first Monday of every month or whole-day rentals. [`google-calendar-sync`](/skills/google-calendar-sync) and [`microsoft-calendar-sync`](/skills/microsoft-calendar-sync) take calendar sync further, with push notifications, channel and subscription renewal, health per calendar and Google Meet or Teams links. [`bookable-events`](/skills/bookable-events) adds paid sessions with Stripe Checkout and deposits that stop no-shows. [`stripe-connect-subscriptions`](/skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions) turns it into a marketplace where providers get paid. [`slack-ai-bot`](/skills/slack-ai-bot) tells your team about new bookings and answers questions about them. [`booking-kiosk`](/skills/booking-kiosk) puts a walk-up booking screen in your venue on the same core. [`visit-logger`](/skills/visit-logger) shows you who opened a booking link, and [`invoicing`](/skills/invoicing) bills paid sessions.
**With your agent.** The skill's extensions file lists what a team scheduling product adds, round robin, collective events, routing forms, polls, SMS reminders, with the rules each one must keep and a prompt to start from. For example:
```text
Add round robin event types: an event type can list several hosts; slots are the union of their free slots, and a booking goes to the eligible host with the fewest bookings that week. Keep the per-host lock and the overlap constraint.
```
**With us.** If you would rather have it built, or you need more than meetings, rooms and equipment, approvals, rules that no setting covers, [send us a brief](/brief?module=calendar-scheduling-links). We build it on the same skill into a system you own, for a fixed price. And if you build these for clients, [Timerise Builders](/builders) is our partner program for exactly that.
## What to know before you switch
Owning it means running it. You keep the secrets, watch the job queue and renew the Microsoft client secret before it expires. The skill's operations guide lists what to watch. Google's verification of calendar access takes days to weeks. Email deliverability is yours: use a provider and a domain you trust. And for one person with one event type, Calendly's free plan is still the easier answer.
For a team that pays per seat, wants its own domain and data, or needs the next feature on its own schedule, the core is now a free download and an afternoon of work.
**Get the skill:** [timerise.ai/skills/calendar-scheduling-links](/skills/calendar-scheduling-links), or straight from [GitHub](https://github.com/timerise-ai/calendar-scheduling-links).
_Calendly is a trademark of Calendly LLC. Timerise is not affiliated with Calendly. Adobe, Microsoft and the other product names are trademarks of their owners._
---
## How to Build a Booking System: A Step-by-Step Guide
> The parts every booking system needs, in the order to build them: rules, data model, availability, payments, notifications, admin panel and launch.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/how-to-build-a-booking-system
A booking system looks simple from the outside: pick a time, pay, done. Inside, it has to answer one hard question thousands of times a day, without ever getting it wrong: **is this slot still free?**
This guide walks through the parts every booking system needs, in the order we build them. It works for appointments, classes, rooms, desks, tables, vehicles or tickets. Whether you call it a booking system, a reservation system or scheduling software, the parts are the same.
## 1. Write down the booking rules
Before any code, describe how a booking works in your business. Most problems later come from a rule nobody wrote down.
- **What is booked?** A person, a room, a piece of equipment, a seat, or several at once (a dentist and a chair).
- **How long does it take?** Fixed length, chosen by the customer, or depending on the service.
- **What surrounds it?** Breaks before and after, cleaning time, travel time.
- **How many fit?** One customer per slot, or a class with 12 places and a waitlist.
- **When can people book?** How far ahead, and how late. When can they cancel, and what does that cost?
- **Who confirms?** Instantly, or after someone approves.
Write each rule as a sentence. That list becomes the specification.
## 2. Design the data model
A booking system usually needs these tables:
| Table | What it holds |
| :----------- | :------------------------------------------------------------ |
| Resources | What can be booked: people, rooms, items, seats |
| Services | What customers buy: duration, price, which resources it needs |
| Availability | Working hours, exceptions, holidays per resource |
| Bookings | Who booked what, when, for how long, and the status |
| Customers | Contact details and consents |
| Payments | Amounts, status, refunds, linked to bookings |
Two rules save a lot of pain later:
- **Store every time in UTC** and keep the location's time zone next to it. Convert only when you show it. Daylight saving changes will otherwise move bookings by an hour. More on this in [timezone handling in booking APIs](/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis).
- **Never delete a booking.** Change its status (confirmed, cancelled, no-show) and keep the history.
## 3. Build the availability engine
This is the heart of the system. It takes the rules, the working hours and the existing bookings, and returns free slots.
The hardest part is **double bookings**. Two customers open the same slot at the same moment and both press "Book". Checking "is it free?" in your code and then saving is not enough, because both checks pass before either booking is saved.
The fix belongs in the database. In PostgreSQL, for example, an exclusion constraint on a time range per resource makes the second booking fail, no matter how the requests arrive. For a short hold while the customer pays, reserve the slot with an expiry time and release it if payment does not complete.
## 4. Build the booking flow
Keep it short. Every extra step loses customers.
1. Choose the service.
2. Choose the time (and the person or place, if it matters).
3. Enter details.
4. Pay, if needed.
5. See the confirmation.
Show only times that are really free. Make it work well on a phone, because many people book on one.
## 5. Add payments
- **Decide what you charge:** full price, a deposit, or nothing until the visit. Deposits are one of the best tools against no-shows, see [reducing no-shows](/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations).
- **Use your payment provider's webhooks** to confirm a payment, not the redirect back to your site. The customer may close the tab.
- **Handle webhooks idempotently.** Providers can send the same event twice. Processing it twice must not create two bookings or two refunds.
- **Plan refunds** for cancellations, according to your rules from step 1.
## 6. Send notifications
A confirmation right after booking, a reminder before the visit, and a message when something changes. Email is the minimum. Text messages cut no-shows further. Add a calendar file (.ics) so the booking lands in the customer's calendar.
## 7. Build the admin panel
Your team needs to see the day, move bookings, block time, add a booking by phone and handle exceptions. This panel is used every day, so it deserves as much care as the customer side.
## 8. Connect your other systems
Calendar sync for staff, your CRM, accounting, access control, your own app. Build an API from the start, even if you don't need it yet. It is much harder to add later. An API also lets AI assistants and agents book for your customers.
## 9. Security and privacy
Booking data is personal data, and sometimes health data. Use proper sign-in for the admin panel, give each role only the access it needs, log who changed what, and decide where the data is stored. Our approach is in [Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking).
## 10. Test, migrate and launch
- **Test the edge cases:** two people booking the same slot, a booking across midnight, a daylight saving change, a payment that fails halfway.
- **Move the data** from the old tool: customers, future bookings, history. Keep the old tool running until the numbers match.
- **Launch quietly** with a small group first, then switch everyone over.
## How long does it take?
Built from zero, by your own team or a general software house, a booking system usually takes 6 to 12 months. Most of that time goes into steps 3 to 7, which every booking system needs.
We build from parts we have shipped many times, so engineers spend the time on what makes your business different. The build takes 2 to 3 weeks, and the system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call, with migration and handover. Some of those building blocks are public as [Agent Skills](/skills): for example a [booking kiosk](/skills/booking-kiosk), [screens in the venue](/skills/digital-signage), [an offline server](/skills/island-mode-server) and [scheduling links](/skills/calendar-scheduling-links). For the last one we wrote a step-by-step guide: [build your own Calendly with an Agent Skill](/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill).
## Build it yourself or with us?
Build it yourself if you have a team with time, booking is your core product, and you want to run the software long term. Use this guide as your checklist.
Work with us if you want your own booking software, with the code handed over, without spending a year on the common parts. It costs one fixed price, typically $15,000 to $50,000. What moves that number is in [How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost?](/blog/custom-booking-software-cost), and the wider choice in [Build vs Buy Booking Software](/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software).
## See your booking system before you build it
Describe your rules in a short brief. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed price. More about what we build is on the [custom booking software](/custom-booking-software) page.
[Leave a brief](/brief). It is free and comes with no commitment.
---
## Custom Booking Software vs White Label: Which One Fits?
> White label booking software puts your logo on someone else's platform. Custom booking software is built for you and owned by you. How to choose.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-software-vs-white-label
White label booking software is a vendor's platform with your logo, your colours and often your domain. It looks like yours. Custom booking software is built for your business and handed over to you. It is yours.
Both can look the same to your customers. The difference is in what happens behind the page: who sets the rules, who holds the data, what you pay over time and what happens if you want to leave.
## At a glance
| Topic | White label | Custom booking software |
| :--------------------- | :---------------------------------------- | :-------------------------------------- |
| What you get | A shared platform with your brand on top | Software built for you |
| Time to launch | Days to weeks | 6 to 8 weeks from the first call |
| Cost | A monthly fee, often per user or location | One fixed price, typically $15k to $50k |
| Commission on bookings | Depends on the vendor | 0% |
| Booking rules | The settings the platform offers | Your rules, however unusual |
| Customer data | In the vendor's platform | In your database, in your cloud or ours |
| Integrations | The ones the vendor supports | Anything with an API |
| New features | When the vendor's roadmap gets there | When you need them |
| Leaving | Depends on the vendor's export | Nothing to leave: you own the code |
## What white label really means
A white label platform is built once and sold to many businesses. Each of them gets the same software with a different logo. You can usually change the colours, the logo, the texts and sometimes the domain. You can't change how the software works.
That is fine when your business works the way the platform expects. It becomes a problem when it doesn't. Then your team adds workarounds: a spreadsheet next to the platform, manual approvals by email, a second tool for what the first one can't do.
There is one more thing to check: the data. Your customers, their bookings and their history sit in the vendor's system. Ask before you sign how you get all of it out, in what format, and what it costs.
## What custom booking software means
Custom booking software is built around your business. The booking flow, the prices, the rules, the admin panel and the integrations follow how you work. When the project ends, the repository is transferred to you with full documentation.
It used to mean a long and expensive project. It doesn't have to. We start from building blocks we have shipped many times, so engineers spend the time on what makes your business different. The build takes 2 to 3 weeks, and the price is fixed before it starts. What drives that price is in [How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost?](/blog/custom-booking-software-cost)
## When white label is the right choice
- You need to take bookings next week.
- Your booking flow is standard: pick a service, a time, pay.
- The monthly fee is small compared with what bookings bring in.
- You don't need the booking data in your other systems.
If that is you, choose white label and don't look back.
## When custom booking software is the right choice
- Your rules don't fit: packages, memberships, deposits, approvals, several things booked at once.
- The fees grow with every new location, user or booking.
- Bookings have to work with your CRM, ERP, access control or your own app.
- You want full control over customer data, GDPR and where the data is stored.
- The booking experience is part of your brand, not just a logo on a template.
## If you want to sell booking to your own clients
Some businesses look at white label because they want to offer booking to their own customers: a franchise, a network of venues, a software company adding booking to its product.
Here there is a third option: your own platform, which you then offer to your clients under your brand. You own the code, so you set the price, the features and the roadmap. If that is your plan, say so in the brief, and the prototype will show it.
If instead you build booking systems for clients as a freelancer or a small studio, look at [Timerise Builders](/builders), our partner program.
## How to decide in one afternoon
1. Write down how you take bookings today, step by step.
2. Check every step against the white label platform. Mark each workaround.
3. Add up three years of platform fees, with the growth you plan.
4. Ask the vendor how a full data export works.
5. Send us a brief and compare: within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype of your own software and a fixed price.
More on the general choice is in [Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide](/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software).
## Frequently asked questions
### Can custom booking software look as polished as a white label platform?
Yes. It is designed for your brand from the start, not adapted from a template. You see it before you commit, in the clickable prototype.
### Is white label cheaper?
At the start, yes. Over time it depends on the fees and how much you grow. With custom software you pay once for the build and then for hosting, with no commission.
### We already use a white label platform. Can we move?
Yes. We move your customers, bookings and history, even when the platform has no export. The old platform keeps running until the data matches, so bookings never stop.
## See your own version first
Describe your business in a short brief. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed price. More about what we build is on the [custom booking software](/custom-booking-software) page.
[Leave a brief](/brief). It is free and comes with no commitment.
---
## How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost?
> What custom booking software costs, what drives the price, what the price includes and how it compares with a SaaS subscription over three years.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-software-cost
Custom booking software from Timerise costs **$15,000 to $50,000** for most projects. It is one fixed price, agreed before the build starts and paid once. There is no monthly subscription and no commission on bookings.
Below: what moves the price up or down, what the price includes, what it does not include, and how it compares with a booking platform you rent.
## At a glance
| What | Details |
| :--------------------- | :------------------------------------------- |
| Typical price | $15,000 to $50,000, fixed before the build |
| Prototype and quote | Within 48 hours of the brief, free of charge |
| Build time | 2 to 3 weeks |
| First call to launch | 6 to 8 weeks, with migration and handover |
| Commission on bookings | 0% |
| Ownership | The code and data belong to you |
| Support | 3 years after launch, included |
## What drives the price
The price depends on two things: how complex your booking rules are and how many other systems the software has to talk to.
**Closer to the lower end:**
- one location or one type of service,
- a standard booking flow: choose a service, a time and pay,
- card payments through one provider,
- email confirmations and reminders.
**Closer to the upper end:**
- several locations, each with its own staff, rooms or equipment,
- unusual rules: packages, memberships, deposits, approvals, different prices for members and guests,
- integrations with your CRM, ERP, access control or single sign-on,
- extra modules such as a kiosk, screens in the venue or an AI assistant,
- a large migration from a tool that has no export.
You don't have to order everything at once. You can start with booking and payments and add the rest later. A smaller first scope means a smaller first price.
## What the price includes
- a discovery call and an architecture blueprint,
- the complete build of your booking software,
- data migration from your current system,
- deployment to your infrastructure or ours,
- the full code and documentation, handed over to you,
- 3 years of support after launch.
## What the price does not include
- **Hosting.** The software runs in your own cloud account, on your bill, or on our infrastructure, billed by actual usage. Never as a share of your revenue.
- **Payment fees.** Your payment provider, such as Stripe, charges its usual fee per transaction. We add nothing on top.
- **Support after year three.** After that, your team can run the software, we can keep it on a retainer, or you can split the work.
## Compared with a platform you rent
A booking platform looks cheaper on day one. The cost shows up over time: a monthly fee, often per user or per location, and on many platforms a commission on every booking.
You can do the math for your own business in one line:
**yearly cost = monthly fee × 12 + commission × yearly booking revenue**
An example with made-up numbers: a platform charges $400 a month and 2% of $500,000 in yearly bookings. That is $4,800 plus $10,000, so $14,800 a year and $44,400 over three years. And the cost grows when your bookings grow.
With your own software, the build is paid once. After that you pay for hosting, and the commission is 0%. We explain the difference in more detail in [Ownership vs Commission](/ownership-vs-commission) and [Custom booking system vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas).
If a ready-made tool does everything you need and the fees stay small, stay with it. Custom software pays off when the fees grow faster than your business, or when your rules don't fit the tool.
## Compared with building from scratch
Building booking software from zero, with your own team or a general software house, usually takes 6 to 12 months. Most of that time goes into parts every booking system needs: the booking engine, payments, notifications, the admin panel.
We start from building blocks we have shipped many times. Engineers spend the time on what makes your business different. That is why the build takes 2 to 3 weeks and the price is fixed.
## How to get your exact price
1. **Brief.** About 15 minutes, in a conversation with our AI, whenever it suits you.
2. **Prototype and quote.** Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype on your data and a price.
3. **Scope.** You give feedback, we adjust, and the price is fixed before any work starts.
The prototype and the quote are free and come with no commitment. More about this step in [From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours).
## Frequently asked questions
### Is there a monthly fee?
No. You pay once for the build. If we host the software, hosting is billed by actual usage.
### Do you take a commission on bookings?
No. The commission is 0%, always.
### Can the price change during the project?
The price is fixed for the agreed scope. If you want to add something later, we quote it before we build it.
### Can I start small?
Yes. Start with booking and payments, and add modules when you need them.
### What happens to the data in my current tool?
We move your customers, bookings and history into the new software, even when your current provider has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches. The full process is in [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
## See your price in 48 hours
Describe your business in a short brief. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed quote. More about what we build is on the [custom booking software](/custom-booking-software) page.
[Leave a brief](/brief) and see the price before you decide.
---
## Timerise Builders: Build Your Own Business on Our Skills
> Timerise Builders is taking applications. We want people who will build their own clients and cash flow on our skills, tools, review and contract.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/timerise-builders-build-your-own-business-on-our-skills
Everything we know how to build is public: the skills, the process, the review, the prices. The [skills catalog](/skills) holds our Agent Skills, each one the way our engineers build a module they have shipped many times. Anyone can install them today.
What was missing is a way for people outside the studio to earn on them. That is [Timerise Builders](/builders), our partner program. The first round is by invitation, and [applications are open](/builders/apply).
This post is about who we are looking for, and what we put under them.
## Who we are looking for
Not employees, and not subcontractors billed by the hour. We are looking for people who want a business of their own: their own clients, their own pipeline, their own cash flow from project to project.
Most people who could do that never start, because a client project needs far more than the skill of building or selling. It needs a contract, a price list, infrastructure, a review process, a way to produce an offer quickly, and a name the client is willing to sign with. Building all of that takes years. We already have it, so we are putting it under the people who can use it.
Four kinds of people fit:
- **A developer who builds with coding agents** and wants paid client work, without having to become a sales team and a legal department first.
- **A freelancer or a small agency** whose clients already ask for booking, payments or screens in the venue, and who would rather deliver a proven module than invent one.
- **A salesperson** who knows gyms, clinics, rentals or venues by first name and does not write code.
- **Someone a community trusts**: an association, a franchise, a local network.
We are keeping the first round small on purpose. A few partners, certified one skill at a time. We would rather have a few people who deliver than a long list of sign-ups.
## The umbrella: what Timerise carries
The idea is simple. You do the part you are good at. Timerise carries the rest.
| What a project needs | Who carries it |
| -------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| The contract and invoice | Timerise. The client signs one contract and gets one invoice, and Timerise is responsible for delivery |
| The brief and prototype | Timerise runs the brief and builds the [clickable prototype in 48 hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours) |
| The price | Timerise, from the price list |
| The cost of a lost offer | Timerise. The brief and the prototype are always paid by us, so a lost offer costs you nothing |
| Infrastructure and secrets | Timerise. You build in our repository, and client secrets never leave Timerise |
| Review | CI, an agent and a senior on every pull request |
| The offer | One document from Timerise, with your name on it |
You also get the tools to sell and run projects: an offer generator that goes from brief to modules from the catalog to a price, materials per industry in English, and in the client's language when an offer needs it (Polish or Spanish, for example), call scripts with the objections and the answers, and a public profile on timerise.ai with your badges and your own brief link. A brief that arrives through that link is attributed to you.
The client loses nothing in the arrangement. They get one contract, every line reviewed, and the code, documentation and IP handed over, as always.
## The catalog is the product line
A business needs something to sell. Here it is the catalog. It keeps growing, so the table below is where it stands today and the [catalog](/skills) is the current list.
| Category | Skills |
| ------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| In-venue | [`booking-kiosk`](/skills/booking-kiosk), [`digital-signage`](/skills/digital-signage), [`island-mode-server`](/skills/island-mode-server) |
| Payments & compliance | [`stripe-connect-subscriptions`](/skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions), [`bookable-events`](/skills/bookable-events), [`ledger-wallet`](/skills/ledger-wallet), [`ksef`](/skills/ksef) |
| Content | [`blog-markdown`](/skills/blog-markdown), [`help-center-markdown`](/skills/help-center-markdown) |
| Infrastructure & security | [`site-pin-gate`](/skills/site-pin-gate), [`visit-logger`](/skills/visit-logger) |
| AI & integrations | [`slack-ai-bot`](/skills/slack-ai-bot), [`browser-extension-connector`](/skills/browser-extension-connector), [`ecommerce-process-mining`](/skills/ecommerce-process-mining), [`skill-eval-loop`](/skills/skill-eval-loop) |
All but one build a module a client can buy. The exception, the skill eval loop, is a tool for the people who maintain skills.
An offer is a composition from that list. Take a gym that wants class booking and memberships. The offer names a booking kiosk at the entrance, Stripe Connect payments behind it and, in Poland, KSeF e-invoicing. Three modules from the catalog, a prototype attached, one price.
The catalog is also why this works for someone who is not a senior engineer yet. A skill is not a blank page. It carries the architecture, the hard rules and the tests of a module that has already been shipped, so a Builder starts from the reviewed version and the reviewer checks the work against a written list. We described what is in one in [Our Agent Skills, and What Is Inside Them](/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them).
Certification follows the catalog too. It is per skill: you build one module from it on our infrastructure, it passes review, and you carry the badge for that skill, for example "Certified Builder · KSeF e-invoicing".
## Four ways to earn
In any combination. Pick the ones that fit you.
1. **Bring clients.** Introduce a gym, a clinic or a venue. Timerise runs the brief and builds the prototype.
2. **Connect communities.** Open the door to a group you belong to and host a meetup with us. Timerise talks to the members.
3. **Run projects.** Be the client's contact from brief to acceptance.
4. **Build modules.** Build the module from a skill you are certified on, in our repository, under our review.
Partners are paid per project: a fixed share of the project value for each role, set in your partner agreement. Your share follows the roles you hold, so the person who brings the client, runs the project and builds a module earns on all three.
The shares are not public. Yours are set in your partner agreement when we approve you, and they change only with your consent, never for projects already contracted.
## From the first module to your own clients
The path has five steps.
1. **Apply.** Tell us what you want to do and the skill you want to start on.
2. **Certify on one skill.** Build one module from it on our infrastructure. Pass review, and you are certified.
3. **First project.** A Timerise lead is at your side for the whole of it.
4. **Your own clients.** Bring them with your own brief link.
5. **Senior builder.** Certified on three skills and reviewing others, or maintaining one skill. From here you write custom logic beyond the skills and lead projects.
Referrers and Ambassadors do not have to walk it. They are roles, not levels, and neither ever has to become a Builder.
The reputation you build along the way is yours. Every badge carries a date and a link to its proof: the merged pull request, the module a client accepted, the first project from a community you connected.
## Why every line is reviewed
A Builder pushes to the project branch. Three gates stand between that push and production: CI on every push, an agent that reads the pull request against the skill line by line, and a senior who looks at what the agent flagged and at the architecture. Merging and deploying is done by a senior or by Timerise, never by a Builder.
That can sound like a limit. It is the reason the rest is possible. The client can sign one contract with Timerise because Timerise has read every line, and you can sell a system without carrying the delivery risk alone.
## What it is not
Better said now than after you apply.
**It is not a job.** There is no salary. You are paid per project.
**It is not white label.** The client always signs with Timerise. Your name is on the offer, not on the contract.
**It is not a way around review.** Custom logic outside the skills belongs to a Senior builder. Access to a project ends with the project.
**It does not lock up the skills.** They are MIT and stay that way. You can install any of them and build for your own clients on your own contract. The program covers projects contracted through Timerise: the infrastructure, the review, the price list, the prototype, the brand and your share.
## How to apply
The [application](/builders/apply) takes two minutes and needs no account: your name, country, the languages you work in and the roles you want. A GitHub or LinkedIn profile helps.
Contributors go first. A merged pull request to any skill in the [skills index](https://github.com/timerise-ai/skills) earns the Contributor badge and a place ahead of the queue. If you want to show us how you work before we talk, that is the shortest way.
The full program, with the roles, the badges and the permissions table, is at [timerise.ai/builders](/builders).
---
## Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting
> Move your bookings out of a SaaS with zero downtime, then never run a server. We maintain the Next.js, Vercel and Supabase or Firestore stack. You own it.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting
SaaS got one thing right. You signed up, and you never thought about a server again. Someone else patched the database, rotated the certificates, and answered the pager at 3 a.m.
The fear of owning a booking system is that you get all of that back. Plus a migration project to reach it, with a week of frozen bookings in the middle.
Neither has to be true. This post explains how we move your data without downtime, and how a system you own stays maintenance-free for you after launch.
## Two fears that keep businesses renting
When we talk to a business that has outgrown its booking platform, the reasons to stay are rarely about features. They are about two risks.
The first is **migration pain**. Years of bookings, customers, and history live inside a provider that offers a partial export at best. Moving feels like starting over.
The second is **maintenance burden**. A custom system sounds like servers, updates, and a developer on retainer. The subscription looks cheaper because someone else carries that weight.
We built our delivery model around removing both.
## Painless data migration: your data moves with you
Already on another booking system? Switching shouldn't mean starting over. We migrate your bookings, customers, and history into a system you own, even when your current provider offers no export at all. The migration is part of the fixed project price, not an add-on.
It runs in three steps.
**Step 1: Source audit.** We map where your data lives and how to get it out: an API, a native export, CSV dumps, or direct database access. You get a written migration plan before we touch anything.
**Step 2: Extraction and mapping.** When there is an API or a full export, this step is mechanical. When there is not, we have two more paths. Our AI reconstructs your records from data you already have access to: booking lists, reports, or confirmation emails, and maps them onto your new data model field by field. Or we build a small [custom browser extension](/skills/browser-extension-connector). It runs inside your own signed-in session of the old system, reads the data its admin screens already show you, and hands it to the new system. It is your data, from your account, with nothing to install on any server.
**Step 3: Import and validation.** We import into your new system and validate every record against the source. Counts and checksums are checked before cutover. Your old system keeps running until the numbers match, so you keep taking bookings during the entire migration, and the switch happens with zero downtime.
Every migrated record lands in a database you own. The coworking operators we wrote about in [our post on booking systems for coworking spaces](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces) move members, bookings, and history exactly this way.
## Maintenance-free by design: we maintain infrastructure, not a SaaS
Here is the shift that makes ownership practical. Timerise does not run one shared platform that every customer logs into. We build one system per customer. Every one of them runs on the same native stack: **Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud** as the database, chosen per project.
That choice does the heavy lifting. Vercel runs the application without a server for anyone to patch. Supabase gives you managed Postgres with Row-Level Security (RLS) enforced in the database itself, and Firestore on Google Cloud gives the same managed guarantees where a document store fits better. Secrets live only in the platform environment, never in the codebase (more in [booking data security by design](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking)). Storage and compute can be pinned to EU regions, Frankfurt for the strictest GDPR deployments. All three providers are independently audited, ISO 27001-certified, and backed by signed data processing agreements (DPAs).
So the maintenance we do is not maintenance of an application. It is maintenance of infrastructure: keeping the platform layer healthy, applying the same security patches across every system, and monitoring the same signals. As our [infrastructure manifesto](/infrastructure) puts it, the stack is quick to set up, costs track usage instead of revenue, and a handover takes hours rather than a migration project.
For you, "maintenance-free" means something concrete. No servers. No database upgrades. No one on your side has to know how any of it is deployed, unless you want to.
## One stack, many systems: how it scales like a SaaS
A SaaS scales because one team runs one codebase for a thousand tenants. Adding the thousandth tenant costs almost nothing, because nothing new has to be operated.
We get the same shape of curve from a different direction. One stack, one toolchain, and one library of [Agent Skills](/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them) serve every customer system we build. Each system is isolated and owned by its customer, but they are all operated the same way, on the same platforms, with the same monitoring. The thousandth system costs the same to keep healthy as the tenth. We are not publishing a customer count here. The point is that the cost of running your system does not depend on how many others we run. Neither does your bill.
| Who keeps it running | Classic SaaS | Timerise model |
| :------------------- | :-------------------------------- | :------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Servers and runtime | The vendor | **Next.js on Vercel, managed by us** |
| Database and backups | The vendor | **Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud, managed by us** |
| Application code | The vendor, shared by all tenants | **Yours, one system per customer** |
| Data and schema | Their schema, partial export | **Yours, in full** |
| Cost of scaling | Commission on your revenue | **Hosting billed by actual usage** |
| Leaving | Expensive, risky | **Standard Next.js and Postgres or Firestore, handed over in hours** |
The difference sits in the third row. The code is yours alone. Only the infrastructure underneath is shared expertise.
## Three ways to run it
Where the system runs is your call. We work in whichever setup fits your organization, and the code stays yours in every one of them.
1. **Your infrastructure, managed by us.** The system runs in your cloud accounts, under your contracts and your billing. We set it up, deploy, monitor, and keep it healthy.
2. **Our infrastructure.** We provide the hosting and run everything on our side, billed by actual usage. Nothing to set up in your organization, and you can take the whole environment over whenever you want.
3. **Your servers, your ops team.** The infrastructure is already configured by your people. We only build the system and deploy it on what you have.
We recommend the Next.js, Vercel, and Supabase or Firestore pairing for speed and predictable costs. If your organization runs on AWS, Azure, on-premise hardware, or a specific data region, we build there instead.
## The honest trade-offs
This model is not free of decisions, and we would rather name them now.
- **You inherit a platform choice.** Unless you pick the first or third hosting model, your system runs on the providers we recommend. The code is standard Next.js and Postgres or Firestore, so it is portable, but moving it is a task, not a click.
- **Usage billing cuts both ways.** A traffic spike costs hosting money instead of a commission. For most businesses that is a far smaller number, but it is a real invoice that scales with load.
- **Support has a horizon.** Every project includes 3 years of post-delivery support. After that you choose: maintain it yourself, take a managed-updates retainer with us, or split it, where you handle features and we handle security patches.
- **Sometimes SaaS is still right** ([custom booking vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas)). When booking is a secondary channel, volume is modest, and rules are simple, rent a subscription and move on. Ownership earns its place when booking is core to your revenue.
## What is included
Everything in this post ships inside one fixed-price project. A typical range is $15k to $50k, and the exact quote depends on the scope of your booking logic and integrations.
- 6 to 8 weeks from the first call to a system running in production.
- Data migration from your current system, validated record by record.
- Deployment to your infrastructure, or to ours with a handover open at any time.
- Full code and documentation handoff, with the repository transferred to your GitHub organization.
- 3 years of post-delivery support.
- 0% commission on bookings, ever.
You do not have to commit to find out what your system would look like. Leave a brief and within two days you get a clickable prototype and a quote, as described in [From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours). Why we think this is the right way to buy booking software is the subject of [The Post-SaaS Manifesto](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto).
The migration is our problem. The servers are our problem. The system is yours.
[Matt Sowa](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mateusz-sowa/)
---
## A Custom Booking System for Your Coworking Space
> We build booking systems for coworking spaces: desks, rooms, passes, payments and building access in one place. Scope, timeline, price and how to start with a free prototype.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces
We build booking systems for coworking spaces. Built to order, around the way you sell, with the code and data owned by you.
Below are the specifics: what such a system can include, how long it takes to build, what it costs and how to get started.
## At a glance
| What | Details |
| :--------------------- | :---------------------------------------------- |
| First step | Online brief, about 15 minutes |
| Prototype and quote | Within 48 hours, free of charge |
| Time to launch | Usually 6 to 8 weeks from the first call |
| Price | Fixed and agreed up front. Usually $15k to $50k |
| Commission on bookings | 0% |
| Ownership | The code and data belong to you |
| Support | 3 years after launch |
## What the system can include
Below are screens from a prototype we built for a coworking operator with six locations. The brand, the cities, the prices and the names are made up for this post. The flows are as delivered.

- **Desk and room booking.** Members see a floor plan with free spots. They book a desk by the hour, for the day or as a fixed seat.
- **Several locations in one system.** One availability and one occupancy view for all your spaces.
- **Passes, bundles and memberships.** Day passes, room hours, monthly memberships and company packages. You can set different prices for members and guests.
- **Payments and invoices.** Card payment at booking or every month. The invoice is issued automatically after a successful payment.
- **Building access.** Members get a QR code on their phone. If your access control has an API, the system can open the gates.
- **Operator dashboard.** Occupancy, entries and payments in one view, for today and the weeks ahead, the [data that shows where to optimize](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems).
- **Integrations.** Google and Outlook calendars, Slack, CRM, Stripe. We connect to any tool that has an API.



You do not have to order everything at once. You can start with booking and payments and add the rest later.
## How we work together
| Step | Time | What you get |
| :------------------ | :------------------- | :----------------------------------------------------------- |
| 1. Brief | about 15 minutes | A description of your spaces, pricing and needs |
| 2. Prototype | up to 48 hours | **A clickable prototype on your data and a quote** |
| 3. Agreeing scope | as long as you need | Changes based on your feedback and a fixed price |
| 4. Build and launch | usually 6 to 8 weeks | A working system, code, documentation and 3 years of support |
You fill in the brief yourself, in a conversation with AI, whenever it suits you. No sales call is needed first. You can read more about the prototype in [From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours).
## When your own system makes sense
An off-the-shelf coworking platform is a good choice to start with (we compare both in [custom booking vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas)). Your own system makes sense when:
- you run several locations or plan to open more,
- you sell access in ways the platform does not support, such as company packages or different prices for members and guests,
- your front desk copies data between tools,
- platform fees grow with your number of members.
With a custom system you pay once, for a defined scope. There are no per-member fees and no commission on bookings. The code and data are yours, so you can develop the system further with us or with another team. Why we think that matters is the subject of [the Post-SaaS Manifesto](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto).
If you run one small space and a ready-made tool does everything you need, stay with it.
## Frequently asked questions
### How much does it cost?
The price depends on the scope. Most projects fall between $15k and $50k. It is a one-time build cost, with no monthly subscription and no commission. You get the exact figure together with the prototype, before you sign anything.
### How long does the build take?
Usually 6 to 8 weeks from project kickoff to launch. You get the clickable prototype within 48 hours of sending the brief.
### We already use a platform. What happens to our data?
We move your members, bookings and history into the new system. This works even when your current provider has no export. The old system keeps running until the data matches, so there is no break in bookings. The full process is in [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
### Will the system connect to our access control?
Yes, if your entry system has an API. We check this at the brief stage.
### Where does the system run and who maintains it?
You choose. The system can run in your own cloud accounts or on our infrastructure. The price includes 3 years of support after launch. After that you can maintain the system yourself or keep working with us.
### Does the prototype cost anything?
No. The prototype and the quote are free and come with no commitment.
## Start with a brief
The brief takes about 15 minutes. Describe your spaces, your pricing and what you want to simplify. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a quote.
[Leave a brief](/brief) and see your system before you make a decision.
---
## Build vs Buy Booking Software: How to Decide
> Rent a booking platform or build your own booking software? Four options compared on cost, time, fit and ownership, with five questions to decide.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/build-vs-buy-booking-software
Most businesses should start by buying. A ready-made booking platform is quick to set up and cheap at the start. Building your own booking software makes sense later: when the fees grow faster than the business, when your rules don't fit the platform, or when bookings have to work with your other systems.
This post compares the options and gives you five questions to decide.
## The four options
| Option | Time to launch | Cost | Fits unusual rules | You own the code |
| :------------------------------ | :------------- | :---------------------------------- | :----------------------- | :--------------- |
| Rent a SaaS platform | Days | Monthly fee, often commission | Only within its settings | No |
| White label platform | Weeks | Monthly fee, your brand on top | Only within its settings | No |
| Build from scratch | 6 to 12 months | Large, often open-ended | Yes | Yes |
| Custom build from proven blocks | 6 to 8 weeks | Fixed price, typically $15k to $50k | Yes | Yes |
**Rent a SaaS platform.** You sign up, set your services and hours, and take bookings the same week. You pay every month, often per user or location, and many platforms also take a share of every booking. Your process has to fit the settings the platform offers.
**White label platform.** The same as SaaS, but with your logo and colours. It looks like yours. It still isn't: the rules, the data and the roadmap belong to the vendor.
**Build from scratch.** Your own team or a software house writes everything from zero. You get exactly what you want and you own it. It takes a long time, because most of the work goes into parts every booking system needs: the booking engine, payments, notifications, the admin panel.
**Custom build from proven blocks.** This is how we work. The common parts are already built and tested. Engineers spend the time on what makes your business different. You get your own software, with the code handed over, in weeks rather than months, for a fixed price.
## Five questions to decide
### 1. Does a ready-made tool do everything you need?
Write down how you take bookings today, step by step. Then check it against the platform. If everything fits without workarounds, buy. If your team copies data between tools or keeps a spreadsheet next to the platform, that is a sign you are outgrowing it.
### 2. How fast do the fees grow?
Add up a year of platform costs: the monthly fee times twelve, plus the commission times your yearly booking revenue. Then do the same for next year's plan. If the number grows faster than your business, owning starts to pay off. We show the math in [How Much Does Custom Booking Software Cost?](/blog/custom-booking-software-cost)
### 3. Do bookings need to work with other systems?
A CRM, an ERP, access control, your own mobile app, single sign-on. Platforms connect to some tools. Your own software connects to anything that has an API.
### 4. Who should own the customer data?
On a platform, your customers and their history sit in the vendor's account. Moving away can be hard, especially when there is no full export. With your own software, the data is in your database, in your cloud or ours, under your rules for GDPR and data location.
### 5. Who will look after the software?
This is the fair worry about building. With us, three years of support are included. After that, your team can run it, we can keep it on a retainer, or you can split the work. The code is standard Next.js and Node.js, so any developer can work on it.
## When to buy
- You are just starting and still learning how you will sell.
- You run one location with a simple booking flow.
- A platform does everything you need and the fees stay small.
## When to build
- Fees or commission grow faster than your revenue.
- Your rules don't fit: packages, memberships, deposits, approvals, several things booked at once.
- You run several locations or plan to open more.
- Bookings have to work with your CRM, ERP or your own app.
- You want the booking flow in your own brand and the data in your hands.
## How to lower the risk of building
Building used to mean a long project with an unknown end. You can avoid that:
- **See it before you pay.** We send a clickable prototype on your data and a quote within 48 hours of the brief. [Here is how that works](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours).
- **Fix the price.** The price is agreed for a defined scope before the build starts.
- **Keep the old tool running.** Your data moves over while the old tool still works, so bookings never stop. [The migration process](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
- **Own the result.** The repository is transferred to you with full documentation.
## Frequently asked questions
### Is building always more expensive than buying?
Not over time. Buying is cheaper at the start. Building costs more at the start and nothing per booking after that. Which one is cheaper depends on how big your business is and how fast it grows.
### Can we switch from a platform later?
Yes. We move your customers, bookings and history, even when the platform has no export. The old tool keeps running until the data matches.
### How long does building take with you?
The build itself takes 2 to 3 weeks. The system is live 6 to 8 weeks after the first call, including discovery, migration and handover.
## Find out which one fits you
If you are unsure, send a brief. Within 48 hours you get a clickable prototype and a fixed price, and you can compare it with what you pay today. The full picture of what we build is on the [custom booking software](/custom-booking-software) page.
[Leave a brief](/brief). It is free and comes with no commitment.
---
## Our Agent Skills, and What Is Inside Them
> Agent Skills written by the engineers who ship each module. What is in them, how they are tested, where their limits are and how to install one.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them
We are building a public library of Agent Skills at [github.com/timerise-ai/skills](https://github.com/timerise-ai/skills). The list keeps growing. Each one is a separate repository that teaches a coding agent to build a single module: a help center, a multilingual blog, in-venue screens, a self-service kiosk, an on-premise fallback server, marketplace payments, Polish e-invoicing. Agent Skills is an open format, so the same folder works in Claude Code, Codex CLI, Gemini CLI and the other agents that read skills.
This post covers what is actually in them, where the rules inside them come from and where their limits are. If you only want to install one, the commands are at the bottom.
**Update, September 2026.** Each skill now has its own page at [timerise.ai/skills](/skills): what the module builds, where its rules come from, how to install it, and two ways to get the module. Install the skill and let your agent build it, or [send a brief](/brief) and have us build it into a system you own.
**Update, October 2026.** Every release of a skill is now run through Claude Code, Codex CLI and Gemini CLI on a fresh app, with the results published. The section "How they are tested" below describes the run. This post no longer counts the skills, because the number keeps growing: the [catalog](/skills) is the current list, and "What comes next" says where it is going.
## What a skill is
A skill is a folder of markdown that an agent reads before it writes code. The agent loads it when a task matches its description, and you can also call it directly. Nothing in it is tied to one vendor. `SKILL.md` declares a name and a description, everything below it is plain markdown about Next.js, Postgres, Firestore or a vendor's API, and no file calls a model.
It is not a package. Nothing gets installed into your app, and there is no dependency to track or license. The agent reads the skill and writes the module into your repository, in your stack, with your auth, your naming and your design system.
The practical difference is narrow but real. Without the skill, an agent writes a help center that looks right. With the skill, it writes the one our engineers build, including the parts that only make sense once you know what went wrong the first time.
## What is inside one
They all share the same layout, so an agent that has read one knows how to read the next.
| File | Contents |
| -------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `SKILL.md` | The entry point: what the module is, its architecture, the critical facts, the hard rules, and an index of the references below |
| `references/adaptation.md` | The seam with the host app: auth, tenancy, storage, styling, i18n, the domain rename, and the module's non-negotiables |
| `references/*.md` | One file per concern: data model, backend specifics, routes, UI, operations, extensions |
| `references/provenance.md` | The record of writing the module down: what the review of the earlier implementation changed, what was kept on purpose, what is new |
| `assets/` | Runnable files a reference points at instead of inlining |
| `evals/` | The prompts an operator would type, and one result file per agent run |
| `CHANGELOG.md` | Semantic versioning |
Only `SKILL.md` is read up front. The references load on demand, so a task about device pairing does not drag the billing chapter into the context window.
Every skill is versioned on its own line under one release standard: a `vX.Y.Z` tag, a Keep a Changelog entry and a GitHub release carrying it. The index spells that standard out in `STANDARD.md`, together with the layout and the writing rules any new skill has to meet.
## The first skills
These are the skills the library started with. The current list is in the [catalog](/skills).
| Skill | Builds | Backend |
| ---------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | ------------------------------------------------- |
| [`help-center-markdown`](/skills/help-center-markdown) | Markdown help center: category folders, static article pages, ranked client-side search, locale fallback, JSON-LD, sitemap, content validator in CI | Repository files, no CMS |
| [`blog-markdown`](/skills/blog-markdown) | Multilingual blog: locale-partitioned posts joined by a shared translation key, localized slugs, tag pages, related posts, cover art, RSS, hreflang | Repository files, no CMS |
| [`digital-signage`](/skills/digital-signage) | In-venue screens: media library, per-screen playlists, device pairing by PIN, fullscreen TV player with stall recovery and health monitoring | Firestore or Supabase |
| [`booking-kiosk`](/skills/booking-kiosk) | Self-service touchscreen kiosk: seven-step walk-up flow, on-screen keyboard, inactivity auto-reset, server-priced idempotent bookings, pay at the counter or by QR | Backend and payment agnostic, Firestore reference |
| [`island-mode-server`](/skills/island-mode-server) | On-premise fallback server: live replica of the site's data, LAN takeover when the internet drops, idempotent flush on reconnect, HMAC hardware auth | Node box on site, Firestore in the cloud |
| [`stripe-connect-subscriptions`](/skills/stripe-connect-subscriptions) | Marketplace settlement: split charges and transfers, escrow and reserves, connected-account onboarding, off-session billing with dunning, ledger reconciliation | Store adapter, backend agnostic |
| [`ksef`](/skills/ksef) | Poland's mandatory e-invoicing via KSeF API 2.0: token auth, invoice encryption, batch sending, UPO receipts, purchase-invoice sync, QR codes | Postgres on Vercel |
## Where they come from
A skill does not start as a blank document that somebody fills with best practices. It starts with an engineer on our team who has built the same module several times and knows how it has to behave.
Writing it down is a review of its own. The engineer goes back over the earlier implementation they shipped, writes the module the way they would build it today, and states every property it has to hold as something the templates and the tests verify. What that review changed, what was kept on purpose and what is new goes into `provenance.md`.
None of it is synthetic. No skill was generated by a model from a prompt, and none of them carries code from a customer's project.
That is why some rules look oddly specific. Hash the per-device token before you store it. Send a search summary to the browser, never the whole corpus. Bind an invoice's seller NIP to the authenticating taxpayer. None of those are style preferences. Each one comes from a real deployment, and the record says which one.
Each skill also names a short list of non-negotiables: the rules that travel with the module into any project. Everything else is adaptable, and the skill says which is which.
## How they are tested
A skill is worth what an agent builds from it when nobody is helping. So every published release of a skill is run through three coding agents, each on a named model.
| Agent | Model |
| ----------- | ------------------ |
| Claude Code | `claude-opus-5-5` |
| Codex CLI | `gpt-6-astra` |
| Gemini CLI | `gemini-3.8-flash` |
The models are chosen, not inherited from whatever a CLI defaults to this month, and they are the same for every skill. That is what makes a result comparable across skills and across releases. Moving to a newer model is a decision recorded in the index changelog.
The run is the same every time:
1. **A fresh app.** Next.js App Router with TypeScript and nothing else.
2. **One skill.** Installed the way its README says, for the one agent under test. No other skills, no personal instructions, no memory.
3. **One prompt.** Taken from the skill's `evals/prompts.md` and written the way an operator would type it, not in the skill's vocabulary. For the site PIN gate: "Hide this whole site behind a PIN until launch. One environment variable turns it on, and search engines must not index anything while it is on."
4. **No help.** The agent works unattended, with no questions answered, no external services and a 60-minute limit.
5. **Three checks.** The app is type-checked, built and tested. Nothing is fixed by hand before the checks.
The result is `pass` when every check that ran passed, `partial` when the app builds but its tests fail, and `fail` when it does not type-check or build, runs out of time or leaves the app unchanged.
A GitHub Actions workflow makes the run on every release, one agent after another, and commits one result file per run to the skill's `evals/` folder, with a link to the run that holds the agent's full log. The harness and the standard it follows are in the [index](https://github.com/timerise-ai/skills), in `eval/` and in section 10 of `STANDARD.md`.
### What a passing build does not tell you
Passing checks say the code compiles and its tests run. They do not say the agent followed the skill. An agent can patch a template, rewrite a test until it passes, widen a default or skip the handover, and still build.
So a maintainer reads the log of every run and writes the notes under the result, scoring it against a fixed rubric. Each deviation is traced to the sentence in the skill that allowed it and fixed there, in a patch release. The release runs the evals again, and the loop repeats until every agent scores full. That loop is a skill of its own, [`skill-eval-loop`](/skills/skill-eval-loop).
### Failures are published
A failing run is committed like a passing one. The fix is the next release, not a deleted file.
One example is in `EVALS.md` today. On version 0.1.3 of `ecommerce-process-mining`, Gemini CLI activated the skill, read 18 files, and exited without changing one. It is recorded as a `fail` with a rubric score of 0/8, and the result file stays in the repository.
### Where to read the results
- **On each skill's page**, under "How does it do in each agent?", with the newest run per agent and prompt.
- **In [`EVALS.md`](https://github.com/timerise-ai/skills/blob/main/EVALS.md)** in the index: one row per skill and agent, with the model, the result, the three checks and the skill version. It is regenerated from the skill repositories once a day.
- **In each skill's README**, as one badge per agent, linking the result file.
The harness is new, so not every skill has all three agents yet. A few are in line for their first run, and each skill gets its runs with its next release.
## What they give you
**A lesson gets written down once.** When a project teaches us something, it becomes a rule in the skill instead of a commit in one repository. Everything we build after that starts with it. Without that loop, the same ground gets covered again on every project.
**The module is documented before it is written.** The skill is the documentation. When we hand a project over, the developers taking it on get the reasoning behind the code, not only the code.
**Less of an estimate is guesswork.** A large share of a booking system is work we have already done, in a form the agent can reproduce. It is also how a brief becomes a [clickable prototype in 48 hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours). What is left to estimate is the logic that actually differs between projects, which is also where the interesting engineering is.
**Reviews get shorter.** Reviewing generated code is easier when the rules it was meant to follow are written down. Instead of arguing about whether an approach is sound, you check it against a list.
**You can read the parts before you commit.** The index is public and so is every skill in it. What a Timerise system is made of is inspectable up front, without having to ask us for it.
**Installed on your own, a skill gives you the reviewed version.** Not a plausible module written from scratch, but the way an engineer who has shipped it many times builds it, with the corrections already in.
## What they will not do
Worth knowing before you clone one.
**They assume Next.js App Router.** The data model and the operational rules travel anywhere. The routing and rendering chapters do not. The exception is `island-mode-server` (the server behind [Timerise Offline's Island Mode](/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations)), which builds a Node box that sits next to the app rather than inside it.
**They are instructions, not a package.** Once the agent has written the module, the code is yours. There is no version inside your app to bump, and a later `git pull` in the skill directory improves the next thing you build, not the thing you already built.
**You still review the output.** A skill narrows the space of wrong answers a long way. It does not remove the review, and it does not turn a coding agent into an engineer.
**You pick the backend.** The data layer sits behind an explicit seam, with Firestore, Supabase/Postgres and a custom store adapter described side by side. Choosing and adapting one is your call, not the skill's.
**`ksef` is the odd one out.** It wraps someone else's API rather than a UI module, so it starts from the Ministry of Finance specification corrected against field reports, and its record of corrections is the changelog rather than `provenance.md`.
## Installing one
The shortest way is the [skills.sh](https://www.skills.sh) CLI. It resolves the GitHub repository directly and writes the skill into whichever agents you name, with no manual clone and no per-agent path to remember:
```bash
npx skills add timerise-ai/help-center-markdown # every agent it detects
npx skills add timerise-ai/ksef -a claude-code -a codex # or just the ones you name
```
You can also clone a skill yourself. Into your Claude Code skills directory:
```bash
git clone https://github.com/timerise-ai/help-center-markdown.git ~/.claude/skills/help-center-markdown
```
To scope it to a single project instead, clone it into that project's `.claude/skills/` directory. The skill activates on its own when a task matches it, or you can invoke it with its slash command: `/help-center-markdown`. Update it with `git pull` in its directory, and read its `CHANGELOG.md` to see what moved.
### Codex CLI, Gemini CLI and other agents
Codex CLI and Gemini CLI read the same layout, including the on-demand loading of `references/` that keeps a long skill affordable. Both discover skills in `~/.agents/skills`:
```bash
mkdir -p ~/.agents/skills
git clone https://github.com/timerise-ai/ksef.git ~/.agents/skills/ksef
```
If a skill is already cloned for Claude Code, symlink it rather than cloning it twice, so one `git pull` updates every agent:
```bash
ln -s ~/.claude/skills/ksef ~/.agents/skills/ksef
```
Invocation differs: `$ksef` in Codex, `/skills` in Gemini CLI. Two things also do not travel on their own. Each host matches a task against a description its own way, so invoke a skill explicitly on a first run instead of assuming it fired. And the non-negotiables in `references/adaptation.md` are where models diverge most, so check that the ones that matter for your module survived the build.
## Why they are public
We do not sell the skills, they are MIT licensed, and none of them contains anything specific to a customer.
Our customers [own the code they receive](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto), so it seemed right that the parts it is assembled from are readable without having to ask. Beyond that, a module is more useful shared than kept. Every improvement a project makes goes back into the skill, and that same repository is what anyone else installs.
We wrote about the rest of how we work in [How we build](/how-we-build).
## What comes next
More skills, and not only for code. A few published skills are in line for their first eval run, and more are being prepared.
By the end of the year we plan to publish the skills of the whole company, across every department: sales, marketing, development, growth and finance. How we qualify a lead or close the books gets written down the way we wrote down how to build a kiosk, so it can be read, installed and improved the same way. The first one from outside engineering is already in the index: a [runbook for a LinkedIn Ads campaign](https://github.com/timerise-ai/ad-campaign-runbook) built around one blog post.
Next to the company's skills come personal ones. People in [Timerise Builders](/blog/timerise-builders-build-your-own-business-on-our-skills) can publish what they know that nobody else has written down: their own way of running a process, or a skill that is theirs alone. A skill published in the catalog earns its author the Author badge.
Each skill is listed in the index the day it is published, so [watch the repository](https://github.com/timerise-ai/skills) if you want to see them arrive. The pack is also being listed on [skills.sh](https://www.skills.sh), the open directory for Agent Skills, so the skills become searchable alongside the rest of the ecosystem.
---
## From Brief to Clickable Prototype in 48 Hours
> Leave a brief and get a clickable prototype of your booking flow and a quote within 48 hours. What is inside, what is not, and why it costs you nothing.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours
The standard way of buying a system goes like this: an intro call, then a second call, then a thirty-page PDF whose most interesting sentence is "final quote after analysis". Three weeks pass and you still have not seen a single screen.
We do it the other way round. You leave a brief, and within 48 hours you get a link to a clickable prototype of your booking flow, plus a quote.
[Get your free prototype](/brief): the brief takes about fifteen minutes and needs no sales call.
## What actually lands in your inbox
The prototype is a visual preview of your system, built from what you wrote in the brief. It is not a template with your logo dropped on top.
- **Your services and your steps.** If booking with you takes four steps, a specialist choice and a consent form, that is exactly what you click through. See the screens from [a prototype for a coworking operator](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces).
- **Your data in the content.** Real service names, real team names, prices, currency, language. That specificity is the whole point, because it is what lets you spot in the first minute what fits and what does not.
- **Your branding.** Colors, typography, the general feel of the interface.
- **A quote and an architecture direction.** What it costs and how we want to build it, in a form you can put in front of your board.
The link is private and tied to your brief. It does not sit on the open internet and it does not end up in search engines.
Two screens from the coworking prototype linked above. The brand, the cities, the prices and the names are made up.


## What it is not
We would rather say this plainly, because the word "prototype" gets stretched a lot.
The prototype runs entirely in the browser. There is no database underneath, it does not talk to any API, it does not take payments and it will not email anyone. The data inside is prepared for your case, but it is demo data.
It is not a trial of the production system and not a staging environment. It is a mockup that behaves like the product: you click through it the way your customer would, and you see whether that flow makes sense.
That sounds like a limitation, and it is exactly why it is ready in two days instead of two months.
## Why a prototype beats a proposal
**The decision stops being abstract.** It is hard to judge the sentence "we will build a flexible availability configurator". It is easy to judge a screen where you try to book an appointment and notice there is no location picker.
**Misunderstandings surface in 48 hours, not in week six.** Every brief leaves something unsaid, that is normal. A prototype turns the unsaid into concrete notes: "this step is unnecessary", "the customer has to pick a room here", "our prices depend on duration". At this stage a fix costs one sentence in an email.
**Your whole company sees the same thing.** Operations, marketing and management read a specification in three different ways. A clickable prototype looks identical on every desk, which usually cuts weeks off internal alignment.
**The quote is anchored to something concrete.** The number under the prototype refers to the things you have just seen, not to a bag labelled "booking system". Easier to verify, and easier to compare with other offers.
**You also get to test us.** You see how we read a brief, how we think about your process and what our work looks like, before you sign anything. Two days of output is a fairer sample than the best-written case study.
## How this fits into 48 hours
There is no magic here, just a different order of work.
The prototype is a static front-end layer, so we skip everything that normally eats the most time: the data model, integrations, payments, permissions. AI, guided by [our Agent Skills](/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them), takes us from brief to finished screens in hours rather than days, and the team spends the rest of the time where a machine does not help, which is the logic of your process.
Then there is the less glamorous but equally important part: we run only a few projects at a time. There is no queue in which your brief waits for a free slot.
We wrote more about the way we work in [How we build](/how-we-build).
## The part we consider fair
The prototype is free and comes with no commitment. You do not have to sit through a sales call first: you fill in the brief yourself, in an AI-guided conversation, in about fifteen minutes, at any hour.
Everything created from your brief, the prototype included, is 100% your IP. Only our project team sees the brief, we process it on secure infrastructure, and the conversations are not used to train models.
If you look at the prototype and say "thanks, but no", that is the end of it. No seven-email follow-up sequence starts afterwards.
## When those 48 hours can shift
One case: the brief leaves questions open that would turn the prototype into guesswork. Then we come back with those questions first, and the clock starts from your answer. We would rather ask than deliver on time something that misses how you actually work.
## What happens next
| Stage | Time | Outcome |
| :-------------- | :---------------- | :------------------------------------------------- |
| AI-guided brief | 10 to 15 minutes | A description of your booking process |
| Our work | up to 48 hours | **A clickable prototype and a quote** |
| Your feedback | as long as needed | A corrected scope, still no commitment |
| Build | 6 to 8 weeks | A system in production, code and data on your side |
That last stage runs on a fixed price agreed upfront, 0% commission on your bookings, and a full handover of the code and infrastructure to you, with [data migration and zero-maintenance hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting) included. Why we think this is how booking systems should be bought is the subject of [The Post-SaaS Manifesto](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto).
## Start with the brief
The hardest moment in a project like this is usually the first concrete question: "how is this supposed to work, exactly?". The prototype answers it in 48 hours, on your own data, for free.
[Get your free prototype](/brief) and see your system before you make any decision.
---
## Booking Data Security: GDPR, ISO & HIPAA by Design
> How Timerise secures your booking data: EU data residency, database-level tenant isolation, encrypted health records, and audited access.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking
A booking system is rarely just a calendar. The moment someone reserves a slot, you're holding their name, email, phone number - and in a clinic, a salon, or a therapy practice, often something far more sensitive: why they're coming in.
That data is the most valuable thing you own, and the easiest thing to lose. One misconfigured table, one leaked token, one tenant able to read another tenant's rows, and the trust you spent years building is gone in an afternoon.
So at Timerise we don't treat security as a feature you switch on. We treat it as the architecture. Every layer - the network, the database, authentication, encryption, secrets, audit, and the tests that hold it all in place - assumes the layer above it could fail. That's **defense in depth**, and here's exactly how it works in our booking products.
## EU data residency you can point to
Compliance starts with a simple question: _where does my data physically live?_ For European customers, the answer needs to be "in Europe," with no asterisks.
Timerise runs on Google Cloud, Vercel, and Supabase - three providers that are independently audited, ISO 27001-certified, and HIPAA-ready, each backed by signed data processing agreements. We pin storage and compute to EU regions (Frankfurt for our highest-GDPR deployments), so personal data stays inside the European Economic Area by design rather than by accident.
That means when a customer asks where their patients' records are stored, you give them a region, not a shrug. Data residency is a configuration we own, not a hope we hold. How we run that stack for you, with no servers on your side, is the subject of [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
## Security headers on every response
Before a single byte of application logic runs, the browser has already been told how to behave. We set hardened HTTP security headers globally, on every response:
| Header | Value |
| --------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------- |
| `Strict-Transport-Security` | `max-age=63072000; includeSubDomains; preload` |
| `X-Content-Type-Options` | `nosniff` |
| `X-Frame-Options` | `DENY` |
| `Referrer-Policy` | `strict-origin-when-cross-origin` |
| `Permissions-Policy` | `camera=(), microphone=(), geolocation=()` |
| `Content-Security-Policy` | locked-down baseline |
HSTS forces HTTPS for two years (and is on the browser preload list). `X-Frame-Options: DENY` and a `frame-ancestors 'none'` Content Security Policy make clickjacking a non-event. The CSP baseline starts from `default-src 'self'` and tightens from there - `object-src 'none'`, `base-uri` and `form-action` locked to our own origin - so the set of places a page can load code or send a form from is small and explicit.
These aren't toggles a customer has to remember to flip. They ship on by default, everywhere.
## Tenant isolation enforced in the database
Most multi-tenant breaches aren't dramatic exploits. They're a forgotten `WHERE tenant_id = ?` in some query written at 2 a.m. The only reliable defense is to stop trusting application code to remember.
So tenant isolation in Timerise lives in the database itself, through Postgres **Row-Level Security (RLS)**. Every table carrying tenant data has policies that make a row invisible - for reads, writes, _and_ inserts - to anyone outside its tenant. Combined with a server-first write model (clients never get a direct, privileged path to the data), one tenant simply cannot see or touch another's bookings, customers, or records. The database enforces it, even if a query forgets to.
This isn't a claim we ask you to take on faith. We prove it on every commit - more on that below.
## Authentication built for sensitive workloads
Sessions are where convenience and security usually fight. We resolve it with Supabase Auth and a few non-negotiables.
- **Hardened cookies.** Sessions ride in HTTP-only, Secure, SameSite cookies managed by `@supabase/ssr` - never readable by JavaScript, never sent cross-site.
- **Short-lived tokens with rotation.** JWTs expire after one hour, and refresh tokens rotate on every use. A stolen, replayed refresh token is detected and invalidates the entire session family - so a leaked token is a dead end, not a master key.
- **Scoped identity.** Every request carries the user's role and tenant, and the authoritative access check runs server-side on protected layouts, not just optimistically at the edge.
- **Brute force, blunted.** Repeated failed logins trigger throttling and CAPTCHA escalation; sensitive API and auth routes are rate-limited with a token bucket.
- **Strong credentials.** Passwords must be at least 12 characters and are checked against known-breach databases at the moment they're set.
- **MFA for the keys to the kingdom.** TOTP multi-factor authentication protects owner and manager accounts - the roles that can see and change the most.
## Encryption for health data (GDPR Article 9)
Health data is special-category data under **GDPR Article 9**, and we treat it that way - with a dedicated stack, not a checkbox.
Clinical fields live in their own isolated `clinical` schema and are protected with **application-side envelope encryption**: each tenant gets its own data encryption key, and that key is itself wrapped by a master key held in Supabase Vault or an external EU KMS - never in the repository, with a documented rotation policy. Decryption happens **server-side only**; the raw values never reach the browser. The stored columns are ciphertext, useless to anyone reading the database directly.
Before/after photos and other sensitive media live in a **private bucket** that has no public URLs at all. Access is granted only through short-lived signed URLs, issued after a server-side role check - so a link can't be guessed, scraped, or shared past its expiry.
## Secrets that never touch the repo
The fastest way to leak everything is to commit a key. We make that hard to do by accident.
Secrets live only in the platform environment (Vercel env), never in the codebase; `.env.local` is gitignored and pulled on demand. **gitleaks** scans for credentials both in CI and as a pre-commit hook, so a stray key is caught before it ever reaches a remote branch. Encryption keys, as noted above, live in a vault or KMS - separate from the application entirely.
## Every sensitive action is audited
When something does go wrong - or a customer, regulator, or auditor asks "who touched this record?" - you need an answer, not a guess.
Every mutation on clinical and financial data writes an **append-only audit log** row: who did it (the actor), when (timestamp), what (the entity), and a before/after diff of exactly what changed. Reads of clinical records are logged too, because in health contexts _looking_ is itself a regulated event. The log is append-only by design - entries can be written, never quietly edited or deleted.
## Proven, not promised: full test coverage
Security claims are worthless if nothing checks them after the next refactor. So the controls above aren't documented and forgotten - they're tested, and the tests gate every deploy.
- **Unit tests with enforced coverage.** Vitest with v8 coverage holds an 80% threshold on our core library code, including the encryption layer - round-trip correctness, tenant key isolation, and tamper detection (a modified ciphertext must fail to decrypt).
- **The isolation matrix.** Integration tests run against a _real_ Postgres, not mocks, and assert the thing that matters most: tenant A can never read, write, or insert tenant B's rows, and the audit log stays append-only. A parallel clinical matrix proves special-category rows are visible to clinical roles and hidden from reception - and that stored columns are genuinely ciphertext.
- **End-to-end smoke paths.** Playwright drives the real booking flows on every deploy, with automated accessibility (Axe) checks that fail the build on serious or critical violations.
- **Load tested.** Weekly k6 runs keep hot paths fast under pressure, because availability is part of security too.
Lint, type-checking, and a dedicated RLS policy linter all gate CI as well. A change that weakens isolation doesn't get a stern code review - it gets a red build.
## What this means for GDPR, ISO, and HIPAA
Frameworks don't secure systems; controls do. But it helps to see how these map:
- **GDPR.** EU data residency, Article 9 envelope encryption for health data, a complete audit trail, data minimization at the database layer, and signed [DPAs](/dpa) with every subprocessor.
- **ISO 27001.** We build on ISO 27001-certified infrastructure and mirror its discipline in practice - least-privilege access, secret management, change control gated by CI, and tested isolation.
- **HIPAA.** The platform runs on HIPAA-ready infrastructure with the technical safeguards regulated health data demands: encryption at rest and in transit, strict access control, and audited access to protected records.
We don't hand you a framed certificate and call it a day. We hand you the architecture - and the tests that keep proving it's still true.
## Summary
Security at Timerise isn't a setting; it's how the product is built. EU data residency, hardened headers, database-enforced tenant isolation, short-lived rotated sessions with MFA, envelope-encrypted health data, vaulted secrets, append-only audit logs - and a test suite that fails the build the moment any of it slips.
Your customers' data is the most sensitive thing you'll ever hold for them. Build it on a foundation that treats it that way, and that [you own](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto).
[Review our DPA, privacy policy & terms →](/privacy)
[Start your project →](/brief)
[Matt Sowa](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mateusz-sowa/)
---
## The Post-SaaS Manifesto: Own the Systems Your Business Runs On
> SaaS made software easy to start and easy to never own. Post-SaaS keeps the convenience and adds ownership: your code, your data, your logic, no servers to run.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto
SaaS was step one: software without servers. You signed up, logged in, and started working. Nobody in your company had to know what a deployment was.
Post-SaaS is step two: software without servers, **that you own**.
That is the whole idea. Keep everything SaaS got right. Add the one thing it could never give you: the code, the data, and the logic of the system your revenue runs on.
This is the Post-SaaS Manifesto.
## What SaaS got right
SaaS solved a real problem. Before it, software meant servers, installs, upgrades, and long procurement cycles. SaaS removed that friction: sign up, log in, start working.
It also got the economics right for the early stage. Costs start small. Nobody has to hire an ops team. The product improves without anyone on your side lifting a finger.
For tools at the edge of your business, that is still the right choice. A SaaS form builder, a SaaS help desk, a SaaS analytics dashboard: rent them, and never think about them again.
SaaS is a great way to **use** software. We are not here to argue with that. We are here to ask what comes after it.
## Where a shared platform stops fitting
A booking platform is built for the average business. That is not a flaw. It is the only way one product can serve thousands of customers at once. Its rules are the rules that fit most people most of the time.
Picture a clinic. It opens with one location, a few practitioners, and simple hours. SaaS booking is perfect: live in a day, cheap, done.
Then it grows. A second location with different hours. Practitioners who split their week between sites. Rooms and equipment that must never be double-booked. A rule that new patients need a longer first visit. An insurer integration. A report the finance team needs every month. A coworking operator with several locations hits the same wall, which is why we build [custom booking systems for coworking spaces](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces).
None of this is exotic. It is what success looks like. And one by one, each requirement meets the same answer: the platform does not do that. So the team starts patching. A spreadsheet here. A manual override there. A booking rule now enforced by a person instead of the system.
The software still works. The business has stopped being average, and the platform's rules have stopped being its rules. That is the day the fit ended, and no one sent a notification.
## Post-SaaS: keep the convenience, add the ownership
The Post-SaaS model starts from what a shared platform gives you and asks what has to change so that the system is yours.
| What you get | SaaS | Post-SaaS |
| :----------------- | :--------------------------- | :------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| No servers to run | Yes | **Yes** |
| Live in days | Yes | **Yes, [prototype in 48 hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours)** |
| Availability logic | Platform rules | **Your rules** |
| Pricing logic | Preset models | **Whatever your business needs** |
| Your data | Their schema, partial export | **Yours, in full** |
| Integrations | Vendor-gated | **Deep, system-native** |
| Cost at scale | Grows with revenue | **Tracks usage, not revenue** |
| The exit | Expensive, risky | **Always open** |
The first two rows are the point. Ownership used to mean giving up the convenience. It no longer does.
## We are not against SaaS. We know it from the inside.
Timerise did not arrive at this position from the outside. We ran a booking platform ourselves, and the help center for that app still lives on this site. We know exactly what it takes to keep one product healthy for a large number of customers, and we know where the model runs out.
What changed is where we put that effort. Instead of maintaining one shared product, we maintain the infrastructure under many owned systems: Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore on Google Cloud as the database. The platforms carry the servers and the databases. We carry the deployment, the monitoring, and the security patches. You carry nothing you do not want to. How that works, and how your data gets there without downtime, is the subject of [Painless Data Migration and Zero-Maintenance Hosting](/blog/painless-data-migration-and-zero-maintenance-hosting).
The result is a step up, not a step sideways. The convenience of SaaS stays. The ownership is new.
## When SaaS is still the right call
We will not pretend otherwise: much of the time, SaaS is the correct choice.
Rent SaaS when booking is not mission-critical (we compare both paths in [custom booking vs SaaS](/custom-booking-vs-saas)), when your workflows are simple and unlikely to change, when volume is modest, and when speed matters more than control. A pilot, an early-stage product, a secondary channel: do not build infrastructure for those. Buy a subscription and move on.
Ownership earns its place when booking is genuinely core: when it drives revenue directly, when operations depend on non-trivial rules, when other systems read your booking data, and when you intend to grow. Below that line, a manifesto is overkill. Above it, owning is the calmer option.
## What Post-SaaS looks like in practice
Timerise does not sell access to a platform. We design and build custom booking infrastructure, accelerated by AI, and we hand it over completely:
- You receive the **code**, not a login.
- You own the **data** and the schema.
- You control the **logic** and the roadmap.
- You pay **once** for the system, never a commission on your growth.
We are specific about what that means in practice:
- **6 to 8 weeks** from the first call to a system running in production.
- A **fixed price**, set by the complexity of your booking logic, not by hours billed.
- **0% commission** and no recurring platform fees layered on top ([ownership vs commission](/ownership-vs-commission)).
- **3 years of support** included after handover, with the full source code and infrastructure transferred to you.
AI is what makes this practical. It removes the old excuse that custom is slow and expensive. As we argued in [The End of SaaS Compromises](/blog/ai-revolution-software-as-a-product), custom infrastructure can now ship in weeks, not months. And because the frontend is yours, you can keep extending it the way [open-source components](/blog/the-power-of-open-source) let you.
## The principles
1. If a system is core to your revenue, own its code, its data, and its logic. All three.
2. Owning a system should never mean running a server you do not want to run.
3. Growth must not raise your platform bill. Costs track usage, not revenue.
4. Your workflows shape the system, never the other way around.
5. Leaving stays cheap in both directions: into the system, and out of it.
6. AI ended the trade-off. Custom is no longer slow, and no longer expensive.
## The real question
The SaaS pitch always asks the same thing: how much does it cost per month? It is a fair question for a tool at the edge of your business. For the system at its center, ask a different one: **what do we want to own in three years?**
When booking is core to what you do, ownership is not an upgrade over SaaS. It is the next step after it.
---
## Agent-Ready Payments: How Bookings Get Paid When Nobody Fills a Form
> Discovery gets you found. MCP lets agents talk to your API. But most checkouts still assume a browser and a human thumb - agent-mediated payments, explained.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings
Friday, 9:42 PM. A traveler asks their AI assistant: _"Book me a 60-minute deep-tissue massage near my hotel tomorrow afternoon, under €80, with a 24-hour cancellation window."_
The agent finds three providers. Two need a card-on-file flow that opens in a browser. The agent can't open a browser. It picks the third - the one that accepted the booking _and_ held the deposit in a single API call, against a mandate the user pre-authorized last week.
You weren't on that shortlist. Not because your prices were wrong. Because the agent couldn't pay you.
Discovery is solved by [AEO](/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services). Connection is solved by [MCP](/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book). **Payment is the next failure mode** - and most booking systems aren't ready for it.
## Why Classic Checkout Breaks for Agents
A normal checkout assumes four things, all of which break the moment the buyer is an AI agent:
1. **A visible 3DS challenge.** Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) under PSD2 was designed to interrupt a user with a UI flow. Agents don't see UIs. If your only path through SCA is a redirect to a card-issuer page, the booking fails silently.
2. **A browser session that stays open.** Tokenized card vaults often hand back an iframe or a redirect target. Agents call APIs and move on; they don't keep tabs alive.
3. **A human thumb on a "Confirm" button.** Two decades of UX research have been optimizing the moment a human commits. That moment doesn't exist anymore.
4. **Form fields for card data.** Even if the agent has a payment method, it's almost never raw PAN. It's a token, mandate, or a delegated wallet handle.
If your checkout assumes any of these, the agent moves on to a provider whose checkout doesn't.
## Three Authorization Models in Agentic Commerce
There isn't one right pattern. Today, three models are converging - each with a different trust and latency profile:
### 1. Pre-authorized mandates
The user grants the agent (or the wallet behind the agent) standing authority to charge specific service categories up to a cap. The agent books and charges in a single API call.
- **Best for:** trusted platforms, recurring or low-value bookings, frequent travelers.
- **Mechanics:** Stripe `Customer` mandate, ACH/SEPA mandates, card-on-file with off-session intents.
- **Trade-off:** highest convenience, lowest friction. The user can't review every charge individually.
### 2. Delegated payments
The agent prepares a payment intent and hands it to a _verified user device_ for tap confirmation. The booking is held; the human ratifies.
- **Best for:** higher-value bookings, first-time providers, regulated industries.
- **Mechanics:** PaymentIntent created off-session, push to the wallet, capture after biometric confirmation.
- **Trade-off:** strong fraud posture, but adds 5–60 seconds of human-in-the-loop latency.
### 3. Per-transaction confirmations
The agent commits the booking with a hold; the user receives a notification, taps to confirm, capture happens. If they ignore it, the hold expires and the slot reopens.
- **Best for:** providers without an existing mandate relationship to the user.
- **Mechanics:** PaymentIntent with `capture_method=manual`, 7-day auth window, webhook on capture.
- **Trade-off:** highest drop-off, lowest trust requirement.
Most providers will end up supporting models 2 and 3. The wallet - Apple Pay, Google Pay, or an agent-native wallet - decides which one fires for a given transaction.
## Holds and Deposits as the Trust Layer
The cleanest pattern we see: **the agent commits early, the human ratifies later, the slot is held in between.**
Concretely:
1. Agent calls `createBooking` with a `paymentIntent` whose `capture_method` is `manual`.
2. The card is _authorized_ - funds reserved, not captured. On most card networks, that auth holds for up to 7 days.
3. Your system emits a webhook and a push to the user.
4. User confirms → you capture. User ignores → the auth expires; the slot reopens automatically.
This is graceful degradation. The agent acts decisively, the user retains the final say, and you never end up with a phantom booking blocking real customers.
## Refunds and No-Shows When the Booker Isn't Human
When the buyer is an AI, the dispute landscape shifts:
- **The agent's log becomes evidence.** A timestamped tool-call trace ("user requested booking, agent confirmed, payment captured at T+3.2s") is stronger evidence than a session cookie ever was.
- **Chargeback risk drops** for transactions where a verified user mandate signed off - the issuer treats it closer to a recurring authorized charge than a card-not-present dispute.
- **Pre-paid deposits get more important.** They de-risk the [no-show](/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations) case where the agent booked enthusiastically but the user never showed up.
- **Your no-show policy must be machine-readable.** If your cancellation terms are buried in a legal page, the agent ignores them - and your refund decisions look arbitrary later.
Expose policy as structured data: cancellation window, deposit amount, refund tiers. Agents read these _before_ they book, not when something goes wrong.
## What Timerise Ships Today
If you're building on Timerise, the pieces are already there:
- **`paymentIntent` with manual capture** on every booking mutation. Default hold window: 7 days, returned in the response so the agent knows when it expires.
- **Stripe customer mandates** that bind to a Timerise booking session - re-usable across providers under the same merchant of record.
- **Webhook acknowledgement** as the canonical "booking confirmed" event. Don't trust the HTTP 200 from your booking call; trust the webhook.
- **Idempotency keys** required on `createBooking` and `capturePayment`. Replay-safe by construction.
- **Structured error codes** that an agent can route on without parsing English: `card_declined`, `insufficient_authorization`, `slot_taken`, `mandate_revoked`, `sca_required`.
These map cleanly to the MCP tools we ship, so an agent connected over MCP can recover from a failed payment without escalating to the user - most of the time.
## The Agent-Ready Payments Checklist
If you want bookings from AI agents, audit your payment surface against this list:
1. **Idempotency keys** on booking and payment mutations. The agent will retry; make retries safe.
2. **Webhooks** that double as booking confirmation, not optional listeners.
3. **Structured error codes** - strings the agent can `switch` on, not human messages.
4. **SCA exemption flags** in your responses (Low Value, Trusted Beneficiary, MIT) so the agent knows when a challenge is avoidable.
5. **Manual-capture support** with the hold window (in seconds) returned in the response.
6. **Refund and cancellation policy as fields**, not free-form text. Cancellation cutoff in ISO 8601, refund percentage as a number.
7. **Receipt URL** in the success response. Agents drop these into the user's wallet automatically.
Half of these are normal API hygiene. The other half is what separates "we accept payments" from "agents will use us."
## The Payment Is the Real Handshake
Discovery (AEO) gets you on the shortlist. Connection (MCP) lets the agent talk. Payment is where the booking actually becomes a booking.
If your checkout still assumes a browser and a human thumb, you've built an inviting front door with a lock the agent can't pick. The agent will move on to the next provider on its list - silently, with no ticket logged for you to debug.
If you are still deciding what an agent-driven channel means for you, start with [why your customers will soon book with AI, not forms](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business).
The next twelve months will sort booking businesses into two camps: those whose money moves at agent speed, and those still waiting for a confirmation click that never comes.
---
## Agent Experience Optimization: How AI Booking Agents Find (or Miss) Your Services
> AEO is the new SEO. When your customer is an AI agent, not a human with a browser, discoverability changes - here's what makes a service agent-readable.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services
Saturday, 8:14 AM. A customer asks their AI assistant: _"Find me a yoga class this morning in the city center, under $30, beginners welcome."_
The agent doesn't open a browser. It queries six providers it already knows about, filters out the four that don't expose live availability, and shortlists two that match - clear pricing, the right level, an open slot at 10:15. It books one, pays the deposit, drops the confirmation into the customer's calendar with the right timezone.
You weren't on that shortlist. Not because your studio is worse. Because the agent couldn't see you.
This is the new game. SEO got businesses found by humans typing into Google. **Agent Experience Optimization (AEO)** is what gets you found by autonomous AI agents calling APIs. The rules are different. Most businesses haven't noticed yet, even though [customers are already booking with AI instead of forms](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business).
## AEO Is the New SEO
For twenty years, discoverability meant ranking on a search engine. You optimized titles, structured headings, built backlinks, fought for the top three blue links. The currency was _attention_ - humans scanning a page.
Agents don't scan pages. They call functions. An AI booking assistant doesn't read your hero section, doesn't admire your photos, doesn't notice your testimonials. It asks: _"What services do you offer? What's available between 9 and 11 on Saturday? What's the cancellation policy?"_ - and it expects machine-readable answers, in milliseconds.
If the answer requires a human to interpret a calendar widget, you don't exist. If your prices are buried in a PDF, you don't exist. If your "real-time availability" refreshes once a night, you don't exist.
AEO is the discipline of making sure your booking infrastructure is legible to machines as effortlessly as your website is legible to humans.
## What Makes a Service Agent-Readable
There are four things every AEO-ready booking service needs. Skip any one of them and agents skip you.
### 1. Structured service data
Agents need to know what you sell, in machine-readable form. Not "60-min energizing morning class with our award-winning instructor" as flowing prose, but a typed object: `name`, `duration`, `price`, `currency`, `category`, `prerequisites`, `language`, `format` (in-person/online), `location`, `tags`. The same fields every agent gets, with the same names, every time.
On the public web, this is what `schema.org` was designed for. `Service`, `Reservation`, `OfferCatalog`, `LocationFeatureSpecification` - embedded as JSON-LD, they let crawlers and agents understand your offer without parsing layout. On the API side, the same shape lives in your booking system's data model.
If you can't programmatically answer _"give me the full service catalog as JSON"_ in one request, your agent-readability score is zero.
### 2. Live, machine-readable availability
A booking page that _looks_ live to a human (because it loads via JavaScript) is often invisible to an agent that doesn't run a browser. What agents need is a public availability endpoint: given a service, a location, and a date range, return the open slots.
`GET /availability?serviceId=...&from=...&to=...` returning a JSON array of slot objects with start time, end time, capacity, and timezone - that's the contract. Static HTML calendars, "call to confirm" links, manual spreadsheets that sync overnight: all useless to agents.
Real-time means real-time. If a slot was booked thirty seconds ago, the next agent query has to reflect it.
### 3. Stable identifiers and IANA timezones
Agents don't reason about your data, they reference it. Every project, service, location, and slot needs a stable, durable ID. Renaming a service shouldn't change its ID. Migrating regions shouldn't either.
And every time field has to carry an explicit IANA timezone - `Europe/Warsaw`, `America/New_York`, never just "+02:00" or local time without context. We covered why in [the timezone post](/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis). When an agent books a Tokyo customer with a Berlin therapist for "3 PM," it doesn't get to guess.
### 4. Transparent pricing and policies
Hidden fees, "ask for a quote," deposit rules buried in a terms page - agents won't dig for these. (How agents then pay is its own topic: [agent-ready payments](/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings).) If the price isn't a number on the wire, the agent treats your service as priced unknown and ranks it below clearer competitors.
Same for cancellation, deposits, prerequisites, age restrictions, equipment requirements. Whatever a human guest would ask before booking, an agent will ask too - through your API. If the answer isn't a structured field, you lose the slot.
## The MCP Layer: How Agents Actually Talk to You
Even with all four pillars in place, you still have an integration problem. Every agent in the wild - Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, the next ten platforms nobody's heard of yet - would otherwise need a custom adapter to talk to your API.
That's where **Model Context Protocol (MCP)** changes the math. MCP is an open standard (originally proposed by Anthropic, now adopted broadly) that lets an agent connect to a server, ask _"what can you do?"_, and get back a self-describing list of operations. No bespoke integration. No prompt engineering for each platform.
We covered the Timerise MCP server in [a separate deep dive](/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book) - 16 tools covering the full booking lifecycle, mounted at `/mcp`. The point for AEO: an MCP-compatible booking system gets onboarded by an agent in seconds. A non-MCP system requires a developer to hand-write a tool manifest before the agent can use it. Guess which one ends up on shortlists.
If schema.org is the agent-readable map of your _services_, MCP is the agent-readable map of your _capabilities_.
## How Agents Actually Discover Providers
A reasonable question: how does an agent know your studio exists in the first place?
Today, four entry points dominate, and you should be visible on at least two:
- **Marketplace platforms with public catalogs.** Booksy, ClassPass, Eventbrite, Mindbody - agents already pull live availability from these via partner APIs. Being listed makes you discoverable to any agent that integrates with the platform.
- **Search engines that surface structured data.** Google's `/Reservation` schema and similar Bing/Apple equivalents are increasingly read by AI assistants. Marking up your services with proper JSON-LD is still the best way to land in answers from a general-purpose AI search.
- **MCP registries.** Just as `npm` lists packages and `App Store` lists apps, MCP server directories are emerging where agents look up booking servers by domain or category. Registering your MCP endpoint is becoming the equivalent of submitting your sitemap to Google in 2005.
- **Direct hand-off from your existing channels.** Customers paste your [booking link](/blog/share-your-booking-page-link) into their AI assistant - _"book me into this"_. The agent crawls the link, finds (or doesn't find) an MCP endpoint or a typed availability API, and proceeds. This pathway rewards businesses whose booking page exposes machine-readable hooks even when a human is the entry point.
If you're absent from all four, agents have no way to reach you.
## The AEO Checklist (Do This Week)
Concrete moves that move the needle, none of which require rebuilding your stack:
1. **Audit your service catalog.** Every service should have a name, duration, price, currency, category tag, and a 1-2 sentence description optimized for matching, not marketing. Vague titles like "Premium Package" lose every comparison.
2. **Expose a public availability endpoint.** If your booking provider doesn't offer one, that's the migration signal. Agents won't scrape your widget.
3. **Add `schema.org/Service` and `schema.org/Reservation` JSON-LD** to your booking pages. Fifteen minutes of work, lasting benefit for AI search.
4. **Set explicit IANA timezones** on every service and slot. Drop "local time" everywhere - it's a silent bug factory.
5. **Make policies machine-readable.** Cancellation window, deposit amount, prerequisites, language - fields, not paragraphs.
6. **Register your MCP endpoint** if your booking system supports MCP. If it doesn't, ask your provider when it will.
7. **Tag services with intent keywords** ("beginner-friendly", "outdoor", "kid-safe", "wheelchair-accessible"). Agents match on tags long before they parse descriptions.
8. **Verify your real-time availability is actually real-time.** Open two browser windows, book a slot in one, refresh the other. If there's a delay, you're invisible at the moment that matters most.
9. **Track agent traffic separately.** Tag programmatic API calls with a distinct user-agent or auth scope so you can see how much of your booking volume is already coming from agents. Most operators are surprised.
## Where Timerise Fits
Timerise was built API-first, well before AEO had a name, because we believed the booking layer would eventually be consumed by software more often than by humans. Concretely:
- The **[GraphQL API](/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps)** returns a fully typed service catalog and live availability - agent-readable by construction.
- The **MCP server** mounted at `/mcp` exposes 16 booking tools to any MCP-compatible agent without integration code.
- **IANA-aware timezone handling** means cross-border bookings never fall into the local-time trap.
- **Structured policies** (deposits, cancellation windows, prerequisites, form fields) live as first-class data, not free-text disclaimers.
- **Stable IDs** on projects, services, locations, slots, and bookings make agents safe to reference your data over time.
None of this is a marketing layer bolted on. It's the underlying shape of the system. If you're building a service that needs to be agent-discoverable in 2026 and beyond, this is the substrate you want.
## The Window Is Open, Briefly
Every prior shift in distribution had a window. Businesses that opened a Google My Business listing before competitors won local search. Businesses that exposed live availability via API before competitors won marketplace integrations. Businesses that mark themselves AEO-ready before competitors will win the first wave of AI-mediated booking traffic.
The window stays open until the platforms that mediate AI bookings start deciding which providers they'll source from by default - and once those defaults harden, climbing into them is a years-long battle. Right now they're listening. Right now your service catalog, your availability endpoint, and your MCP server are the audition.
Show up legibly, and the agents will find you. Stay invisible, and your competitors will collect the bookings that used to ring your phone.
---
Timerise is built API-first with native MCP support, IANA timezones, and machine-readable service data - the substrate AI agents need. If you want to see what AEO looks like for your business, [leave a brief](/brief), open the chat in the corner, or write to us at [hello@timerise.ai](mailto:hello@timerise.ai).
---
## Your Customers Will Soon Book With AI, Not Forms - What This Means for Your Business
> AI assistants are learning to book on behalf of customers. What that shift means for business owners, and how to make your booking system ready for it.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business
It's 7 PM. Your studio is closed. A potential customer picks up their phone and asks their AI assistant: _"Find me a yoga class this Saturday morning in the city center, under $30."_
The AI doesn't open a browser or scroll Google. It connects straight to booking systems, checks live availability across providers, compares prices, and books a class that fits. The customer gets a confirmation. No form. No tab. No human in the loop.
You either showed up in that search, or you didn't.
This isn't a distant future. It's happening now, and faster than most business owners realize.
## What Changed (and Why Now)
For years, AI could only talk. It answered questions, wrote text, translated documents. But it couldn't _do_ things. It had no hands.
That changed with **AI agents**: language models that use tools, call APIs, and complete multi-step tasks on their own. Today's AI assistants, embedded in phones, browsers, and business apps, don't just recommend services. They book them, [pay for them](/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings), and reschedule them when needed.
The key enabler is a new generation of protocols, such as the [Model Context Protocol (MCP)](/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book), that let AI connect to external systems in a standardized way. Instead of a custom integration for every service, an AI agent can discover what a booking system can do and interact with it: instantly, reliably, at scale.
## What This Means for Your Business
### 1. The booking form is no longer the front door
For the past decade, your booking page was the destination. Customers found you through Google, Instagram, or word of mouth, then came to _your_ website to book.
In an AI-mediated world, that flow breaks. The customer never visits your site. The AI acts as the intermediary: it finds you, checks availability, and completes the transaction. **Your booking system becomes an API, not a page.**
You still need a website. It just isn't enough on its own anymore.
### 2. Speed and precision matter more than ever
AI agents don't tolerate ambiguity. If your availability is stale, your service descriptions are vague, or your system returns errors, the agent moves to the next option in milliseconds. No patience, no second chance to explain.
Businesses that win in this environment have:
- **Real-time availability** (not "call to check")
- **Clear, structured service data** (duration, price, requirements)
- **Reliable APIs** that respond correctly every time
### 3. First-mover advantage is real
Very few businesses are AI-compatible today. The ones that are will dominate AI search results. An AI assistant looking for a plumber, a physiotherapist, or a dog groomer will default to systems it can actually work with.
Early means found. Late means invisible, not because your service is worse, but because the AI simply can't reach you.
### 4. Your data quality becomes a competitive advantage
AI agents match customers to services based on what your system tells them. The richer and more accurate your descriptions, pricing, and availability, the better the match. A business that describes its services precisely and keeps availability live will be surfaced more often and matched more accurately.
Think of it as SEO for AI agents. We call it [Agent Experience Optimization](/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services).
## What Stays the Same
Let's be clear: **AI agents handle the transaction, not the experience.**
The quality of your service, the relationships you build, the personal touch that brings customers back, none of that changes. AI books the appointment. You deliver what matters.
Your online reputation still counts. Reviews, photos, how you respond to customers, these are signals AI agents weigh too. The basics of running a great business don't disappear. They just get a new distribution layer on top.
## How to Prepare
You don't need to become a software engineer. But you do need a booking infrastructure that's ready.
**Check that your booking system has an [API](/blog/booking-apis-made-simple).** If customers can only book through your website, with no programmatic access to availability or bookings, you're invisible to AI agents. Full stop.
**Make sure availability is real-time.** Manual calendars, spreadsheets, or systems that refresh once a day won't cut it. Agents need to know right now whether Saturday's 10am slot is free.
**Describe your services precisely.** Duration, price, location, requirements, what's included: all of this should be structured data in your system, not buried in a paragraph on your About page.
**Look for systems that support modern standards.** The booking infrastructure emerging as AI-compatible supports protocols like MCP (Model Context Protocol), which is becoming the standard way AI agents talk to external tools. If your system doesn't support it, it may not make the shortlist when agents look for options.
## The Window Is Open, But Not Forever
Every major shift in how customers find and transact with businesses creates a window. Businesses that moved to online booking early captured customers tired of phone calls. Businesses that showed up on Google Maps first captured local search. Businesses that were bookable on Instagram captured impulse buyers.
AI-mediated booking is that window, right now.
The businesses that make themselves accessible, with real-time APIs, clean data, and modern protocols, will be the ones AI agents recommend, book, and send customers to. The rest will be waiting for the phone to ring.
---
Timerise is built API-first, with real-time availability, structured service data, and support for the Model Context Protocol. If you want to explore what this means for your business, [leave a brief](/brief), open the chat in the corner, or write to us at [hello@timerise.ai](mailto:hello@timerise.ai).
---
## Timerise Offline: Island Mode for Field Operations
> How Timerise keeps bookings, inventory, and access control running when internet drops - using database-level replication that auto-syncs when connectivity returns.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/timerise-offline-island-mode-for-field-operations
Saturday afternoon at a shooting range thirty kilometers outside the city. Twenty customers on site, the next group already checking in at the kiosk. Then the LTE modem loses signal - a cell tower overloaded during a local event, or just the reality of operating in a place surrounded by concrete walls and forest. The cloud dashboard goes dark.
What happens to your bookings? Your inventory counts? The electronic locks securing the armory? If your scheduling system lives entirely in the cloud, the answer is: everything stops. Staff switch to paper, customers wait, and when the connection returns you spend the rest of the day reconciling handwritten notes with your database.
## Why Cloud-Only Fails at Field Venues
Cloud-first architecture works brilliantly for offices, clinics, and [urban co-working spaces](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces) - places with redundant fiber and stable Wi-Fi. But a growing category of businesses operates in environments where **continuous internet is a luxury, not a given**:
- **Shooting ranges** - often located in industrial zones or rural areas with poor cellular coverage, thick concrete walls blocking signal
- **Paintball and airsoft fields** - forest clearings, abandoned buildings, open terrain with no fixed broadband
- **Offroad parks and rally stages** - remote locations where the nearest fiber cable is kilometers away
- **Bushcraft camps and survival events** - deliberately off-grid, sometimes with satellite or mobile hotspot as the only link to civilization
These venues share a pattern: they need a booking system, inventory tracking, and access control just like any urban business - but they cannot guarantee uninterrupted connectivity. They work with **sync windows** - periods when the internet is available - rather than an always-on connection.
## Island Mode: Your Location Becomes Self-Sufficient
Timerise solves this with **Island Mode** (also available as the open [`island-mode-server` Agent Skill](/skills/island-mode-server)) - a local server deployed on-site that maintains a complete replica of your location's data and automatically takes over when the cloud becomes unreachable.
The local server runs on a compact Linux machine (a mini PC, an Intel NUC, even a Raspberry Pi-class device with enough RAM) connected to the same LAN as your kiosk and staff terminals. It continuously replicates data from the cloud in the background. When the internet drops, terminals seamlessly switch to the local server. When connectivity returns, everything syncs back.
No manual intervention. No data loss. No downtime.
## Architecture: Cloud, Local Server, and Terminals
```
Internet
|
+--------+--------+
| Cloud |
| Firestore SSOT |
+--------+--------+
|
DB-level replication
(real-time)
|
+--------+--------+
| Local Server |
| NestJS + RxDB |
+--------+--------+
|
LAN (Wi-Fi/ETH)
|
+-----------+-----------+
| | |
Kiosk Staff Hardware
(PWA) (PWA) (Lock Ctrl)
```
**Online mode**: Terminals talk to the cloud API. The local server quietly replicates all data in the background - bookings, inventory, pricing, staff records, lock states - eight collections synchronized in real time.
**Offline mode (Island Mode)**: When the cloud becomes unreachable, terminals redirect to the local server on the LAN. Bookings continue, inventory updates flow, electronic locks respond to commands. The location operates as an autonomous island.
**Return to online**: The local server detects connectivity restored, flushes all locally created data to the cloud, and terminals migrate back to the cloud API. The transition is invisible to staff and customers.
### Heartbeat and Automatic Failover
The local server sends a heartbeat to the cloud every 30 seconds. If the cloud detects no heartbeat for over 60 seconds, it marks the location as offline. This status propagates in real time - the public booking page disables new reservations for that location (since the cloud can't guarantee slot availability while the location is in Island Mode), while on-site operations continue uninterrupted through the local server.
## Database-Level Replication: Why It Matters
Most offline-capable systems attempt to solve sync at the **application layer** - queuing API calls, replaying REST requests, resolving conflicts through middleware. This approach is fragile. Every endpoint needs its own offline queue. Conflict resolution is ad-hoc. A failed replay can leave data in an inconsistent state.
Timerise takes a fundamentally different approach: **replication happens at the database level**.
The local server uses **RxDB** - a reactive database designed for real-time replication - synchronized directly with **Firestore** in the cloud. This is not an API cache. It is a full bidirectional database replica with built-in conflict resolution.
The advantages are significant:
- **Speed** - Data replicates as documents, not as serialized HTTP request-response cycles. There is no REST overhead, no retry queues, no middleware translation.
- **Consistency** - The database engine handles conflict resolution using timestamps and document revisions, not application code. Every record has a single source of truth.
- **Security** - In line with our [security-by-design approach](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking), replication uses authenticated database channels with service account credentials, not exposed API endpoints. The attack surface is smaller than an API-based sync layer.
- **Completeness** - All eight data collections (locations, bookings, inventory, transactions, locks, lock logs, pricing, staff) replicate as a unit. There is no risk of partial sync where bookings update but inventory doesn't.
When the connection returns after an offline period, the local RxDB instance and cloud Firestore reconcile automatically. No manual merge. No lost records.
## Kiosk and Staff Terminals
Island Mode powers two types of on-site terminals, both built as Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) that run in a browser:
### Self-Service Kiosk
A touch-screen terminal where customers book and check in without staff assistance (see the [`booking-kiosk` skill](/skills/booking-kiosk) for the full flow). The kiosk runs in fullscreen mode on a dedicated display - no address bar, no system UI, no distractions. It supports multiple languages, resets automatically after inactivity, and disables all browser escape routes (right-click, pinch-zoom, swipe navigation).
In Island Mode, the kiosk connects to the local server over LAN and continues to show available slots, accept bookings, and process check-ins. Customers never know the internet is down.
### Staff Terminal
A PWA for employees to manage daily operations: view today's bookings, check in customers, issue and return inventory items (weapons, ammunition, safety equipment), control electronic locks, and adjust stock levels. Staff authenticate with their credentials - in online mode verified by the cloud, in offline mode verified against the local staff replica.
The staff terminal handles the operational core of a location: **bookings, inventory, and physical access control** - all three continue working in Island Mode.
## Use Cases: Where Island Mode Shines
### Shooting Ranges
The original use case. Shooting ranges combine several offline-hostile factors: thick concrete construction (signal attenuation), rural locations (poor coverage), and high-stakes inventory (weapons and ammunition that must be tracked precisely). Island Mode keeps the booking flow, inventory ledger, and electronic armory locks operational regardless of connectivity. When the internet returns - whether in minutes or at the end of the day - all data syncs to the cloud.
### Paintball and Airsoft Fields
Typically located in forests, abandoned industrial sites, or open fields. Infrastructure is minimal. Internet often comes from a mobile hotspot that loses signal when the weather changes or too many phones connect. With Island Mode, the check-in kiosk at the entrance keeps processing groups, staff track equipment issue and return, and the operation runs smoothly through the sync window - morning setup with internet, offline during peak hours, evening sync when staff return to the office area.
### Offroad Parks and Rally Events
Temporary or semi-permanent venues in remote terrain. Connectivity might be satellite-based with high latency and limited bandwidth, or a mobile hotspot that works only from the hilltop near the entrance. Island Mode is designed for exactly this scenario: replicate everything during the connectivity window, operate autonomously during the event, sync results when the crew packs up and returns to coverage.
### Bushcraft and Survival Events
Multi-day events in deliberately off-grid locations. Internet availability might be limited to a 30-minute satellite window each morning. Island Mode turns that window into a sync opportunity - the local server pushes all overnight bookings, equipment logs, and access records to the cloud, pulls any updates (new pricing, schedule changes), and then operates independently until the next window.
## How Sync Works in Practice
The lifecycle of a typical day at a field venue with Island Mode:
1. **Morning startup** - The local server boots with the machine (automatic systemd service). It connects to the internet and begins replicating. Within seconds, all eight data collections are synchronized with the cloud.
2. **Operations begin** - Customers arrive. The kiosk and staff terminals connect through the cloud API while internet is available. The local server continues replicating in the background, maintaining a live mirror.
3. **Internet drops** - The heartbeat fails. After three consecutive missed heartbeats (configurable), the local server switches to offline mode. Terminals detect the change and redirect to the local server's LAN address. Operations continue without interruption.
4. **Island operations** - New bookings are created locally. Inventory moves are recorded. Lock commands execute. All data is stored in the local RxDB instance with full consistency.
5. **Internet returns** - The local server detects connectivity, sends a heartbeat, and begins flushing locally created data to Firestore. The cloud marks the location as online. Terminals gradually migrate back to the cloud API. The public booking page re-enables.
6. **End of day** - All data is consistent between local and cloud. The manager can review the day's operations from anywhere - every booking, every inventory transaction, every lock event is in the cloud, regardless of how many offline periods occurred.
## Built for the Real World
Island Mode isn't a theoretical failsafe - it's a production feature designed for venues where offline operation is a daily reality, not an edge case. Database-level replication means the sync is fast, consistent, and secure. PWA terminals mean no native apps to install or update. The patterns behind it are written down in [our Agent Skills](/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them). Automatic failover means staff don't need to flip a switch or call IT.
If your venue operates where the internet doesn't, Timerise keeps running.
---
**Ready to take your operations offline-proof?** [Get in touch](/contact) to discuss Island Mode deployment for your venue.
---
## MCP Server: Your AI Agent Just Learned to Book
> The Timerise API includes a built-in MCP server that lets AI agents search services, check availability, and manage bookings without writing integration code.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book
Your AI agent can write an essay, analyze a contract, and translate documentation into 30 languages. But can it book a haircut appointment?
Until recently, the answer was no, even as [customers started to book with AI instead of forms](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business). Not because language models aren't smart enough. Because **they had no standard way to communicate with external systems**. Every integration required dedicated code, endpoint mapping, and manual authorization management.
**Model Context Protocol (MCP)** changes that. It's an open standard for communication between AI agents and external tools - something like USB-C for artificial intelligence. And the Timerise API has a built-in MCP server that lets agents perform real booking operations from the very first minute.
## What Is Model Context Protocol?
MCP (Model Context Protocol) is a protocol developed by Anthropic that defines how AI agents can discover and use tools provided by external servers. Instead of hardcoding API calls in prompts, the agent connects to an MCP server and automatically learns what operations are available.
An analogy? Think of it as a restaurant menu. Instead of guessing what the kitchen can prepare, the agent gets a list of dishes (tools) with descriptions and ingredients (parameters). It picks what it needs and places an order.
In practice, it works like this:
1. The agent sends an `initialize` request to the MCP server.
2. The server returns a list of available tools with descriptions and parameter schemas.
3. The agent calls a specific tool with the appropriate arguments.
4. The server executes the operation and returns the result.
No glue code. No manual documentation. The agent understands what it can do on its own.
## How Does the MCP Server Work in Timerise?
The MCP server is mounted directly on the Timerise API at the `/mcp` path. There's no separate process to run and no additional infrastructure to configure. All you need is an API key and the server address:
- **Sandbox:** `https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp`
- **Production:** `https://api.timerise.io/mcp`
The authorization flow is straightforward:
1. The agent sends `POST /mcp` with an `Authorization: Bearer ` header.
2. The server creates a private MCP session and returns a session identifier in the `mcp-session-id` header.
3. Every subsequent call within that session uses the same API key.
4. The agent sends `DELETE /mcp` to end the session.
All Timerise access controls work as usual - the API key determines which projects and services the agent can access.
## 16 Tools for Complete Booking Management
The MCP server exposes 16 tools organized into four groups. They cover the entire booking lifecycle and give developers access to the API schema and key management.
### Service Discovery
- `list_projects` - list projects accessible with the given API key
- `get_project` - details of a selected project
- `list_services` - list services within a project
- `get_service` - service details, including required form fields (`formFields`)
- `list_locations` - list physical or virtual locations
### Slot Availability
- `list_available_slots` - query available slots within a given date range
### Booking Management
- `create_booking` - create a booking (slot-based or range-based)
- `confirm_booking` - confirm a booking (change status from `NEW` to `CONFIRMED`)
- `cancel_booking` - cancel a booking
- `reschedule_booking` - move a booking to a different time
- `list_bookings` - list bookings with filters (status, service, date range)
- `get_booking_details` - full details of a specific booking
### Developer Tools
- `get_api_schema` - retrieve the full GraphQL API schema in SDL format, useful for exploring the data structure and building integrations
- `list_api_users` - list API users and their keys within a project
- `create_api_key` - create a new API key for a project (the key is shown only once)
- `delete_api_key` - delete an API key by its ID
With these tools, an AI agent can not only handle bookings but also help developers with onboarding - fetch the API schema, create a sandbox key, and start integrating right away. All without leaving the IDE.
The agent doesn't need to know [GraphQL](/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps) structure or request formats. The MCP server abstracts those details and exposes clean, well-described tools.
## From Question to Booking - Step by Step
Let's see how an AI agent handles the full booking process using MCP tools. The user writes: "Book me a haircut on Monday morning if anything is available."
**Step 1: Find the project**
The agent calls `list_projects` and receives a list of projects, e.g., `"Haircut Studio"` with ID `prj_abc123`.
**Step 2: Find the service**
The agent calls `list_services` with the `projectId` and finds `"Men's Haircut"` with ID `svc_xyz789`.
**Step 3: Check required fields**
The agent calls `get_service` to learn what data is needed for the booking. The server returns a field list: full name (required), email (required), phone (optional).
**Step 4: Check availability**
The agent calls `list_available_slots` with the Monday morning date range and receives a list of free slots with their IDs.
**Step 5: Create the booking**
The agent calls `create_booking` with the selected slot, user data, and [timezone](/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis). The booking is created with status `NEW`.
**Step 6: Confirm the booking**
The agent calls `confirm_booking` to change the status to `CONFIRMED`.
Six tool calls. Zero lines of integration code. The agent determines the operation sequence on its own based on tool descriptions provided by the MCP server.
## Setup in 2 Minutes
The Timerise MCP server works with any client that supports the MCP protocol. Here's how to connect it to popular tools.
### Claude Desktop
Edit the config file (macOS: `~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json`):
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"timerise": {
"url": "https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp",
"headers": {
"Authorization": "Bearer SANDBOX-your-api-key-here"
}
}
}
}
```
> **Production:** replace the URL with `https://api.timerise.io/mcp` and use a key with the `PROD-` prefix.
After restarting Claude Desktop, the hammer icon in the toolbar confirms that MCP tools are active. Ask Claude: "What Timerise projects can you see?" - it will automatically call `list_projects`.
### Claude Code (CLI)
```bash
claude mcp add timerise \
--transport http \
--url https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp \
--header "Authorization: Bearer SANDBOX-your-api-key-here"
```
### Cursor
Edit `~/.cursor/mcp.json` or use **Cursor Settings → MCP → Add Server**:
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"timerise": {
"url": "https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp",
"headers": {
"Authorization": "Bearer SANDBOX-your-api-key-here"
}
}
}
}
```
### OpenAI Agents SDK (Python)
```python
from agents import Agent, Runner
from agents.mcp import MCPServerStreamableHttp
async with MCPServerStreamableHttp(
url="https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp",
headers={"Authorization": "Bearer SANDBOX-your-api-key-here"},
) as timerise:
agent = Agent(
name="Booking Assistant",
instructions="You help users book appointments.",
mcp_servers=[timerise],
)
result = await Runner.run(
agent, "Book me a slot for Monday morning."
)
```
In every case, setup comes down to providing the MCP server URL and an API key. The protocol handles the rest.
## Testing and Debugging Tools
Before releasing your agent to production, it's worth testing the MCP connection. Timerise gives you several paths to do that.
### MCP Inspector
[MCP Inspector](https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/inspector) is a browser-based tool for interactively testing MCP servers. Launch it with a single command:
```bash
npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector
```
In the interface at `http://localhost:5173`, select **Streamable HTTP** as the transport, enter the address `https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp`, and add the authorization header. You can browse all 16 tools, call them with any arguments, and observe raw JSON-RPC messages in the **Network** tab.
### Testing with curl
If you prefer the terminal, initialize a session manually:
```bash
curl -si -X POST https://sandbox-api.timerise.io/mcp \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer SANDBOX-your-api-key-here" \
-d '{
"jsonrpc": "2.0",
"method": "initialize",
"params": {
"protocolVersion": "2025-03-26",
"capabilities": {},
"clientInfo": { "name": "test", "version": "0.1" }
},
"id": 1
}'
```
The server will return an `mcp-session-id` header. Use it in subsequent requests, e.g., to fetch the tool list (`tools/list`) or call a specific tool (`tools/call`).
### Common Issues
- **`404 Session not found`** - the session expired or the API was restarted. Send a new `initialize` request without the `mcp-session-id` header.
- **`Not authorized`** - the API key doesn't have access to the given project. Check permissions in the Timerise dashboard.
- **`Slot not available`** - the slot was booked by someone else. Call `list_available_slots` again.
MCP sessions live on the server side. If the connection is interrupted, the agent should reinitialize the session.
## OAuth 2.1 for Claude.ai and Other Platforms
Beyond Bearer token authorization, Timerise supports **OAuth 2.1 with PKCE** - the standard required by Claude.ai, ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and other AI platforms connecting to remote MCP servers.
The process looks like this:
1. An administrator creates OAuth credentials via the GraphQL API (`mcpOAuthClientCreate`).
2. The `clientId` and `clientSecret` are configured in the AI platform's settings.
3. The platform automatically performs OAuth endpoint discovery, authorization, and token exchange.
4. The resulting access token is a standard Timerise API key.
This means an AI agent on Claude.ai can use the same 16 MCP tools as an agent connected via Bearer token - without additional configuration on the developer's side.
## When Does MCP Make Sense?
The MCP server in Timerise works well in scenarios where an AI agent needs to **autonomously perform booking operations** without developer intervention:
- **Customer service chatbots** - a bot on a website or WhatsApp that books, reschedules, or cancels appointments on its own.
- **Voice assistants** - a voicebot in a clinic that suggests a new time to a patient during a phone call.
- **IDE agents** - a developer in Cursor asks the agent to check available test slots in the sandbox environment.
- **Internal automation** - a Python script with the OpenAI Agents SDK that checks daily occupancy and generates a report.
In each of these cases, the agent doesn't need dedicated integration code. An MCP server connection and an API key with the right permissions are enough.
## Summary
Model Context Protocol is the missing link between intelligent language models and real business systems. Timerise embeds an MCP server directly in the API, eliminating the need to write integration code.
**16 tools** cover the full booking cycle - from service discovery, through availability checking, to creating and managing bookings. Setup takes minutes, not days. And with OAuth 2.1 support, the MCP server works both with local developer tools and cloud AI platforms.
Connecting is one of three steps. Agents also have to [find your services](/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services) and [pay for the booking](/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings).
If you're building an AI agent that needs to handle bookings, don't write another REST API wrapper.
[Test the MCP Server with MCP Inspector →](https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/inspector)
[Start your project →](/brief)
[Matt Sowa](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mateusz-sowa/)
---
## Time Zones in Booking Systems: Six Rules That Prevent Wrong Bookings
> Six rules for time zones in a booking system: UTC storage, IANA zones, safe DST handling, tests in several zones, and APIs that AI agents cannot misread.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis
A customer in Tokyo books a call for 3 PM. The therapist is in Berlin. Which 3 PM is it?
If the booking system cannot answer that from its own data, it has a time zone bug. Nobody sees it until someone waits alone on a call, or two people turn up for one slot. When an [AI agent](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business) makes the booking, there is no person in between to notice the mistake.
**Update, October 2026.** We first wrote this post about the API of the Timerise platform, the hosted booking product we ran from 2021 to 2025. Today we build booking systems that our clients own, so the post now gives the rules we build by. They come from those platform years, and they are the same rules our [Agent Skills](/skills) teach a coding agent.
## Why time zones break bookings
"3 PM" means nothing without a place. And the gap between two places is not fixed:
- **Clocks change on different days.** In 2026, the US moved its clocks forward on 8 March and Europe on 29 March. For those three weeks, New York was five hours behind Warsaw, not six. On 25 October 2026, Europe moves back, and the US follows on 1 November.
- **Some local times do not exist.** In Warsaw on 29 March 2026, the clock jumped from 02:00 to 03:00. A slot at 02:30 that day is not a real time.
- **Some local times happen twice.** On 25 October 2026, 02:30 comes twice in Warsaw: once before the clocks go back, once after.
- **Rules change.** Governments change daylight saving rules, sometimes with only a few weeks' notice.
A booking system that does not plan for this moves bookings by an hour, shows a slot that cannot be booked, or puts a class on the wrong day.
## Rule 1: store instants in UTC, keep the zone next to them
Every booked time goes into the database as an instant in UTC. Next to it, the system keeps the zone the time belongs to, such as the location's or the host's.
Use [IANA zone names](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_database_time_zones), like `Europe/Warsaw` or `America/New_York`. Do not use abbreviations like "CET" or "EST". They do not say whether summer time applies, and some of them mean different things in different countries. A fixed offset such as `+01:00` is not a zone either: it is right for half of the year.
Convert to local time only when you show the time to a person.
## Rule 2: write rules in local time, and pin the zone
Opening hours are local. "Open from 09:00" means 09:00 in the shop, in winter and in summer. So the rules that create slots are written in local time, and each rule carries its own zone.
Fix that zone when the rule is created. If a business later changes its main zone, existing slots and bookings must not move. A booking made for 09:00 stays at 09:00.
## Rule 3: count local days, never add 24 hours
This is the most common bug we see in slot code:
```ts
// Wrong: a day is not always 24 hours
const nextDay = new Date(start.getTime() + 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
```
On the day the clocks change, a local day has 23 or 25 hours. Take 23:30 on the evening before a spring change and add 24 hours: you get 00:30 on the day after the change. Add it to 09:00 and the slot moves to 08:00 or 10:00.
Count calendar dates instead, and turn each date and local time into an instant with the zone:
```ts
import { fromZonedTime } from "date-fns-tz";
// datesBetween is your own helper: it returns "2026-03-28", "2026-03-29", ...
// counted as calendar dates, not as hours
for (const date of datesBetween("2026-03-28", "2026-04-03")) {
const start = fromZonedTime(`${date}T09:00`, "Europe/Warsaw");
// start is a UTC instant: 08:00Z before 29 March, 07:00Z from 29 March
}
```
Then decide what happens to the times that do not exist or happen twice. A slot at 02:30 on a spring change day can be skipped or moved to 03:00. On an autumn change day, pick the first 02:30 or the second, and use the same choice everywhere. Write the choice down and test it.
## Rule 4: the server's time zone must not matter
Code that works on a developer's laptop in Warsaw can break on a server in UTC, and the other way round. Two common traps:
- `new Date("2026-03-29T09:00")` reads the time in the server's zone, not the business's zone.
- `getUTCDay()` gives the weekday in UTC. For a Monday 08:00 slot in Auckland, that is Sunday evening. Far from UTC, the slot ends up on the wrong day.
Always pass the zone yourself, with the `Intl` API or a library such as `date-fns-tz`. Then prove it: run the same tests under several process time zones.
```bash
for tz in UTC Europe/Warsaw America/Los_Angeles Pacific/Auckland; do
TZ=$tz npm test || exit 1
done
```
Add a test for each clock change you care about. Add one for a place that is a long way from UTC, such as Auckland. And add one for Lord Howe Island in Australia, where the clocks move by 30 minutes, not an hour.
## Rule 5: show times in the customer's zone too
The browser knows the visitor's zone:
```ts
const visitorZone = Intl.DateTimeFormat().resolvedOptions().timeZone;
// e.g. "Asia/Tokyo"
```
Use it to show times, never to decide them. The slot belongs to the business's zone. When the visitor is somewhere else, show both:
> **Session:** 8:00 AM Berlin time (4:00 PM your time)
Save the visitor's zone with the booking, so the confirmation and the reminders use the same times the customer saw. And if an old booking has no zone, fall back to the UTC instant, not to the server's zone.
## Rule 6: give AI agents times they cannot misread
An AI agent reads exactly what the API returns. It cannot guess the zone from context the way a person can. So the API should leave nothing to guess:
- **Every time in a response comes twice:** the UTC instant for logic, and the local time with its offset for display. On the platform, these were two fields: `2026-02-16T19:43:29Z` and `2026-02-16T20:43:29+01:00`.
- **The zone is named:** the response says `Europe/Warsaw`, not only `+01:00`.
- **Input accepts an offset or a zone:** the agent can send `2026-03-15T09:00:00+01:00` as the customer said it, and the server converts it.
- **The check happens on the server:** when the agent books, the server checks the slot again with the same function that listed it. If the time is no longer free, the agent gets a clear error, not a booking at a different time.
That last rule matters for people too. In our skills, the page and the booking use one function, so a slot that was on the screen is still bookable when the customer presses the button. The systems we build come with their own API, and can include an [MCP server](/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book), so agents book under the same rules. [How AI agents find your services](/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services) covers the rest of what an agent needs.
## Where these rules live
These rules are part of three of our Agent Skills. A coding agent reads the skill before it writes the code, so it keeps the rules without being told:
- [`time-slot-generator`](/skills/time-slot-generator) creates slots from rules: opening hours, classes on the first Monday of the month, overnight slots. Its tests run under four process time zones.
- [`calendar-scheduling-links`](/skills/calendar-scheduling-links) builds booking pages for meetings, with calendar sync and reminders. We walk through it in [Build your own Calendly with an Agent Skill](/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill).
- [`bookable-events`](/skills/bookable-events) handles paid events and deposits, with each event's time zone and currency.
For the other parts of a booking system, see [How to build a booking system](/blog/how-to-build-a-booking-system). If you would rather have us build it, [send a brief](/brief). You get a system you own, for a fixed price.
---
## The End of SaaS Compromises. How AI Brings Back the 'Software as a Product' Era?
> SaaS compromises belong in the past. Learn how AI and the Software as a Product model give you a perfectly tailored booking system with full code ownership.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/ai-revolution-software-as-a-product
For years, we lived in a binary world. Either you chose **SaaS**, accepting compromises and "universal" processes you couldn't change, or you invested a fortune in **Custom Development**, waiting months for the first results.
That era is ending now.
The AI revolution means personalization is no longer a luxury, but a standard within reach. Today, thanks to artificial intelligence, creating a **product perfectly tailored to your needs** takes as long as configuring a ready-made SaaS used to take.
We're going back to the roots. We're returning to **Software as a Product**.
## Software as a Product (SaaP) – What Does It Really Mean?
In the flood of acronyms, it's easy to get lost, but the definition of **SaaP** in the AI era is simple and liberating. It's a model that combines the best of both worlds:
1. **Ownership**: The frontend, the "head" of your system – interfaces, unique processes, client-facing logic – is yours. You have the source code. You're not a hostage to a vendor who can change pricing or disable a feature critical to you overnight.
2. **Maintenance and Infrastructure**: The backend, the "heart and lungs" – security, database, scalability, API – you get as a service. It's a stable foundation you don't have to build or patch.
In this model, you don't rent tools. You buy **your own product**, built on solid, maintained foundations.
## New Category: The End of "Do-Everything" Monoliths
The Enterprise market already understands that monolithic "do-everything" (All-in-One) systems become a ball and chain. They're large, sluggish, and hard to modify.
Solutions like **[Open Mercato](https://docs.openmercato.com/)** are pioneering a new category of software. They introduce standards like the **Open-Closed Principle (OCP)** – systems open to extensions but closed to core modifications. This lets you add new modules without risking breaking the entire system. No more dead-ends where every update threatens disaster.
It's proof that the market has matured to modularity. But modularity is just the beginning.
## Timerise: Your Booking Expert in a Hybrid World
While Open Mercato is a brilliant solution for broad applications (mainly in CRM/ERP areas), **[Timerise](/)** goes a step further in specialization. We focus on one hellishly difficult area: **General Booking Problems**.
If you've ever tried to [build a booking system from scratch](/blog/booking-apis-made-simple), you know what we mean. Time zones, real-time resource availability, complex cancellation rules, split payments, recurring events... It's a bottomless pit.
Most "universal" solutions offer only basic features here. At Timerise, "hard booking problems" are solved out of the box.
### Our Hybrid Approach:
1. **Foundation (Backend)**: We give you a stable, battle-tested **GraphQL API**. It precisely describes **WHAT** can be done (book, cancel, check availability), but doesn't dictate **HOW** you show it to the client. It's an engine that works. Always. (More on why [GraphQL is the perfect backend for AI agents](/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps)).
2. **Facade (Frontend + AI)**: This is where the magic happens. You don't have to spend months drawing mockups and coding forms. We use AI to generate a **dedicated frontend** based on your brief specification, starting with a [clickable prototype in 48 hours](/blog/from-brief-to-clickable-prototype-in-48-hours). We have most components ready for you to use, and everything works great with popular standards like **Tailwind CSS** and **shadcn/ui**. AI "understands" your business needs and creates an interface that's yours.
### Why Does This Change the Game? (Timerise Rules!)
- **Code ownership**: The generated frontend belongs to you. You can develop it freely, and if you ever want to change the backend provider (though we doubt you'll want to!), your business "face" stays with you. That principle grew into [the Post-SaaS Manifesto](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto).
- **Security (Tenant-Scoped)**: Security isn't an add-on. We use **Supabase** and **pgcrypto** to encrypt data with unique keys for each organization. Your data is safe even if the database itself leaks – this is the standard required in Healthtech and Fintech. More in [booking data security: GDPR, ISO and HIPAA by design](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking).
- **AI-Supportive**: Our system isn't just a "form on the internet." The data structure in Timerise is designed to be understandable to **[AI Agents](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business)**. Your system can "talk" to bots and assistants without additional layers.
- **Automated AI Development Cycle**: You report an issue and typically within tens of minutes you get a ready version on **Sandbox**. Every update is coded by AI, goes through cross-check by an alternative LLM model and final **Human Review** before merge. You test and decide if the change goes to production. Clean delivery, zero unnecessary procedures.
## Software House: From Hourly Seller to Business Partner
This is also a revolution for Software Houses. The "Time & Material" model (selling programmer hours) is slowly going away. Clients expect results, not invoices for man-hours.
Thanks to the **Open Mercato** and **Timerise** approach, Software Houses can change their business model:
- Instead of writing 80% infrastructure code (CRUDs, authorization), they get it "out of the box."
- They focus on 20% unique value for the client (business logic, UX).
- **They sell finished products and value, generating higher margins**, instead of "grinding" hours on repetitive tasks.
## Summary
Stop looking for a "solution for everything," because those are usually good for nothing specific. Don't build everything from scratch either, because life and budget are too precious.
Choose **Software as a Product**. Choose **ownership**, **security**, and **expertise**. In the world of bookings, the choice is simple.
**Timerise.** Because your business deserves more than a "universal form."
[Start your project →](/brief)
[Matt Sowa](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mateusz-sowa/)
---
## Timerise API and GraphQL: The Perfect Backend for AI Agents and LLM Apps
> Why GraphQL suits AI agents and LLM apps: a typed schema, one endpoint and precise queries let an agent read and act on your data reliably.
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps
Your AI bot can know every language in the world, but it can't book a table at a restaurant. Why?
Because most APIs were designed for humans, not machines.
**REST APIs** are relics of an era when every endpoint had to return "everything just in case." When your AI agent needs just an available slot date, it gets gigabytes of JSON with descriptions, photos, and metadata in 47 languages. You pay for every processed token. You waste budget on garbage data.
**GraphQL changes the game.** It lets AI ask one precise question and get exactly what it needs. Nothing more, nothing less.
And that's exactly why **Timerise API** – built natively on GraphQL – is the perfect heart for any AI-driven booking system.
## Problem #1: REST Drains Your Token Budget
Traditional REST APIs were designed in times when bandwidth was cheap and programmers manually filtered data. In the LLM era, every excess byte is wasted money.
**Over-fetching is the silent budget killer.** Your AI agent wants to check if there's a free slot at 2 PM. REST responds: "Here's 3 MB of JSON with service descriptions in 12 languages, photo gallery, and complete booking history." AI has to process everything. You pay for every token. Even for those you'll never use.
**Hallucinations are the second threat.** For AI to understand how to use REST, you need to pack long documentation into the prompt: "endpoint X returns Y, but only if parameter Z is set to true, unless...". The more context, the higher the risk the model will make a mistake and send a wrong request.
GraphQL solves both problems in one move:
1. **Precise queries**: AI requests only the fields it actually needs. Zero excess data.
2. **Introspection (self-documentation)**: The model can query the schema itself about available types and relations. The API structure is understandable "automatically."
Research confirms: using GraphQL in LLM applications **reduces token consumption by up to 60%** compared to REST (Source: TechConative).
## Timerise API: Built for AI Agents from the First Line of Code
Timerise isn't just another "booking system with an API." It's an **API-first platform**, designed from the ground up with autonomous agents in mind.
We handle every type of booking you can imagine:
- **Hourly bookings** – consultations, medical appointments, spa sessions
- **Date ranges** – equipment rental, accommodation, car rentals
- **One-time events** – webinars, conferences, workshops
- **Pre-orders** – online course sales, early access to products
And most importantly? Thanks to native GraphQL implementation, Timerise speaks the same language as your AI models. Zero "glue code." Zero rewriting REST responses into something LLM understands.
Timerise supports **[Model Context Protocol (MCP)](/blog/mcp-server-your-ai-agent-just-learned-to-book)** – the new communication standard for AI agents. Your assistant can precisely execute operations without constant "querying" about data structure.
### Example 1: One Precise Shot Instead of Three Uncertain Ones
Imagine: a user asks your bot "Can I book a massage this week?"
**REST Scenario:**
1. GET /services → 2 MB of JSON with all services
2. GET /services/massage-123/slots?from=...&to=... → another 500 KB with all details
3. Filtering and parsing on the AI side → wasting tokens
**Timerise GraphQL Scenario:**
One query. Four fields. Zero garbage.
```graphql
query GetAvailableSlots {
service(serviceId: "srv_12345") {
title
slots(
slotType: AVAILABLE
dateTimeFrom: "2023-11-01T00:00:00Z"
dateTimeTo: "2023-11-07T23:59:59Z"
limit: 5
) {
slotId
dateTimeFrom
dateTimeTo
quantity
}
}
}
```
**Result?** Clean, minimal JSON. AI gets exactly what it needs. Your token budget remains intact. Bot responds in a fraction of a second.
## Problem #2: Hallucinations Cost You Customers
The worst thing that can happen in a booking system? **A bot that books a slot for "-1 people" on "December 32, 2023."**
LLMs are powerful, but they can also "make up" things that don't exist. We call these hallucinations. With payments and bookings, one hallucination = lost customer.
**Timerise eliminates this problem at the source with strong GraphQL typing.**
We've defined precise **Scalars** that act as guardrails for your AI:
- **NonNegativeInt**: Bot won't book "-5 rooms" or "0.5 spots"
- **DateTime (ISO 8601)**: Model knows exactly what date format to send – no improvisation
- **EmailAddress, PhoneNumber, GeoLocation**: Validation built into the schema, not your code
When AI creates a booking, the GraphQL schema acts as quality control. Invalid data is rejected **before** it reaches business logic. Your backend stays clean, and the client gets either a correct booking or a clear error message.
### Example 2: From Intent to Booking in One Query
User writes: "I want to sign up for beginner yoga on Wednesday at 6 PM"
Your AI agent parses the intent, finds an available slot, and in **one mutation** creates a complete booking:
```graphql
mutation CreateBooking {
bookingCreate(
serviceId: "srv_yoga_class_01"
slots: ["slot_id_abc123"]
formFields: { clientName: "John Doe", experienceLevel: "Beginner" }
locale: "en-US"
timeZone: "America/New_York"
) {
bookingId
status
shortUrl
paymentStatus
}
}
```
**Magic?** No. Precise contract between AI and API. Bot knows which fields are required (GraphQL schema), user gets SMS confirmation, and you get the payment. All in one request.
## 3 Real Scenarios You Can Build Tomorrow
Stop thinking abstractly. Here are specific use cases clients are deploying today:
### 1. Hotel Concierge That Never Sleeps
WhatsApp Bot integrated with reception. Guest writes at 2 AM: "Can I extend my stay by two days?" Bot checks room availability, shows price, books, and sends confirmation. Receptionist sees a ready booking in the morning.
**Timerise gives you:**
- Date range bookings (check-in/check-out)
- Asset management – bot won't book a bike that's not in the garage
- Automatic blocking of already occupied slots
### 2. Clinic That Doesn't Lose Patients Due to "No Available Slots"
Voicebot calls patients with appointment reminders. If a patient needs to reschedule, the bot **itself** finds the nearest available slot and books it on the spot. Zero waiting for a callback from reception.
**Timerise gives you:**
- `bookingReschedule` mutation – moving appointments without cancellation
- [Correct time zone handling](/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis) (critical in telemedicine)
- Validation of conflicts in doctor's calendar
### 3. Course Creator Who Launches Landing Pages in 5 Minutes
Recorded a course? AI reads your notes, generates a landing page with description, then automatically creates a product in Timerise and connects Stripe payments. User clicks "Buy now," pays, and gets access.
**Timerise gives you:**
- `serviceCreate` and `productCreate` mutations – bot sets up your offer itself
- Integrated payments (Stripe/Adyen) without extra code, ready for [agent-initiated payments](/blog/agent-ready-payments-how-ai-agents-pay-for-bookings)
- Pre-orders and digital product access management
## Summary: Stop Fighting REST. Start Building with GraphQL.
In the AI era, "backend glue code" is the most expensive type of code you can write. You spend weeks on:
- Parsing huge REST responses
- Mapping API documentation to LLM prompts
- Debugging hallucinations because the model was "guessing" data structure
- Optimizing token costs because every query returns gigabytes of garbage
**Timerise ends this circus.**
**You get:**
1. **Booking backend out-of-the-box** – time zones, payments, resources, conflicts. Solved.
2. **GraphQL natively** – AI fetches only what it needs. Your token budget drops by 60%.
3. **Strong typing** – schema eliminates hallucinations before they hit production.
4. **Enterprise scale** – payments (Stripe/Adyen), SMS, email, webhooks. All built-in.
Stop building yet another booking backend. [Start building what actually distinguishes your product](/blog/ai-revolution-software-as-a-product).
Because in the AI world, **infrastructure should be invisible. What matters is user experience.**
[Test GraphQL Explorer live →](https://api.timerise.io/graphql)
[Start your project →](/brief)
[Matt Sowa](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mateusz-sowa/)
---
## Sharing booking page links - where and how to do it
> Your booking link is your 24/7 assistant, ready to help clients schedule with ease. Learn how to share it across social media, emails, and even physic...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/share-your-booking-page-link
Sharing your booking page link is a powerful, yet often underutilized, way to make booking your services effortless for your audience. Whether you’re a personal trainer, a photographer, or a wellness coach, making it easy for clients to schedule appointments directly can significantly increase conversions. So, why not meet them where they are-on social media, email, or even in physical spaces? Let’s explore how to maximize the reach of your booking link and, ultimately, your business!
## Why sharing your booking page link is key
Your booking link is your 24/7 assistant, always ready to help clients book appointments. By sharing it in strategic places, you remove barriers to scheduling, making the process seamless. No more back-and-forth emails or missed opportunities. Plus, short links are super easy to share and look professional!
## The best places to share your booking link
There is no single right place. The best results come from putting the link everywhere your customers already are:
### 1. Social media profiles and posts
Firstly, social platforms are the ideal place to reach your audience and make it easy for them to book with you. Make sure your booking link is visible on:
• **Instagram Bio**: Add a clear call-to-action like, “Ready to work with me? Book here: [short link].”
 Pro tip: Use tools like Linktree or Beacons to share multiple links while keeping your booking link front and center.
• **Facebook Page Description**: Include your booking link in your “About” section or as a pinned post at the top of your page.
Example: “Book your free consultation today: [short link].”
• **Stories, Reels, and Posts**: Promote your services through engaging posts and add your booking link in captions or as a clickable sticker in stories.
Example: “Transform your skin with our facials! Book now through the link: [short link].”
• **LinkedIn Profile**: Add your booking link to your profile summary or feature it in your “Featured” section for professional credibility.
Example: A coach could say, “Looking for 1:1 career guidance? Schedule a session here: [short link].”
• **TikTok Bio**: Keep it short and catchy, like “Book a session with me here  [short link].”
In short, social media is all about visibility, and placing your booking link where your audience interacts with your content can make a big difference.
## 2. Email signatures and newsletters
Email is a direct line to your clients, so don’t let it go to waste!
• **Email signature**: Add a link or button at the end of every email you send.
Example: “Ready to chat? Click here to schedule a call: [short link].”
• **Newsletters**: Whether you’re promoting a seasonal offer or just sharing updates, always include your booking link.
** For example:** “Spots are filling up fast-book your free consultation now: [short link].”
## 3. Website and blog
Your website is often your first impression, so ensure your booking link is prominent:
• Embed the booking page or add the link to your homepage with a CTA like “Schedule Your Appointment Now.”
• Include it in your blog posts to make related services easier to book.
• Create a dedicated “Book Now” page, or link to a page listing all your services, and link it in your website’s main navigation.
### 4. Messaging platforms and DMs
Interacting with clients on WhatsApp, Messenger, or even via text messages? Don’t miss the opportunity to share your booking link directly. Clients love fast, frictionless interactions.
### 5. QR Codes on physical materials
Sometimes, offline is the way to go. Turn your booking link into a QR code and feature it on:
• Business cards: “Scan to book an appointment!”
• Flyers, posters, and event banners: Perfect for promotional campaigns.
• Packaging or receipts: Ideal for businesses selling products as well as services.
** For example:** A yoga instructor could add a QR code to their printed class schedules so students can book on the spot.
### 6. Google My Business (GMB) Listing
If you have a local business, adding your booking link to your Google My Business profile is a must! This ensures people searching for your services can book directly from search results or Google Maps.
### 7. In your digital content
Either it's creating blogs, podcasts, videos, or other content, add your booking link as part of your call-to-action. For example:
• At the end of a blog post, include, “Liked this content? Let’s talk-book a free consultation here: [short link].”
• In YouTube video descriptions, add: “Book a coaching session with me today: [short link].”
### 8. Collaborations and Guest Appearances
Lastly, when collaborating with another business or appearing on a podcast, always share your booking link for listeners or followers to connect with you.
** For example:** “Want to work with me? Book a session at [short link].”
## Tips to make the most of sharing booking page links
• **Keep it short**: Short URLs look clean and are easier to share. Tools like Bitly or branded links can help.
• **Add a CTA**: A simple call-to-action like “Book Now” or “Schedule Here” can make a world of difference.
• **Track your links**: Use analytics to see which platforms drive the most bookings, so you can refine your strategy. More on that in [data analysis in booking systems](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems).
## Final thoughts on sharing booking page links
To sum up, your booking page link is more than just a URL-it’s an opportunity to connect with clients and grow your business. By sharing it strategically across social media, emails, physical materials, and even on your website, you can make the booking process as effortless as possible for your audience. Make sure the page behind the link is worth the click: see how [customizable booking pages enhance customer experience](/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages). And as customers start pasting links into AI assistants, it also has to be readable by machines, which is what [Agent Experience Optimization](/blog/agent-experience-optimization-how-ai-agents-find-your-services) covers. Start sharing today and watch your bookings soar!
## Useful links
Book a demo - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
January 13, 2025
## What's next?
Book a demo today-we’re here to help!
[ Book a demo](https://tmrs.io/LUKE)
[Start your project](/brief)
---
## Data Analysis in booking systems + insights to optimize services
> Discover how data analysis in booking systems can enhance your services, improve customer satisfaction, and drive business growth. Learn practical tip...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems
Data analysis is no longer a luxury-it’s a necessity for businesses that want to stay competitive. In booking systems, every reservation, cancellation, and customer interaction holds valuable data that can guide better decisions and elevate service quality. However, to make the most of this data, businesses need to understand how to turn it into actionable insights. In this guide, we’ll explore why data analysis is crucial, the tools to use, and practical steps to optimize your services.
## Why data analysis in booking systems matters
Booking systems generate a wealth of data that, when analyzed effectively, can transform your business. For instance, understanding customer booking patterns can help you allocate resources efficiently. Moreover, analyzing feedback allows you to improve services and build customer loyalty. Additionally, data analysis enables you to:
- **Spot patterns and trends:** Understand peak booking times, popular services, and customer demographics.
- **Enhance operational efficiency:** Predict resource needs based on booking data to prevent overbooking or underutilization.
- **Drive revenue growth:** Identify upselling opportunities and underperforming services to refine your offerings.
- **Improve customer experience:** Use data to tailor services to customer preferences, creating a personalized experience.
Moreover, by leveraging these insights, businesses can gain a competitive edge while improving customer satisfaction.
## Key data types to focus on
Naturally, there are several key data points to analyze in booking systems. Each of them provides unique insights that can guide your decisions:
- **Customer Demographics:** Understand your audience-age, location, and preferences.
- **Booking Patterns:** Pinpoint high-demand times and seasonal fluctuations.
- **Service Performance:** Analyze which services are thriving and which need improvement.
- **Cancellation Rates:** Identify frequent cancellation reasons and mitigate them with [proven no-show strategies](/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations).
- **Customer Feedback:** Use reviews and ratings to gauge satisfaction and uncover pain points.
In turn, focusing on these areas ensures that your efforts target the most impactful aspects of your operations.
## Tools to simplify data analysis
Although data analysis might seem intimidating, it doesn’t have to be. With the right tools, even non-technical users can turn data into meaningful insights. For instance, **Google Analytics** tracks customer behavior on your booking platform, helping you identify bottlenecks. Similarly, **built-in booking dashboards** offered by systems like Timerise provide ready-made reports to save time. Moreover, **data visualization platforms** such as Tableau or Power BI make it easier to interpret complex trends.
Additionally, **CRM systems** allow you to integrate booking data with customer profiles, creating a comprehensive view of interactions. As a result, these tools simplify data analysis, making it accessible for businesses of all sizes.
## Actionable steps for optimizing services
Turning insights into action is where the magic happens. To get started:
- **Monitor conversion rates:** Where do users drop off in the booking process? Use this insight to simplify the booking flow.
- **Segment customers:** Group customers by behavior, such as frequent bookers vs. first-timers, and tailor your marketing.
- **Predict high-demand periods:** Use historical data to prepare resources and staff for busy times.
- **Offer dynamic pricing:** Adjust prices based on demand trends to maximize revenue.
- **Respond to feedback:** Analyze reviews to identify opportunities for service improvements.
- **A/B test innovations:** Experiment with different features or booking flows and evaluate the results.
Ultimately, by implementing these steps, you can make data-driven improvements to your services.
## Real-life application: turning data into results
For instance, a co-working space faced low weekday bookings. After analyzing their booking data, they noticed midweek mornings were particularly slow. Consequently, they introduced discounted packages and flexible booking slots for those times. As a result, occupancy rates increased by 40%, proving that even small, data-driven changes can deliver significant results. See what a [custom booking system for coworking spaces](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces) puts on the operator's dashboard.
## Advanced strategies: the future of booking systems
As technology evolves, booking systems are becoming smarter and more intuitive. For example, predictive analytics can forecast customer preferences based on past behaviors, allowing businesses to stay ahead of trends. Furthermore, [AI agents](/blog/ai-agents-booking-what-it-means-for-your-business) and other AI-powered tools can offer automated recommendations, suggesting optimal time slots or additional services during bookings. Meanwhile, sentiment analysis can evaluate reviews to gauge overall customer satisfaction and uncover hidden pain points.
Therefore, these innovations are turning booking systems into proactive tools that not only handle reservations but also drive growth and enhance customer loyalty.
## Common pitfalls to avoid
While the benefits of data analysis are clear, there are common mistakes to avoid. Firstly, overcomplicating metrics can lead to confusion and missed opportunities. Instead, focus on actionable data that directly impacts your goals. Secondly, ignoring data privacy regulations like [GDPR](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking) can harm your reputation and result in penalties. Additionally, failing to present insights clearly can make it harder for your team to act on the findings.
By steering clear of these pitfalls, your business can make the most of its booking data without unnecessary complications.
## Conclusion
In summary, leveraging booking data can revolutionize how your business operates. By identifying trends, addressing customer pain points, and implementing data-driven changes, you’ll enhance both efficiency and satisfaction. Starting small-such as focusing on high-impact metrics or using simple tools-can yield immediate results. Over time, these efforts compound, helping you stay competitive and customer-focused. Ultimately, the data you need is already at your fingertips-it’s time to unlock its full potential.
## Useful links
Book a demo - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
December 10, 2024
[ Book a demo](https://tmrs.io/LUKE)
---
## The hidden costs of bad scheduling
> Poor scheduling can quietly eat into your business's profits. Missed appointments, unhappy customers, and wasted resources add up fast. Learn how to f...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling
The hidden costs of bad scheduling can quietly drain your business’s resources. Missed appointments, unhappy customers, and overworked employees may not seem like big issues at first. However, they quickly snowball into major problems that hurt your bottom line and slow your growth. Fortunately, there are ways to address these challenges effectively. Let’s dive into how bad scheduling impacts your business and, more importantly, how you can fix it.
## Missed revenue adds up quickly
First and foremost, missed appointments or double bookings mean lost revenue. Without automated reminders or a reliable booking system, gaps in your schedule will continue to occur. Consequently, these gaps can cost your business thousands of dollars over time. For instance, if your business loses $1,500 every month due to missed appointments, that’s a staggering $18,000 annually. On the other hand, businesses that use automated reminders often see a [dramatic reduction in no-shows](/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations) and an increase in profits.
## You spend more on operations than necessary
Moreover, manual scheduling wastes time and resources. Your staff spends hours fixing errors or chasing confirmations instead of focusing on high-value tasks. Additionally, scheduling mistakes such as overstaffing during quiet periods or understaffing during peak times drive up costs. By adopting a smart scheduling tool, you can eliminate these inefficiencies and allocate resources more effectively.
## Customers lose trust in your business
Next, poor scheduling damages your relationship with customers. Imagine a customer showing up for an appointment only to find it double-booked or canceled due to an error. Not surprisingly, they will feel frustrated and may turn to competitors instead. Worse yet, they might leave a negative review that harms your reputation. However, with a proper scheduling system, you can provide a [seamless booking experience](/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages) that keeps customers happy and loyal.
## Your team feels stressed and dissatisfied
It’s not just customers who feel the impact-your employees do too. For example, constantly managing last-minute schedule changes or dealing with overbooked appointments leaves staff feeling overwhelmed. As a result, employee morale suffers, leading to lower productivity and higher turnover rates. Conversely, a balanced and well-managed schedule keeps your team satisfied and motivated.
## Your brand reputation takes a hit
Furthermore, scheduling errors can tarnish your brand’s reputation. For example, if an event planner double-books a venue, it not only frustrates the client but also leads to negative word-of-mouth. Over time, these mistakes can erode the trust you’ve worked hard to build. On the flip side, using a scheduling tool with automated confirmations and reminders helps prevent such mishaps and protects your reputation.
## Wasted resources cut into profits
Similarly, underutilized resources like idle staff, empty rooms, or unused equipment drain your finances. For instance, a photography studio that fails to book prime time slots could lose thousands of dollars each month. However, a well-organized scheduling system ensures you make the most of your resources, maximizing efficiency and profits.
## Lack of insights stifles growth
Finally, outdated scheduling systems lack the data and insights necessary for business growth. Without understanding customer preferences or peak hours, you can’t optimize your operations. On the other hand, a modern scheduling tool provides [real-time analytics](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems), allowing you to identify trends, plan for demand, and make smarter decisions.
## So, what’s the fix?
Fortunately, fixing these issues is easier than you might think. Smart scheduling tools like Timerise address common problems and improve efficiency:
• **Reduce no-shows:** Automated reminders ensure customers don’t forget their appointments.
• **Optimize resources:** Intelligent tools help you allocate rooms, staff, and equipment more effectively.
• **Gain insights:** Data-driven analytics reveal trends and opportunities for growth.
With the right tool, you can eliminate inefficiencies, enhance customer satisfaction, and boost profits. Here is what that looks like in numbers: [business values delivered by advanced booking solutions](/blog/business-values-delivered-by-advanced-booking-solutions).
## Conclusion: don’t let scheduling hold you back
Bad scheduling isn’t just a nuisance-it actively harms your business. However, the good news is that you can fix it. By adopting a reliable scheduling system, you can streamline operations, protect your reputation, and position your business for long-term success. Why wait? Start building a smarter schedule today.
## Useful links
Let's talk - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
November 25, 2024
[ Book a demo](https://tmrs.io/LUKE)
---
## Business values delivered by advanced booking solutions
> Advanced booking solutions go beyond simple scheduling-they deliver real business value. From reducing costs and no-shows to boosting efficiency and c...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/business-values-delivered-by-advanced-booking-solutions
In our last blog posts, we mostly focused on features and how to utilize them. This time, we’re diving deeper solely into the **business values** our API-first booking system delivers. Beyond just scheduling, our solution brings significant benefits to your business, from cutting costs and enhancing customer satisfaction to offering valuable insights and supporting scalable growth. Here’s how an advanced booking solution can transform your operations-and how these values translate to real-world results.
## Cost savings through automation
One of the most immediate **business values** of an advanced booking solution is cost savings through automation. By automating scheduling, reminders, and confirmations, businesses reduce their need for manual handling of bookings, and avoid the [hidden costs of bad scheduling](/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling). Here’s how this looks in practice:
**Example:** A wellness center that previously relied on phone bookings and manual scheduling invested in a booking solution to handle these tasks automatically. They **reduced their administrative workload by 40%, saving them thousands of dollars** per month in labor costs. Staff time was reallocated to providing more personalized service, leading to higher customer satisfaction.
## Enhancing customer loyalty with a seamless booking experience
A seamless booking experience is key to customer loyalty, a major business value for long-term growth. Customers today expect a fast, simple process where they can book, reschedule, or cancel appointments on their own. Advanced booking systems allow for [customized booking pages](/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages) that reflect your brand and make the process easy for users. Here’s an example of how this builds loyalty:
**Example:** A boutique gym offers a customized booking page where clients can choose their preferred trainer, session type, and time slot. After introducing this system, they saw a **25% increase in repeat bookings**, with clients appreciating the flexibility and ease of use. This simple change also resulted in higher ratings and positive reviews, attracting new clients.
## Reducing revenue loss with no-show management
No-shows can significantly impact revenue, especially for service-based businesses. One important business value of advanced booking solutions is their ability to [reduce no-shows](/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations) by sending automated reminders, allowing easy rescheduling, and even requiring appointment confirmations. Here’s how this value plays out:
**Example:** A hair salon introduced a booking solution with automated text and email reminders sent 24 hours before each appointment. **No-shows dropped by 35%, which translated to a 15% revenue increase** in just a few months. With fewer empty appointment slots, they were able to fill open times more effectively, maximizing their revenue potential.
## Leveraging data insights for smarter business decisions
Data-driven insights are a powerful business value that advanced booking solutions provide. Through real-time [booking data analysis](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems), businesses can better understand customer preferences, peak booking times, and the most popular services. This information allows them to make smarter decisions, directly impacting their bottom line. Here’s an example:
**Example:** A spa used booking data to identify that its most popular services were booked during weekends, with certain time slots consistently overbooked. With these insights, they adjusted their staff schedule to cover the busiest times and introduced special weekday offers to distribute demand. This led to higher **customer satisfaction and a 20% boost** in bookings on off-peak days.
## Scalability for business growth
As your business grows, you need a booking system that can grow with you. Scalability is a key business value for any company planning to expand, add more services, or reach new markets. An advanced booking solution supports growth without requiring a complete overhaul, allowing your business to evolve smoothly. Here’s a practical example of scalability:
**Example:** A health and wellness **franchise expanded from 5 locations to 20**. With a flexible booking solution, they were able to add new locations seamlessly into the system and manage bookings centrally. The system scaled effortlessly to handle hundreds more appointments, saving them the time and cost of managing separate booking systems for each location.
## Increasing operational efficiency with real-time availability
One valuable feature of advanced booking solutions is real-time availability, which enhances operational efficiency. This business value helps prevent double-bookings, manages resource allocation more effectively, and keeps both staff and customers informed about open times. Here’s how this translates into real-world results:
**Example:** A co-working space uses real-time availability to manage room bookings, allowing customers to see which rooms are open and book them instantly. With the booking solution handling all scheduling updates, staff no longer need to manage reservations manually, and customers appreciate the instant confirmation of room availability. This streamlined process **increased room utilization by 30%** and reduced double-booking conflicts to nearly zero. See what a [custom booking system for coworking spaces](/blog/custom-booking-system-for-coworking-spaces) can include.
## Enhancing marketing with integrated promotions
Integrating promotional offers and discounts within a booking system can drive more bookings and increase customer engagement. This is a valuable business advantage because it encourages customers to book during quieter periods or try new services. When the booking solution includes these options, it can turn marketing into a seamless part of the booking process. Here’s an example:
**Example:** A yoga studio created seasonal promotions that customers could apply directly at booking. By tracking which promotions generated the most interest, they identified customer preferences and adjusted their offerings accordingly. This feature helped fill quieter classes, boosted customer engagement, and **increased monthly bookings by 25%**, all without the need for separate marketing campaigns.
## Conclusion: choosing a booking solution that delivers real business values
An advanced booking system isn’t just a scheduling tool-it’s an investment that brings key business values to your operations. From cost savings and reduced no-shows to enhanced customer loyalty and data-driven insights, the right booking solution delivers real, tangible value. By choosing a system that aligns with your business goals, you’re investing in a more efficient, customer-friendly, and scalable business.
## Useful links
Let's talk - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
November 12, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Enhancing customer experience with customizable booking pages
> Creating a seamless and memorable booking experience goes beyond offering services-it's about tailoring every interaction to meet customer expectation...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages
Creating a seamless and memorable booking experience goes beyond offering services-it's about tailoring every interaction to meet and exceed customer expectations. Customizable booking pages play a crucial role in enhancing customer experience, allowing businesses to reflect their brand identity, gather essential information, and provide a smooth, user-friendly interface. In this article, we’ll explore how customizable booking pages, especially those built with Timerise, can elevate customer satisfaction and drive business growth.
## Why customer experience matters in online booking
As the world of online services grows increasingly competitive, customer experience has emerged as a defining factor for business success. In booking systems, personalization is more than an added benefit; it’s a necessity, and customers increasingly [book experiences, not just services](/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services). A well-tailored booking experience communicates that the business understands and values the customer’s needs, which fosters trust, reduces abandonment, and increases conversions.
Customizable booking pages are a powerful tool for achieving these goals. They allow businesses to adapt the booking journey, crafting a seamless experience that resonates with each user. This customization can transform a transactional interaction into an enjoyable journey that customers want to repeat.
## **The impact of customizable booking pages on customer satisfaction**
When a booking page is tailored to customer needs, it not only looks professional but also significantly improves the user experience. A customizable page provides flexibility and a sense of familiarity, which fosters trust and encourages users to complete their bookings without hesitation. Here’s how customized booking pages enhance satisfaction:
- **Builds trust**: When customers see a booking page that aligns with the brand they’re familiar with, it feels professional and legitimate, increasing their trust.
- **Improves engagement**: Personal touches, like personalized fields and options, keep customers engaged.
- **Streamlines booking**: Customizable booking pages reduce the steps required to complete a booking, making the process faster and more user-friendly.
- **Reduces abandonment**: Customers are more likely to complete their booking when the process is straightforward and aligns with their expectations.
## Key elements of an effective customizable booking page
To make the most of customizable booking pages, consider these essential elements:
### **1. Brand identity and design**
- **Consistency**: Reflecting your brand’s identity with consistent colors, logos, and layouts reassures customers and creates a professional impression.
- **Professionalism**: When a booking page mirrors the website design, it signals to customers that they are still in the right place, fostering a smooth, uninterrupted experience.
### **2. Personalized data collection**
- **Relevance**: Asking for the right amount of information shows that your business values customers’ time. Use essential fields only, while giving customers the option to provide additional details if they wish.
- **Simplified forms**: Grouping fields and using dynamic questions (i.e., fields that adapt based on previous answers) can reduce cognitive load and increase completion rates.
### **3. Flexible booking flow**
- **Multiple options**: Offering choices between automatic confirmation or customer-confirmed bookings gives users flexibility. This can be especially useful in cases where a customer wants to double-check with team members before finalizing their booking.
- **Real-time availability**: Displaying real-time availability reduces back-and-forth and enables immediate bookings. It also helps avoid double bookings, creating a smoother experience for both the business and the customer.
## Using Timerise for customizable booking pages
Timerise offers a suite of features specifically designed to make booking pages both functional and customizable. Here’s how Timerise can help businesses enhance their customer experience:
- **Brand-Specific Themes**: Customize the booking page to match brand colors, logos, and themes, providing a seamless brand experience from start to finish.
- **Flexible Data Fields**: Timerise allows businesses, through form elements, to select which fields appear on the booking form, making it easy to collect only the most relevant information.
- **Configurable Booking Flow**: With Timerise, businesses can decide between different booking confirmation methods, allowing them to choose the approach that best fits their customer base.
- **Dynamic Layout**: Timerise’s platform provides the flexibility to adjust layouts and form flows, enabling businesses to easily adapt the booking process to evolving customer needs.
## Practical steps for implementing customizable booking pages
If you’re ready to enhance customer experience by customizing your booking page, here’s a quick guide using Timerise:
**1. Set up brand themes**
Begin by selecting the colors, logos, and fonts that align with your brand. Apply these to the booking page to create a cohesive look.
**2. Choose relevant data fields**
Select only the fields you need. Use Timerise’s dynamic field options to adapt the form based on the customer’s selections.
**3. Configure the booking flow**
Decide on whether to use automatic confirmation or require customer confirmation. This option can be tailored based on the service being offered.
**4. Add real-time availability**
Ensure your booking page shows the latest availability to reduce confusion and enhance user experience.
**5. Optimize based on feedback**
Use customer feedback and [booking analytics](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems) to refine the booking process, making continuous improvements.
## Conclusion
Customizable booking pages are essential for businesses aiming to offer a premium experience. By tailoring the booking process with tools like Timerise, businesses can not only meet customer expectations but exceed them. A personalized, seamless booking experience leads to greater satisfaction, higher conversion rates, and stronger customer loyalty. Whether you’re new to online bookings or looking to enhance an existing system, Timerise’s customizable booking pages offer a practical, flexible solution that puts the customer experience front and center.
With these customization options, your booking pages can become more than a transactional interface; they can serve as a meaningful touchpoint that reinforces brand loyalty and drives growth. Once your page is ready, here is [where and how to share your booking page link](/blog/share-your-booking-page-link).
## Useful links
Let's talk - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
October 28, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Booking for experiences, not just services
> As consumers seek personalized experiences, businesses are moving toward customizable scheduling, allowing customers to tailor their bookings. This sh...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-for-experiences-not-just-services
The traditional approach to booking services has long been based on the simple premise of selecting a date, time, and occasionally a specific provider or location. However, as consumers increasingly seek more personalized and memorable experiences, this once-standard process is evolving. Today's customers aren’t just looking to secure a slot on a calendar; they’re looking for something that feels tailored to them. This shift has given rise to a trend that businesses across industries are adopting: customizable scheduling for experiences.
## What Is experience-driven booking?
Experience-driven booking goes beyond the basics of securing a service or appointment. It allows customers to shape their entire experience-from choosing specific ambiance settings to deciding on additional perks or custom interactions. Whether it's booking a haircut, a dinner reservation, a wellness retreat, or a virtual consultation, consumers now expect to have options that make the process feel unique and personalized to their needs.
For example, imagine booking a spa day. Instead of merely selecting a time and therapist, you could choose the type of music playing during your massage, opt for aromatherapy scents, or even request specific refreshments to be available before and after your treatment. Similarly, a restaurant might allow diners to pre-select table location preferences (indoor, outdoor, near the window) and provide options to add unique experiences like customized cocktails or chef’s table experiences.
### 1. **The demand for personalization**
In a world where consumers have an abundance of choices, personalization has become key to differentiating brands and building loyalty. People want to feel like businesses understand their individual needs and preferences. Customizable booking systems give consumers control over their experience, which can increase satisfaction and engagement.
### **2. The rise of the experience economy**
More and more, people are valuing experiences over material goods. In the “experience economy,” consumers are seeking ways to enrich their lives with unique, memorable moments. By allowing customers to tailor their bookings, businesses cater to this demand for more meaningful interactions, which in turn leads to higher customer retention and better word-of-mouth.
### 3. **Technological advancements**
Booking systems have advanced rapidly with the integration of AI, machine learning, and sophisticated data analytics. These tools allow businesses to offer tailored suggestions during the booking process based on customer behavior, previous bookings, or preferences, making personalization easier and more effective.
### 4. **The influence of luxury and hospitality**
The luxury and hospitality industries have long embraced customization, from hotel guests selecting pillow types to airlines offering bespoke in-flight experiences. Now, these practices are filtering down to mainstream businesses. Consumers have come to expect this level of attention to detail in all their interactions, and customizable booking is one way to deliver that.
## How businesses can implement customizable scheduling
To stay competitive, businesses need to rethink how they approach scheduling and booking processes. Here are a few key strategies for integrating customizable elements into a booking system:
### **1. Offer tiered service packages**
Provide customers with different levels of customization, from basic services to premium, highly personalized experiences. For example, a restaurant could offer an "experience package" that includes a special tasting menu curated by the chef, with a customized wine pairing and a personal meet-and-greet.
### **2. Incorporate add-ons and enhancements**
When booking, give customers the ability to add extras that enhance their experience. Whether it’s a spa offering additional treatments or a concert venue providing backstage access, these add-ons not only increase revenue but also allow the customer to curate their ideal experience.
### **3. Leverage Data for Personalized Recommendations**
Use what you already know about each customer, such as past bookings, preferred times and favorite add-ons, to suggest the right option at the right moment. A returning guest who always books a deep-tissue massage should see the hot-stone upgrade first. Our guide to [data analysis in booking systems](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems) shows which data points to start with.
### **4. Allow Real-Time Changes**
Empower customers to adjust their bookings in real time. Flexibility is a key component of personalization. Whether they want to switch their choice of service, upgrade a package, or tweak an existing booking, giving consumers control over these changes can lead to greater satisfaction.
### **5. Focus on user-friendly interfaces**
Customization should not come at the expense of ease. A user-friendly, intuitive booking interface, such as a [customizable booking page](/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages), is essential for guiding customers through the personalization options without overwhelming them. The more seamless the process, the more likely customers are to engage with these options.
## Benefits for businesses
The benefits of offering customizable scheduling are numerous:
**Increased customer loyalty**When customers feel that their experiences are tailored to their preferences, they are more likely to return.
**Higher revenue per booking**Offering customizable add-ons or premium experiences can increase the average transaction value. More examples in [business values delivered by advanced booking solutions](/blog/business-values-delivered-by-advanced-booking-solutions).
**Better customer insights**By offering personalization options, businesses can gather valuable data on customer preferences, which can be used to further refine services.
**Competitive differentiation **In a crowded market, offering customizable experiences can set your business apart from competitors who only provide basic booking options.
## Conclusion
As customers seek out experiences that are personalized and memorable, businesses that adapt their booking systems to accommodate these desires will stand out. Moving beyond simple appointment scheduling to offer customizable, experience-driven booking options allows companies to not only meet customer expectations but also create deeper, more meaningful connections. As this trend continues to evolve, businesses that embrace this shift will find themselves positioned for long-term success in the experience economy.
## Useful links
Let's talk - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
October 22, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Reducing no-shows: Proven strategies for businesses
> No-shows can be a major challenge for businesses that rely on bookings, leading to lost revenue and operational inefficiencies. In this article, we ex...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/reducing-no-shows-secure-bookings-and-minimize-cancellations
For businesses that rely on appointments and bookings, no-shows can be a significant drain on revenue and resources. From healthcare providers and salons to event managers and consultants, missed appointments not only result in lost income but also lead to inefficiencies in scheduling and resource allocation. Business leaders must adopt effective strategies to reduce cancellations and secure reliable bookings, ensuring operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. No-shows are only one of the [hidden costs of bad scheduling](/blog/hidden-costs-of-bad-scheduling), but usually the most visible one.
## Ways of reducing no-shows
In this guide, we’ll explore actionable strategies that business leaders can implement to minimize no-shows and create a smoother booking experience.
### 1. **Leverage automated booking reminders**
Automated reminders are a simple yet highly effective way to reduce no-shows. Many clients miss appointments simply because they forget. Implementing automated reminders via SMS, email, or push notifications can significantly reduce this problem and keep your schedule intact.
#### Key points for leaders:
- **Timing is critical**: Send reminders at least 24-48 hours in advance to give clients enough time to confirm or reschedule. A follow-up reminder on the day of the appointment can further reduce the likelihood of a no-show.
- **Multichannel approach**: Utilize SMS, email, and mobile app notifications to reach clients through their preferred communication channels.
- **Simplified confirmation process**: Ensure that your reminders allow clients to easily confirm or reschedule their bookings with a single click.
### **2. Offer flexible rescheduling options**
Unexpected events happen, and clients may need to adjust their bookings. Offering flexible, self-service rescheduling options can reduce no-shows by providing clients with a hassle-free way to manage their appointments without canceling altogether.
#### Best practices for business leaders:
- **Self-service tools:** Invest in a booking system that enables clients to reschedule online without needing to call your office. This reduces friction and encourages clients to keep their bookings.
- **Mobile optimization:** Ensure that rescheduling can be done via mobile devices, as more users are managing their appointments on smartphones.
- **Clear rescheduling policies:** Define clear parameters on how close to the appointment time clients can reschedule, ensuring enough time for your business to adjust.
### 3. **Implement prepayments or deposits**
Requiring clients to pay a deposit or prepay a portion of the service at the time of booking can significantly reduce the likelihood of no-shows. When clients have a financial investment, they are more likely to keep their appointments.
#### Best practices for business leaders:
- **Partial prepayment models**: Instead of requiring full payment upfront, ask for a small, non-refundable deposit. This commitment encourages clients to show up while keeping the payment process customer-friendly.
- **Flexible payment solutions**: Ensure your system supports multiple payment methods, including credit cards, mobile wallets, and PayPal, to make the process convenient for your customers.
- **Transparency**: Be clear about refund and cancellation policies at the time of booking to build trust and avoid disputes later.
### 4. **Utilize a waitlist system**
A waitlist system is a powerful tool to fill cancellations quickly and efficiently. When a client cancels, the waitlist feature can notify other interested clients, ensuring that open time slots are filled, and your revenue is preserved.
#### Best practices for maximizing waitlists:
- **Automated notifications:** Set up your booking platform to automatically notify waitlisted clients when a slot becomes available.
- **Instant booking for waitlisted clients:** Allow waitlisted customers to confirm the newly available appointment with just one click.
- **Real-time updates:** Keep clients informed in real-time about their waitlist status, creating a seamless experience.
### 5. **Follow up on no-shows to reengage clients**
Even after a missed appointment, it’s possible to turn the situation around with a thoughtful follow-up. Rather than penalizing clients, business leaders can use this as an opportunity to reengage and offer value.
#### Effective follow-up tactics:
- **Personalized messages:** Send a personalized email or SMS acknowledging the missed appointment and offering to reschedule. A friendly, understanding tone can go a long way in maintaining customer loyalty.
- **Incentivize rebooking:** Consider offering a small discount or bonus for clients who rebook within a specified timeframe after a missed appointment.
- **Segment repeat offenders:** Use your [booking data](/blog/data-analysis-in-booking-systems) to identify clients who frequently miss appointments and send targeted communication encouraging them to stay committed.
### 6. **Set clear cancellation policies**
Clear, consistent cancellation policies are essential to avoid last-minute cancellations. Clients need to understand the consequences of canceling too close to the appointment time, and businesses need to protect themselves from revenue loss.
#### Best practices for policy implementation:
- **Structured penalty system:** Create a tiered penalty structure where clients incur increasing penalties for canceling within shorter time windows. For example, no charge for canceling 48 hours ahead, a 50% fee for 24 hours, and 100% for same-day cancellations.
- **Make policies visible:** Ensure your cancellation policy is visible during the booking process and readily accessible on your website. This transparency helps prevent disputes and keeps clients informed.
- **Enforce consistently:** Business leaders should enforce cancellation policies consistently to maintain fairness and protect revenue.
### 7. **Reward client loyalty with incentives**
Loyalty programs can play a key role in reducing no-shows by rewarding clients for keeping their appointments. Businesses that incentivize regular attendance can build stronger relationships and reduce the likelihood of last-minute cancellations.
#### How leaders can implement loyalty programs:
- **Point-based systems:** Allow clients to earn points for every appointment they attend, which they can redeem for discounts, services, or exclusive perks.
- **Exclusive perks for loyalty:** Offer early access to appointments, premium slots, or other rewards for loyal clients to further encourage attendance.
- **Referral incentives:** Create a referral program that rewards clients for bringing in new business. This not only boosts your client base but encourages repeat bookings.
## Conclusion
For business leaders, reducing no-shows is not just about minimizing lost revenue but about creating a seamless and positive experience for clients. By implementing automated reminders, flexible rescheduling, and transparent cancellation policies, businesses can significantly decrease the rate of cancellations. Additionally, utilizing tools like waitlists, loyalty programs, and prepayment systems can increase client commitment and improve overall operational efficiency.
In today’s competitive landscape, modern booking systems like **Timerise** can help streamline these processes, offering advanced features such as automated communications, flexible payment options, and powerful waitlist management tools. By investing in the right tools and strategies, business leaders can reduce no-shows, secure more bookings, and ultimately drive business growth. For real-world numbers, see the [business value of advanced booking solutions](/blog/business-values-delivered-by-advanced-booking-solutions).
## Useful links
Let's talk - [link](https://tmrs.io/M43QJD)
Piotr Kozak
October 14, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Troubleshooting issues with Booking APIs + solutions
> Booking APIs are essential for travel and hospitality businesses, but they can come with challenges. Learn about common issues like authentication pro...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/troubleshooting-booking-api-issues
Booking APIs play a key role in modern travel, hospitality, and event businesses by making the booking process seamless for customers. However, they come with challenges that can impact your business if not addressed. Issues like authentication problems, rate limits, and data formatting errors are common. In this post, we will explore these challenges, discuss how they affect your business, and provide practical solutions. Understanding these issues will help ensure your booking system runs smoothly and delivers the best experience for your customers.
## Common issues and solutions
### 1. **Authentication and authorization Issues**
Incorrect authentication or authorization often causes problems with booking APIs. Many APIs require a key or token to ensure only authorized users access the system. Incorrect credentials or expired tokens lead to failed requests, which can disrupt your booking system.
**Solution**: Double-check your API credentials and make sure you use the correct environment (e.g., testing vs. live). Verify that your tokens have not expired and that you have the correct permissions. If you use OAuth, set up the redirect links properly to avoid booking API authentication issues.
### **2. Rate limiting and throttling**
Booking APIs often limit the number of requests you can make within a certain time frame. Exceeding these rate limits may result in blocked requests, affecting your booking operations and customer experience.
**Solution**: Check the API documentation to understand the rate limits, and add a retry system to handle blocked requests. Use caching to avoid making repeated API calls when the data has not changed, helping you stay within booking API rate limits.
### 3. **Data formatting errors**
Troubleshooting Booking APIs issues often involves dealing with data formatting errors. Booking APIs expect information to be formatted in a specific way, such as using certain data types or including required fields. Incorrect data formatting commonly causes failed API requests and disrupts the booking process.
**Solution**: Use tools like Postman to test your requests and inspect the responses. Ensure you include all the required fields in the correct format. Pay special attention to dates and times, as booking APIs often need them in a specific format, and mistakes here can lead to booking API data errors.
### 4. **Handling Booking API errors and unexpected Responses**
Network issues, server errors, or data problems can cause booking APIs to return various error codes or unexpected responses. These errors can be confusing if not handled properly.
**Solution**: Add strong error handling in your code to identify different types of booking API errors (e.g., 400 Bad Request, 401 Unauthorized, 500 Internal Server Error). Keep logs of all error messages so you can quickly find and fix issues when they arise.
### 5. **Timezone and availability mismatches**
Booking systems often work across different time zones, which can lead to availability issues and double bookings if times are not handled properly. Timezone mismatches are especially problematic in global booking systems.
**Solution**: Store and process dates and times in UTC, and only convert to local time when displaying information to customers. Make sure your booking checks handle time zones correctly to avoid booking API availability mismatches and prevent double bookings. We explain the full approach, including DST edge cases, in [timezone handling in booking APIs](/blog/timezone-handling-in-booking-apis).
### 6. **API deprecations and versioning**
APIs change over time, and sometimes older versions are no longer supported. Failing to keep up with these booking API changes can cause parts of your system to stop working, leading to disruptions.
**Solution**: Subscribe to the API provider's updates and check their changelog regularly. Plan for updates and make changes to your booking system as needed to stay compatible with the latest booking API versions.
### 7. **Using GraphQL for improved Booking API flexibility**
Some booking systems now offer GraphQL APIs, which provide more flexibility compared to traditional REST APIs. GraphQL allows you to request only the data you need, reducing response sizes and improving efficiency.
**Solution**: If your booking provider offers a GraphQL API, consider using it to customize your data requests. This approach can help reduce the amount of unnecessary information being transferred and improve your application's performance. Ensure your development team understands GraphQL's structure and query language to take full advantage of its benefits in your booking system. The same precision is why [GraphQL is a strong backend for AI agents and LLM apps](/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps).
## Conclusion
Troubleshooting Booking APIs issues can be challenging, but understanding the common booking API issues and having a solid troubleshooting plan saves you time and effort. Whether you deal with authentication, rate limits, data formatting, or explore new technologies like GraphQL, staying proactive and informed helps maintain a smooth booking experience for your customers. It is crucial to stay ahead of potential booking API problems and address them before they become major issues.
## Useful links
GraphQL docs - [link](https://graphql.org/learn/)oAuth 2.0 docs - [link](https://auth0.com/intro-to-iam/what-is-oauth-2)
Piotr Kozak
October 7, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Booking API for marketplaces: Guide for leaders & developers
> This article explores the benefits and practical applications of integrating a booking API into a marketplace. It highlights how a booking API can str...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-api-marketplace-integration
In a marketplace scenario, efficiency and user experience are pivotal. Whether you're operating in travel, real estate, e-commerce, or services, offering seamless booking functionality can significantly improve customer satisfaction and increase revenue. The backbone of this convenience is a well-implemented booking API (Application Programming Interface). In this article, we'll explore how leveraging a booking API can streamline operations, enhance user experience, and drive business growth.
## What is a Booking API?
A booking API enables real-time data exchange between the marketplace and external systems, such as hotel or flight booking platforms, appointment scheduling systems, or rental services. By integrating an API, marketplaces can offer customers live availability, instant confirmations, and automated management of bookings without manual intervention. New to the topic? Start with [booking APIs made simple](/blog/booking-apis-made-simple).
## Benefits of a Booking API in a marketplace
### 1. **Real-Time Availability and Inventory Management**
Booking APIs allow your marketplace to access live data, ensuring that the inventory-whether it’s hotel rooms, rental cars, or appointment slots-is up to date. This eliminates the risk of overbooking or displaying outdated information, ensuring a smooth experience for your users.
### 2. **Improved CX (Customer Experience**)
Customers today expect seamless booking experiences. By using an API, your marketplace can offer features such as instant booking confirmations, cancellations, and modifications, which increase customer satisfaction. Additionally, the API can provide personalized recommendations based on user preferences and behavior, improving engagement and conversion rates.
### 3. **Increased operational efficiency**
For business leaders, one of the most significant advantages of a booking API is the ability to automate and streamline operations. Rather than manually updating bookings, customer records, or availability data, the API handles everything in the background. This reduces the operational burden, minimizes errors, and frees up valuable time for your team to focus on growth-oriented tasks.
### 4. **Scalability**
Booking APIs offer scalability for growing businesses. As your marketplace expands and partners with more service providers or vendors, the API ensures that the integration remains seamless. You can onboard new suppliers or services faster, without requiring a full system overhaul, which is crucial in a competitive landscape.
### 5. **Improved Customer Experience**
By leveraging a booking API, marketplaces can integrate dynamic pricing models, upselling opportunities, and cross-selling features. For instance, a travel marketplace could offer users relevant add-ons like travel insurance or car rentals during the booking process. These personalized offers can drive additional revenue while enhancing the overall user experience.
## Key considerations for implementing a Booking API
### 1. API Documentation and support
Choosing a booking API with comprehensive documentation and robust support is essential for a smooth implementation. Developers need clear instructions, examples, and support forums to ensure that integration is efficient and meets the specific requirements of your marketplace.
### 2. Data security and compliance
Handling bookings often involves managing sensitive customer data, including personal details and payment information. Business leaders must ensure that the booking API adheres to data security best practices and complies with relevant regulations such as GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) or PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard). We describe how we meet these requirements in [booking data security: GDPR, ISO and HIPAA by design](/blog/security-gdpr-iso-hipaa-best-practices-in-booking).
### 3. Customization and flexibility
Not all marketplaces have the same requirements, so the flexibility of the booking API is key. You need to ensure that the API allows customization to fit the specific needs of your platform, whether it’s branding, special booking rules, or third-party integrations.
### 4. Reliability and uptime
Downtime in your booking system can result in lost revenue and frustrated customers. It’s crucial to choose a booking API with a proven track record of high uptime and reliability. Look for APIs that offer service level agreements (SLAs) with guarantees on availability and response times.
### 5. User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX)
A seamless booking process isn’t just about the backend. The API must integrate smoothly with your marketplace’s user interface, ensuring that users enjoy a hassle-free experience. An API that is too complex or not intuitive for users can lead to higher abandonment rates, negatively impacting conversions.
## Real-world examples of Booking APIs in marketplaces
### 1. Travel and hospitality marketplaces
For travel marketplaces like Expedia or Airbnb, booking APIs are central to their operations. These platforms connect users with various services such as hotel bookings, car rentals, and experiences, all managed through multiple APIs. The real-time availability and seamless integration enhance customer trust and simplify the booking journey.
### 2. Healthcare appointment marketplaces
In healthcare marketplaces that offer appointment scheduling services, booking APIs allow patients to book or reschedule appointments in real-time. This type of integration reduces administrative overhead and ensures that doctors and patients are always on the same page regarding availability.
### 3. Event and experience marketplaces
Marketplaces like Eventbrite or ClassPass use booking APIs to handle reservations for events, classes, or activities. APIs ensure that users can book spots based on real-time availability, leading to higher engagement and optimized event attendance.
## Choosing the right Booking API for your marketplace
Selecting the right booking API depends on your marketplace's needs and objectives. Here are some features to consider:
- **Ease of integration**: The API should come with robust documentation and be easy for developers to integrate into your existing infrastructure.
- **Real-time data synchronization**: Ensure the API supports real-time data syncing, so your marketplace always shows up-to-date availability.
- **Customization**: The API should be customizable to align with your unique requirements.
- **Scalability**: Choose a solution that can scale as your business grows.
- **Security**: The API must comply with industry standards for security and data protection.
## Conclusion
Incorporating a booking API into your marketplace can offer significant benefits, from enhancing the customer experience to improving operational efficiency. For business leaders, the ability to scale and automate key processes provides a competitive advantage, while developers will appreciate the flexibility and power of a well-documented API. When an integration misbehaves, our list of [common booking API issues and their fixes](/blog/troubleshooting-booking-api-issues) is a good first stop. By choosing the right booking API, your marketplace can unlock new revenue opportunities and ensure long-term success.
### Optimize your marketplace now!
By adopting a booking API, your marketplace can deliver the real-time, seamless experiences your users demand, ultimately driving growth and customer loyalty. Whether you’re in travel, healthcare, events, or another sector, the right booking API can be the key to unlocking your platform’s full potential.
## Useful links
Piotr Kozak
September 30, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## The Power of open-source: How front-end components benefit your business
> To stay competitive, businesses need solutions that are both flexible and affordable. Open-source tools, like in our case admin apps, service lists, a...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/the-power-of-open-source
To stay competitive, businesses need solutions that are both flexible and affordable. Open-source tools, like in our case admin apps, service lists, and booking pages, provide a great way to achieve this. They allow businesses to create user-friendly systems that can easily grow and adapt-without the high costs of traditional software. These tools make it easier to customize services and keep up with changing needs.
What is open-source?
Open-source software is a type of program where the code is open for anyone to see, change, and share. Unlike traditional software that's owned and controlled by one company, open-source is built by a global community of developers. This means it gets better over time, with faster updates and more flexibility to customize it to fit your business. The best part? It's often cheaper than other software options, and you can adjust it to meet your specific needs.
Main benefits
Let’s explore how open-source front-end components can benefit businesses across different sectors.
1. **Cost-effectiveness**
One of the primary benefits of open-source software is its cost. Unlike proprietary software, which often comes with hefty licensing fees, open-source solutions are generally free to use, modify, and distribute. For businesses, this means lower development costs without compromising on quality.
For instance, open-source booking pages or admin apps allow businesses to customize and deploy ready-made solutions at minimal costs. This helps startups or small businesses optimize their operational efficiency without overstretching their budgets.
2. **Customization and flexibility**
Open-source components are highly customizable. If your business has unique requirements, such as adding features to your booking page or modifying the admin app interface to fit your workflow, you can tweak the codebase to meet those needs. Open-source software gives businesses full control over how their system looks and functions.
For example, **Timerise** offers an open-source booking page that can be easily modified to meet specific business requirements, from design elements to user experience flow. It is the same idea behind [customizable booking pages](/blog/enhancing-customer-experience-with-customizable-booking-pages) that reflect your brand and collect only the data you need. This flexibility ensures that businesses can adapt quickly to market changes, customer feedback, or internal processes without waiting for third-party vendors to implement changes.
3. **Quick deployment**
Open-source components, particularly front-end ones, are typically designed for ease of integration and use. Ready-made elements like booking pages, service lists, or admin dashboards mean you can quickly deploy a working system without starting from scratch. This allows businesses to get their services online faster and start serving customers immediately.
Many businesses choose solutions like **Timerise**, which offer customizable and open-source booking pages, allowing them to set up a complete booking system in a matter of minutes. Such fast deployment helps businesses start verifying ideas and optimizing their services right away.
4. **Scalability**
As businesses grow, their operational needs also evolve. Open-source front-end components are often built to be highly scalable, meaning they can handle increasing numbers of users, bookings, or services without requiring significant changes to the underlying system.
For example, **Timerise’s** customizable service lists and booking pages can support a range of business sizes-from small enterprises with a handful of bookings to large businesses handling thousands of bookings per month. This scalability ensures that your system can grow alongside your business without major overhauls.
5. **Security and Reliability**
Open-source software is often more secure than proprietary alternatives, mainly because it is peer-reviewed by a global community of developers. Bugs and vulnerabilities are identified and resolved quickly by an active user base. Furthermore, businesses can easily audit the code themselves or hire experts to ensure that it meets their security requirements.
Timerise, for instance, uses a robust open-source framework, and businesses that integrate its API into their booking systems can trust in its reliability and flexibility.
6. **Community and continuous improvement**
With open-source, you're never alone. A vast community of developers is constantly working to improve, debug, and enhance the software. This means that your business benefits from continuous innovation and improvements without additional costs. Plus, most open-source projects have active forums, documentation, and GitHub repositories where you can find help or contribute enhancements yourself. We publish our own engineering know-how the same way, as MIT-licensed [Agent Skills anyone can read and install](/blog/agent-skills-and-what-is-inside-them).
6. **White-labeling and branding**
For businesses looking to maintain a strong brand presence, open-source solutions often provide white-label options. This allows businesses to present fully branded interfaces without revealing the third-party services they rely on. For instance, **Timerise** allows businesses to use their own custom domains and personalize booking pages to reflect their brand, ensuring a seamless customer experience.
Conclusion
Open-source front-end components such as admin apps, service lists, and booking pages offer a wealth of advantages for businesses. From reducing costs and increasing flexibility to scaling with growth and ensuring security, open-source solutions provide the agility and power that businesses need to thrive in a competitive market.
Whether you’re a startup looking for rapid deployment or an established business aiming for scalability and customization, adopting open-source components could be the key to unlocking your business's full potential. Taken one step further, owning the code of the systems your revenue runs on is what [the Post-SaaS Manifesto](/blog/the-post-saas-manifesto) is about.
Open-source links
Admin app  **coming soon**
Services list - [visit GitHub](https://github.com/timerise-ai/next-services)
Booking page - [visit GitHub](https://github.com/timerise-ai/open-booking-page)
Piotr Kozak
September 23, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## Booking APIs made simple: A beginner's guide to getting started
> For businesses managing appointments, events, or rentals, a smooth booking system is essential. Whether you're a small business owner or a developer, ...
Page: https://timerise.ai/blog/booking-apis-made-simple
For businesses managing appointments, events, or rentals, a smooth booking system is essential. Whether you're a small business owner or a developer, a Booking API simplifies the process. But what is a Booking API, and how do you get started? Let’s break it down!
What is a booking API?
A booking API (Application Programming Interface) is a tool that allows different software systems to communicate with each other. It enables you to integrate booking functionality into your app or website, connecting it to other services like calendars, payment systems, and customer management tools. In simple terms, it’s a way to automate booking management without reinventing the wheel every time someone makes a reservation.
APIs handle complex tasks behind the scenes, such as availability checks, customer notifications, and payment processing, making your booking system faster, more efficient, and scalable.
Why use a booking API?
So, why does your business need a booking API? Let’s look at a few key reasons:
1. **Save development time**: Instead of building an entire booking system from scratch, APIs provide pre-built solutions that allow you to focus on your core business.
2. **Increase efficiency**: APIs automate the booking process, reducing manual data entry and human errors.
3. **Flexibility**: You can integrate the API into your existing systems, like Google Calendar, payment platforms, and notification systems.
4. **Scalability**: As your business grows, an API can handle more bookings, users, and locations without any extra effort from you.
5. **Customization**: Many APIs, like Timerise, allow you to customize booking flows, branding, and services to fit your business needs.
Getting Started with a Booking API
Starting with a Booking API can seem intimidating, but it’s simpler than you might think! Here are a few key steps to guide you through the process:
1. Choose the Right API for Your Needs
Not all APIs are created equal. Some are more suitable for specific industries, such as healthcare, fitness, or event management. Timerise, for instance, builds customizable booking systems, making it ideal for a range of industries like education, healthcare, and travel.
Before choosing an API, think about:
**What do you need to automate?** Appointment scheduling, rental bookings, or event registrations?
**What third-party integrations do you need?** Payment gateways like Stripe or communication tools like Twilio.
**How much customization do you require?** Do you need a white-labeled solution with your branding or more flexibility with booking flows?
1.
2. Understand the Basics of API Requests
APIs operate using requests and responses. When a customer interacts with your booking system (e.g., selects a date for an appointment), the API sends a request to the server. The server processes the request and sends back a response with the available times, booking confirmation, or error messages.
The two most common types of API requests you’ll deal with are (GraphQL APIs like Timerise use queries and mutations instead, which is why [GraphQL suits AI agents and LLM apps](/blog/graphql-the-perfect-backend-for-ai-agents-and-llm-apps) so well):
- **GET** requests: To retrieve data (like available booking slots).
- **POST** requests: To send new data (like a booking confirmation).
3. Secure API keys
To access an API, you’ll need an API key-a unique identifier that grants you access. Timerise, for example, provides a static API key for development and integration purposes. Make sure to keep your API keys secure, as they control access to sensitive booking data.
4. Test your integration in a sandbox environment
Before going live, it’s essential to test your booking system in a safe environment. Many Booking APIs, including Timerise, offer sandbox environments where you can experiment without affecting real bookings. This way, you can ensure everything runs smoothly before launching your system.
5. Monitor and optimize
Once your API is live, continuously monitor its performance. Use the built-in tools many APIs offer, such as dashboards to track bookings, payment statuses, or cancellations. You can even integrate feedback mechanisms to improve customer satisfaction.
Bonus tips for success
**Use webhooks**: Webhooks allow your API to send real-time updates when certain events occur (e.g., when a booking is confirmed or canceled). This keeps your system up to date without the need for constant polling.
**Integrate payments**: Streamline your revenue by integrating payment gateways directly into your booking process. Timerise, for example, supports Stripe and Adyen, making it easy to collect payments while your customers book.
**Customize notifications**: Make sure your customers are always informed. Configure SMS or email notifications for booking confirmations, reminders, or changes to ensure a smooth customer experience.
Final thoughts
Using a Booking API can be a game changer for your business. By automating and streamlining the booking process, you free up time and resources, allowing you to focus on delivering great customer experiences. APIs like Timerise are designed to be flexible, easy to integrate, and customizable, making it easier than ever to get started with booking automation.
Running a platform with many providers? Read our [guide to booking APIs for marketplaces](/blog/booking-api-marketplace-integration). Already integrated and something breaks? Start with [troubleshooting common booking API issues](/blog/troubleshooting-booking-api-issues).
Are you ready to simplify your bookings? Dive into the world of Booking APIs today, and watch your business thrive!
Piotr Kozak
September 16, 2024
[Contact us](/contact)
---
## calendar-scheduling-links (Agent Skill)
> Your own scheduling links: booking pages per host and event type, availability with overrides and buffers, Google and Outlook calendar sync, e-mail invites, reminders and self-service reschedule.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/calendar-scheduling-links
Agent Skill `calendar-scheduling-links`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/calendar-scheduling-links. Category: Scheduling. Runs on Next.js; backend: Supabase or Firestore behind a `SchedulingStore` seam.
Latest release: v0.1.2 (2026-10-15).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/calendar-scheduling-links. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
A scheduling link looks like the simplest page on the internet: a calendar, some free times, a button. Most teams rent one per seat, every month, and accept that the booking page lives on someone else's domain, sends someone else's e-mails and stops where the vendor's roadmap stops.
The page is the easy part. The hard part is what happens when two people pick the same time, when the host's calendar changed a minute ago, when the clocks go forward on a Sunday night, or when a meeting moves and the reminder still goes out for the old time. Get one of those wrong and a client sits alone on a call.
This skill gives your coding agent the whole core, written by the engineers who build booking systems for a living: availability, booking, calendar sync, invites, reminders, reschedule and cancel links. You own the code, run it on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore, under your own accounts, and extend it with us, with our other skills, or by asking your agent for the next feature.
We explain why we made it, and walk through building your own scheduling links in an afternoon, in [Build your own Calendly with an Agent Skill](/blog/build-your-own-calendly-with-an-agent-skill).
Build self-hosted scheduling links in a Next.js App Router app: a public booking page per host and event type, weekly availability with date overrides, buffers, minimum notice, daily limits and a rolling horizon, one-on-one and group event types, Google Calendar and Microsoft 365 busy-time sync and event write-back, confirmation e-mails with an ICS invite, reminders, reschedule and cancel by a private link, signed webhooks and an embeddable widget. Use when: (1) a team wants its own Calendly-style booking pages instead of a per-seat subscription, (2) an app needs "book a time with me" links for coaches, advisors, sales or support, (3) an existing scheduling module double-books, drifts across DST, sends stale reminders or duplicates calendar events, (4) the user mentions: scheduling link, booking page, Calendly alternative, Calendly clone, Cal.com alternative, event types, availability rules, date overrides, buffer time, minimum notice, daily limit, round robin, time slots, free busy, freeBusy, calendarView, Google Calendar sync, Outlook sync, Microsoft Graph subscription, watch channel, ICS invite, METHOD:REQUEST, SEQUENCE, reschedule link, cancel link, embed widget, booking webhook, double booking, DST, exclusion constraint, btree_gist, pg_cron. Carries one pure slot engine that the page and the write both call, a per-host lock with a Postgres exclusion constraint, side effects as leased idempotent jobs, sealed OAuth tokens, signed state and channel tokens, and 53 unit tests plus a store contract run on Supabase and the Firestore emulator. Next.js App Router on Vercel; Supabase by default, Firestore behind the same SchedulingStore seam. Not payments, not team round robin in this release, not a video meeting service.
This skill was written by the engineer who builds the scheduling core of a booking platform, and audited against the earlier implementation of that core. The templates hold the properties a scheduling module has to hold: a start is booked only if the engine offers it at write time; of any number of simultaneous requests for one slot, one wins; local days survive both DST changes; a reschedule moves the same calendar event and the same invitation; a reminder belongs to the start it was made for; calendar access, manage links and webhooks cannot be forged. 53 unit tests and a store contract, run on local Supabase and the Firestore emulator, state each one, and [`references/provenance.md`](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- A public booking page per host and event type
- Weekly availability with date overrides
- Buffers and minimum notice
- Daily limits and group seats
- Google and Microsoft calendar sync
- E-mail with an ICS invite
- Reminders, reschedule and cancel by a private link
- Signed webhooks
- An embed widget
When to use:
- Public booking pages for one or many hosts, each with their own event types and availability.
- One-on-one meetings and group sessions with seats.
- Avoiding the host's Google or Microsoft calendar, and writing bookings into it.
- Auditing or rebuilding a scheduling module: [provenance.md](references/provenance.md) has the audit ledger and the fix order.
When not to use:
- **Taking payment for a booking, deposits, no-show holds**: the sibling `bookable-events` skill, or `stripe-connect-subscriptions` for a marketplace. [extensions.md](references/extensions.md) shows the join.
- **Capacity-limited events with tickets (a workshop on one date)**: `bookable-events`.
- **A walk-up touchscreen terminal**: `booking-kiosk`, which can call this module's service.
- **Round robin, collective and routing forms**: described in [extensions.md](references/extensions.md), with no templates in this release.
- **Video meetings themselves**: the module creates Google Meet or Teams links through the calendar APIs.
Non-negotiables:
- The write recomputes the slot with the engine that listed it. A start is booked only if `computeSlots` offers it at write time. The booking suite books what the page listed and refuses an off-grid start, a start inside the notice and one outside hours.
- Every booking write is atomic per host. Seats, the daily limit and overlap are checked under one lock per host, with the overlap constraint as the backstop. The store contract sends four simultaneous requests for one slot to each store and expects one winner.
- Side effects are jobs, written with the change and run after it. No e-mail, calendar call or webhook inside the transaction; every job idempotent and re-checking the booking. The booking suite runs the queue twice and expects one send, retries a failing mailer, and plants a stale reminder that must not be sent.
- Instants in storage, zones only at the edges. Store UTC instants; convert with an explicit IANA zone, iterate local dates, never add 24 hours. The time and engine suites cover both DST changes, a 5:45 offset and a late-evening walk across a spring-forward night.
- Secrets stay sealed and links stay unforgeable. Manage tokens stored as hashes, OAuth tokens and webhook secrets encrypted, OAuth state and channel tokens signed, cron auth failing closed. The edges suite checks each.
Not this:
- Payment for a booking, deposits, no-show holds, ticketed events with seats on one date: `bookable-events`
- A marketplace that pays providers: `stripe-connect-subscriptions`
- A walk-up booking terminal: `booking-kiosk`
- Host notifications in Slack: `slack-ai-bot`
- Knowing who opened a booking link: `visit-logger`
- Invoices for paid sessions: `invoicing`
- Round robin, collective events, routing forms: [extensions.md](references/extensions.md), no templates yet
Booking features we build with it:
- Reminders that cut no-shows: /features/reminders
- Google and Outlook calendar sync: /features/calendar-sync
What to tell your agent:
- Add Calendly-style booking links to this Next.js app on Supabase: hosts set their weekly availability and event types, visitors book a free time on a public page, both get an e-mail with a calendar invite, and the visitor can reschedule or cancel from a link in that e-mail.
- Connect our booking pages to the host's Google Calendar and Outlook: hide times when they are busy and put every booking into their calendar.
- Audit our scheduling module: people get double-booked, reminders arrive for meetings that were moved, and around the clock change some days have no slots.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.1.2, 2026-10-15: pass (Supabase)
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.1.2, 2026-10-15: pass (Supabase)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.1.2, 2026-10-15: pass (Supabase)
Recent releases:
- v0.1.2 (2026-10-15): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.1. Apps built from 0.1.0 or 0.1.1 should copy booking-service.ts, booking-widget.tsx and the new manage slots route.
- v0.1.1 (2026-10-15): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.0. Apps built from 0.1.0 should copy runner.ts, calendar/writer.ts, calendar/sync.ts, booking-widget.tsx and cancel-form.tsx.
- v0.1.0 (2026-10-15): First release: self-hosted scheduling links for Next.js App Router on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore.
---
## time-slot-generator (Agent Skill)
> Bookable time slots generated from rules: daily ranges, every first Monday of the month, one-off and whole-day slots, with seats, bookings, blackouts and the host's busy time taken out, safe to book under load.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/time-slot-generator
Agent Skill `time-slot-generator`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/time-slot-generator. Category: Scheduling. Runs on Next.js; backend: Firestore or Supabase/Postgres behind a `SlotStore` seam.
Latest release: v0.1.3 (2026-10-16).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/time-slot-generator. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
Every booking system has a list of times a client can pick. Nobody types those times in one by one: they come from rules such as "every weekday from 9 to 5 in half-hour slots" or "a class on the first Monday of every month", minus whatever is already booked, closed or taken.
The list is the easy part. The hard part is what happens on the Sunday the clocks change, when the server runs in a different time zone from the shop, when a monthly rule meets a week that starts mid-month, or when two clients press "book" on the last seat in the same second. Get one of those wrong and a slot disappears for a day, shows an hour late, or is sold twice.
This skill gives your coding agent the slot engine, written by the engineers who build the one inside a booking platform: rules authored in local time and stored as exact instants, seats, bookings, blackouts, the host's busy time, shared resources and working hours taken out, one availability check for both the list and the booking, and the last seat counted again at the moment it is booked. You own the code, run it on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore, under your own accounts.
Build a strategy-driven time-slot generator with availability in a Next.js App Router app: daily ranges, Nth-weekday-of-month rules, one-off slots and whole-day slots, authored in local wall-clock time and stored as UTC instants, with seats, bookings, blackouts, host busy time, shared resources and working hours subtracted, a listing route and a booking route that re-checks capacity in the write transaction. Use when: (1) an app needs appointment, class, rental or reservation slots generated from rules rather than stored one by one, (2) slot code gives wrong days around DST, wrong weekdays far from UTC, a week view with one day, or times that change with the server's time zone, (3) strategies must be validated, pinned to a zone, or moved off wall-clock-as-UTC storage, (4) two guests can book the last seat at once, (5) the user mentions: time slots, slot generator, availability, booking slots, opening hours, slot strategy, RANGE, PERIODICITY, DAY_RANGE, ONCE, slotInterval, slotDuration, slotsLimit, daysLimit, first Monday of the month, last Friday, overnight slots, lead time, booking window, timeOffset, IANA time zone, DST, fromZonedTime, storageVersion, slot ID, md5, overbooking, capacity check, book_slots, slot-no-longer-available, slot-has-not-enough-capacity. Carries a dependency-free engine on Intl with a 23-test suite run under four process time zones, slot IDs that stay stable for existing bookings, one availability map for listing and booking, and a capacity re-check inside the booking transaction on both backends. Next.js App Router route handlers on the Node.js runtime; Firestore or Supabase/Postgres behind the SlotStore seam. Not a calendar UI, not RRULE or iCalendar recurrence, not payments or booking-flow screens.
This skill was written by the engineer who builds the slot engine of a booking platform, and audited against the earlier implementation of that engine. The templates hold the properties a slot engine has to hold: every weekday of a monthly rule appears in any viewport; local days survive both DST changes; limits count from the strategy, not the requested week; output is the same under any process time zone; nothing the listing hides can be booked by ID; and on ordinary windows the slot IDs are the ones existing bookings already hold. A 23-test suite run under four process time zones states each one, and [`references/provenance.md`](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- Daily ranges
- Nth-weekday-of-month rules
- One-off and whole-day slots authored in local time and stored as UTC
- Seats
- Bookings
- Blackouts
- Host busy time
- Shared resources and working hours subtracted
- One availability map for listing and booking
- Capacity re-checked inside the booking transaction
- Slot IDs that stay stable for existing bookings
When to use:
- Generating bookable slots from rules: "Monday to Friday 09:00 to 17:00 every 30 min", "first and last Friday of each month 18:00 to 20:00", "whole days, weekends only", "this one Saturday 10:00 to 14:00".
- Showing availability: capacity per slot, minus bookings, blackouts, a host's other commitments, shared rooms or equipment, and outside working hours.
- Booking slots by ID with a capacity re-check that holds under concurrent requests.
- Fixing slot code with time-zone bugs, or moving one off wall-clock-as-UTC storage.
When not to use:
- **The booking screens or a kiosk flow**: `booking-kiosk`, which consumes the slots this skill produces.
- **Public scheduling links per host with calendar sync and e-mail**: `calendar-scheduling-links`.
- **Calendar recurrence (RRULE, iCalendar, Google or Outlook event series)**: `rrule` or the provider's API. Strategies describe bookable capacity, not events.
- **Payments, deposits, invoices**: `bookable-events`, `invoicing`.
Non-negotiables:
- Never change the slot ID input. `md5(";;")` is the identity every client and every booking holds; a different input orphans them all. A test pins the format.
- Never infer "overnight" from end before start. A reversed range is far more often a typo than a night shift, so an overnight window needs `overnight: true`. The validation test refuses 17:00 to 09:00 and accepts the explicit overnight window.
- Never generate without a horizon. `maxHorizonDays` and `maxSlots` cap every strategy, since one with no end would otherwise generate until 2038. A test stops a strategy at a 10-day horizon, then at `maxSlots`, and expects `truncated` only in the second case.
- Never filter availability in the listing only. The listing and the booking path read one `buildAvailability` map, so an ID cannot book what the listing hides. Both entry points in `service.ts` call the same `computeAvailability`, and a test resolves booking IDs against that map.
- Never count a host's booking of this service as host busy time. It already subtracts seats as a `BOOKING`; blocking on it as well hides a slot that still has room. Both stores exclude the service from the host query, and `SlotStore.listBusy` states the rule.
Not this:
- Booking screens, a walk-up terminal: `booking-kiosk`
- Public scheduling links per host, calendar sync, e-mail invites: `calendar-scheduling-links`
- Ticketed events on one date, deposits, no-show holds: `bookable-events`
- Invoices for bookings: `invoicing`
- Calendar recurrence (RRULE, iCalendar event series): `rrule` or the calendar provider's API
Booking features we build with it:
- Recurring bookings: /features/recurring-bookings
- Rooms, desks and equipment: /features/resources
What to tell your agent:
- Our studio books classes and private sessions from weekly opening hours, like weekdays 9 to 5 every 30 minutes and the first Saturday of each month. Add an API to this Next.js app on Supabase that lists the free times for a service and books one, without overbooking when two people take the last spot.
- Our booking times are an hour off after the clock change, and the week view sometimes only shows Monday. Fix how this app generates its time slots so it is right in every time zone our customers are in.
- Audit our availability code: customers can book times that the calendar does not show, and staff who are busy with another service still appear free.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.1.3, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.1.3, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.1.3, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
Recent releases:
- v0.1.3 (2026-10-16): From scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.2. No template changed.
- v0.1.2 (2026-10-16): Fix release, from scoring the dispatched prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.1.
- v0.1.1 (2026-10-16): Security fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.0.
---
## google-calendar-sync (Agent Skill)
> Two-way Google Calendar sync: hosts connect their account, their events block availability, kept current by push notifications, and confirmed bookings land in their calendar with Google Meet links.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/google-calendar-sync
Agent Skill `google-calendar-sync`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/google-calendar-sync. Category: Scheduling. Runs on Next.js; backend: Firestore or Supabase; storage, auth and the booking source behind seams.
Latest release: v0.2.2 (2026-10-16).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/google-calendar-sync. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
"Connect your Google Calendar" is one button on a settings page. Behind it, a booking system has to know, at the moment a client picks a time, that the host has a dentist appointment, and it has to put the new booking into the host's calendar so nobody books over it from the other side.
The button is the easy part. The hard part is what happens when Google sends five notifications for one change, when a calendar has more events than one page holds, when an all-day holiday falls on a different day in the server's time zone, when the watch channel expires on a Saturday night, or when the host revokes access and nobody notices. Get one of those wrong and the calendar shows a host free while they sit in another meeting, or busy all week for no reason.
This skill gives your coding agent the whole sync, written by the engineers who build calendar integrations for booking systems: the OAuth connect, busy time from the calendars a host chooses, push notifications with channel renewal, booking events with Google Meet links, and health per calendar so a broken connection becomes a reconnect prompt. You own the code, run it on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore, under your own Google Cloud project.
Build two-way Google Calendar sync for a booking or scheduling app: hosts connect their Google account with OAuth, events on the calendars they choose block their availability, kept current by push notifications and a renewal cron, and confirmed bookings are written to their calendar as events, with Google Meet links when asked. Use when: (1) an app with bookings, appointments, classes or shifts must respect staff's Google Calendar busy time or put bookings into it, (2) an existing calendar sync shows phantom busy time, missed or duplicate events, group sessions blocked after the first booking, sync that stopped without an error, or users stuck after revoking access, (3) the user mentions: Google Calendar integration, two-way calendar sync, connect Google Calendar, busy time, free/busy, events.watch, push notifications, X-Goog-Channel-Token, channel renewal, calendar.events scope, refresh token, invalid_grant, offline access, PKCE, Google Meet link, conferenceData, extendedProperties, hangoutLink. Carries a dependency-free Google client on fetch, a pure busy-time mapper and diff, single-flight sync, idempotent booking events, make-before-break channel renewal, derived health per calendar, Firestore and Supabase stores, and a 32-test node:test suite run under four process time zones. Next.js App Router route handlers, with an Express adapter for other Node servers; storage, auth and the booking source are seams. Not Outlook or Microsoft 365 (microsoft-calendar-sync), not slot generation (time-slot-generator), not a calendar UI, not ICS feeds.
This skill was written by the engineer who owns the calendar integration of a booking API, and audited against the earlier implementation of that integration together with the slot engine that consumes its output. The templates hold the properties a calendar sync has to hold: a booking's own event never becomes busy time; a burst of notifications converges to one block per event; every page of a calendar is read, and a failed page deletes nothing; a multi-day all-day event blocks every day, whatever the server's time zone; a channel is renewed before the old one is stopped; a booking pushed twice is one event; revoked access becomes a reconnect prompt that keeps every setting. 32 tests state them, run under four process time zones, and [`references/provenance.md`](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- OAuth with PKCE
- Busy time from the calendars a host chooses kept current by push notifications and make-before-break channel renewal
- Confirmed bookings written as idempotent events with Google Meet links
- Derived health per calendar
- An Express adapter beside the App Router routes
When to use:
- Hosts connect Google Calendar and pick calendars that block their availability.
- Bookings appear in the host's Google Calendar, optionally with a Meet link, and vanish on cancel.
- Auditing an existing Google sync: duplicates, ghosts, sync that stopped, reconnect loops.
- Moving that sync between Firestore and Supabase/Postgres.
When not to use:
- **Generating bookable slots, subtracting busy time**: `time-slot-generator`. This skill *produces* the busy blocks it consumes.
- **Outlook or Microsoft 365**: `microsoft-calendar-sync`, the same architecture and record shapes on Microsoft Graph.
- **Showing a calendar UI or sending invitations**: the host's own e-mail; this writes events without Google's invitation e-mails.
- **Read-only availability without per-user OAuth**: Google's free/busy query with a service account and domain-wide delegation is a different design.
Non-negotiables:
- Never take the user id from the OAuth callback URL. The state is a key to a server-side, single-use, ten-minute record; otherwise anyone attaches their calendar to someone else's account. The connect tests consume a state twice, let one expire, and check the user comes from the server.
- Never trust a notification before its channel token verifies against the channel id it arrived on. The endpoint is public; the token is the only credential. The webhook test sends a forged token, a foreign resource and an unknown channel.
- Never stop the old channel before the new one exists. If the new watch fails, the calendar has no channel and its busy time stops updating while the UI says "on". The renewal tests fail the new watch and expect the old channel kept, and remove a channel and expect the cron to open one.
- Never store tokens in clear text. A refresh token is long-lived read and write access to a calendar. The token test round-trips AES-256-GCM and rejects tampering; the connect test reads the stored tokens back encrypted.
- Never let a Google failure fail a booking. Outbound writes log and return; the booking stands. `pushBookingEvent` and `removeBookingEvent` catch every Google error and return a result per calendar, as [booking-events.md](references/booking-events.md) shows.
Not this:
- Outlook and Microsoft 365 calendars: `microsoft-calendar-sync`
- Generating bookable slots and subtracting busy time: `time-slot-generator`
- Public booking pages with Google and Outlook sync built in: `calendar-scheduling-links`
- A calendar UI or invitation e-mails: The host's own UI and e-mail
- Availability from a whole Workspace without per-user OAuth: Google's free/busy query with domain-wide delegation, not templated here
Booking features we build with it:
- Google and Outlook calendar sync: /features/calendar-sync
What to tell your agent:
- Our staff should be able to connect their Google Calendar in this Next.js app. Events on the calendars they pick must block their availability and stay up to date without anyone pressing refresh, and every confirmed booking should land in their calendar, with a Google Meet link if they want one. We use Supabase.
- Add Google Calendar sync for our instructors on Firestore. We run group classes: when a student books a class it goes into the instructor's calendar, but the class must stay open for the other students.
- Audit our Google Calendar integration: hosts show as busy at times they cleared weeks ago, some calendars stopped updating without any error, and people who revoked access just see an empty calendar list.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.2.2, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.2.2, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.2.2, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
Recent releases:
- v0.2.2 (2026-10-16): Wording release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.2.1.
- v0.2.1 (2026-10-16): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.2.0.
- v0.2.0 (2026-10-16): The skill brought to the Timerise skill standard, with a new adaptation reference, agent evals, and one template fix found by compiling every block on its own.
---
## microsoft-calendar-sync (Agent Skill)
> Two-way Outlook and Microsoft 365 calendar sync over Microsoft Graph: hosts connect their account, their events block availability, and confirmed bookings land in their calendar with Teams links.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/microsoft-calendar-sync
Agent Skill `microsoft-calendar-sync`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/microsoft-calendar-sync. Category: Scheduling. Runs on Next.js; backend: Firestore or Supabase; storage, auth and the booking source behind seams.
Latest release: v0.1.4 (2026-10-16).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/microsoft-calendar-sync. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
Most companies that sell to other companies live in Outlook. If a booking system cannot see a consultant's Outlook calendar, clients book times the consultant already gave away, and bookings never show up where the consultant actually looks.
Microsoft Graph makes the first demo easy and the first month hard. Refresh tokens change with every use, so a connection that worked yesterday stops working today. Notifications have to be answered within three seconds or Graph gives up on them. Subscriptions expire, and some vanish without a word. An all-day vacation floats between time zones. Get one of those wrong and the integration fails quietly, an hour or a week after it went live.
This skill gives your coding agent the whole sync, written by the engineers who build calendar integrations for booking systems: the Microsoft sign-in, busy time from the calendars a host chooses, change notifications with a renewal job that replaces lost subscriptions, booking events with Teams links, and health per calendar so a broken connection becomes a reconnect prompt. You own the code, run it on Next.js on Vercel, with Supabase or Firestore, under your own Microsoft Entra app.
Build two-way Microsoft 365 / Outlook calendar sync for a booking or scheduling backend over Microsoft Graph: hosts connect their Microsoft account with OAuth, events on chosen calendars block their availability (change-notification subscriptions plus a renewal cron), and confirmed bookings are written to their calendar as events, with Teams meeting links. Use when: (1) an app with bookings, appointments, classes or shifts must respect staff's Outlook busy time or put bookings into their Outlook calendar, (2) an existing Outlook or Graph calendar integration stops working an hour after connecting, never receives notifications, ignores vacations, duplicates events or loses its subscriptions, (3) the user mentions: Outlook calendar integration, Microsoft 365 calendar, Office 365 calendar sync, Microsoft Graph calendar, Entra ID app registration, Calendars.ReadWrite, calendarView, change notifications, Graph subscription, clientState, validationToken, lifecycleNotificationUrl, subscriptionRemoved, MSAL refresh token, AADSTS700082, invalid_grant, interaction_required, singleValueExtendedProperties, teamsForBusiness, showAs, isAllDay, mailboxSettings timeZone. Carries a dependency-free Graph client on fetch, a pure busy-time mapper that anchors all-day events to the mailbox zone, single-flight sync, booking events found again by an extended-property marker, in-place subscription renewal that replaces lost subscriptions, derived health per calendar, Firestore and Supabase stores, and a 43-test node:test suite run under four process time zones. TypeScript for Next.js App Router route handlers, with an Express adapter for any other Node server; storage, auth and the booking source are seams behind CalendarStore, authenticate and BookingSource. Not Google Calendar, not Exchange on-premises (EWS), not a calendar UI.
This skill was written by the engineer who builds the calendar integrations of a booking platform, and audited against the earlier implementation of its Microsoft side. The templates hold the properties a Graph calendar sync has to hold: a connection keeps working past its first access token because every rotated refresh token is stored; every subscription fits Graph's `clientState` limit and is bound to the notifications it signs; a notification is answered before any sync starts; a subscription Graph dropped is replaced on the next cron run; an all-day vacation blocks the host's local days in the mailbox zone; a booking pushed any number of times is one event. A 43-test `node:test` suite, run under four process time zones, states each one, and [`references/provenance.md`](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- OAuth connect with encrypted tokens
- Busy time from the calendars a host chooses kept current by change notifications and a renewal cron that replaces lost subscriptions
- All-day events anchored to the mailbox time zone
- Confirmed bookings written as events with Teams links
- Derived health per calendar
- An Express adapter beside the App Router routes
When to use:
- Hosts connect Microsoft 365 or Outlook.com and pick calendars that block their availability.
- Bookings appear in the host's Outlook calendar, optionally as Teams meetings, and vanish on cancel.
- Auditing an existing Graph integration: dead after an hour, silent subscriptions, missed vacations.
- Moving that sync between Firestore and Supabase/Postgres.
When not to use:
- **Google Calendar**: use `google-calendar-sync`. Same architecture and record shapes, different API.
- **Generating bookable slots, subtracting busy time**: use `time-slot-generator`. This skill *produces* the busy blocks it consumes.
- **Signing users in with Microsoft (SSO)** is an identity concern; this skill asks for calendar access of an already signed-in user.
- **Room and resource mailboxes, or organisation-wide access without per-user consent** need application permissions with admin consent, a different design.
- **Exchange Server on-premises** speaks EWS, not Graph.
Non-negotiables:
- Never take the user id from the OAuth callback URL. The state is a key to a server-side, single-use, ten-minute record that holds the user id, so nobody can attach their calendar to someone else's account. The connect tests consume the state, refuse it a second time and after expiry, and read the user from the server.
- Never sync before answering a notification. Graph wants a reply within 3 seconds and drops the notifications of a slow endpoint; the handler verifies, answers 202 and hands the sync to `defer`, with the cron as the safety net. The webhook test checks that nothing has synced when the response returns, and the routes test that syncs go to `defer`.
- Never trust a notification before its clientState verifies and names the subscription it arrived on. The endpoint is public, so the signed clientState is the only credential. The rules suite checks the signature binds to its subscription, and the webhook test sends forged, foreign and unknown notifications that must schedule nothing.
- Never store tokens in clear text. A refresh token is long-lived read and write access to a calendar, so both tokens are sealed with AES-256-GCM before they reach the store. The rules suite round-trips the encryption and the connect test checks the stored tokens are sealed.
- Never let an Outlook failure fail a booking. The booking store is the truth about bookings; outbound writes log the error and return, and the booking stands. `pushBookingEvent` and `removeBookingEvent` catch at their boundary; this rule is checked by reading, as no test yet throws through them.
Not this:
- Google Calendar busy time and booking events: `google-calendar-sync`
- Generating bookable slots and subtracting busy time: `time-slot-generator`
- Public booking pages per host, Calendly-style: `calendar-scheduling-links`
- Signing users in with Microsoft (SSO): The host app's identity provider
- Room and resource mailboxes, organisation-wide access without per-user consent: Application permissions with admin consent, a different design
- Exchange Server on-premises: EWS, not Graph
Booking features we build with it:
- Google and Outlook calendar sync: /features/calendar-sync
What to tell your agent:
- Let hosts in this Next.js app on Supabase connect their Microsoft 365 or Outlook calendar: the times they are busy in Outlook must stop being bookable, and every confirmed booking should show up in their Outlook calendar and disappear again when it is cancelled.
- Add Outlook calendar sync to our Firestore backend, and put each booking into the host's calendar as a Teams meeting with the guest invited.
- Our Outlook calendar integration stops working about an hour after a host connects, and their vacations never block anything. Find out why and fix it.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.1.4, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.1.4, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.1.4, 2026-10-16: pass (Supabase)
Recent releases:
- v0.1.4 (2026-10-16): From scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.3. Wording only; no template changed.
- v0.1.3 (2026-10-16): From scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.2. Wording only; no template changed.
- v0.1.2 (2026-10-16): From scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.1. Wording only; no template changed.
---
## help-center-markdown (Agent Skill)
> A help center served from markdown files in your repository: category, tag and article pages, ranked search, locale fallback, JSON-LD and sitemap. No CMS.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/help-center-markdown
Agent Skill `help-center-markdown`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/help-center-markdown. Category: Content. Runs on Next.js; backend: Repository files, no CMS.
Latest release: v0.2.16 (2026-10-07).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/help-center-markdown. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
Every product needs a place where customers find answers without writing to support. A help center is the simplest one: articles in categories, a search box, links between them.
The usual way to get one is a CMS or a hosted knowledge base. That means another login, another monthly fee, and content that lives outside your repository, out of step with the product.
This skill builds the help center from markdown files in the repository. An article is a file with a short header. The build renders the landing, category, tag and article pages. Search ranks results and forgives a trailing space or a missing accent. The build fails when an article is unreachable or a link points nowhere. A language without a translation falls back to the default instead of an empty page.
Build a markdown-backed help center in a Next.js App Router app: category folders of frontmatter articles, statically rendered landing, category, tag and article pages, client-side search with ranking and keyboard navigation, locale-aware routing with default-locale fallback, tags with slug identity and per-tag pages, related articles, breadcrumbs, JSON-LD and sitemap entries, plus a content validator for CI. Use when: (1) building or extending a help center, knowledge base, docs section, support articles or FAQ hub from markdown files in the repo, (2) adding article search, tag pages or tag chips, translated articles with fallback, hreflang/canonical rules, related links, or a collapsible article sidebar, (3) the user mentions: help center, knowledge base, docs site, support articles, markdown content, frontmatter, gray-matter, content/help, validate:help, tags, article search, hreflang, i18n content, "help articles". Carries a loader with a CI validator that fails the build on unreachable or malformed articles, search that tolerates trailing spaces, punctuation and diacritics, and tags grouped by slug so every spelling variant reaches one page. Next.js App Router; the content source is a seam behind one getHelpIndex(locale), so a CMS can replace the filesystem. Not a blog skill, not a CMS integration and not docs generated from code.
This skill was written by the engineer who has shipped this module; the earlier implementation it was audited against was a marketing-site help center. The templates hold the requirement as verified properties: the sidebar shows every article of every category, the parser reads every frontmatter shape the corpus uses and the validator fails the build on the ones it cannot, tags group by slug so one label reaches one page however it is spelled, and search ranks a query however it is typed, trailing space and diacritics included. The loader, search and tag suites cover each of those; [references/provenance.md](references/provenance.md) carries the record.
What it builds:
- Category, tag and article pages
- Ranked client-side search
- Locale fallback
- JSON-LD
- Sitemap
- CI content validator
When to use:
- Building or extending a help center, docs section or knowledge base whose articles are markdown files in the repository, on Next.js App Router, with or without multiple locales.
When not to use:
- **A blog**: dated, authored posts are another content model.
- **Docs generated from code** (OpenAPI, TypeDoc): use their generators.
- **A CMS-backed help site** publishing at runtime: the index contract holds, the loader changes; see the CMS note in [extensions.md](references/extensions.md).
- **Marketing pages that happen to be markdown**: reuse the host's renderer.
Non-negotiables:
- Summaries, never articles, cross to the client. `toSummary` / `toSearchDoc` are the only shapes client components accept, so a page carries about a kilobyte per article rather than the whole corpus; the type signatures enforce it.
- `hidden`, not a height cap, on collapsible nav. A height cap clips whatever does not fit and reports nothing; `hidden` renders every link of every category or none, and the shell template uses only that.
- Untranslated pages canonicalise to the default locale and stay out of hreflang and the sitemap, so a fallback page is never indexed as a duplicate; the loader test flags the fallback and the routes read that flag.
- Validation runs in CI. The runtime is forgiving on purpose, dropping bad refs and sorting missing orders last, and `validate:help` fails the build for the author; the validator tests cover unresolved refs, order ties and skipped files.
- Sort by `order`, then title, then slug. Ties left to `readdir` order differ between filesystems, so the same deploy could list articles differently on another build machine; the loader test orders by `order` then title, never by filename, and the validator warns on ties.
- Search trims, tokenises and folds diacritics, over tags and headings as well as title and description, ranked by field. A query is matched however it is typed, trailing space and accents included; the search tests cover each of those and the title-over-description ranking.
- Every chrome string goes through `HelpStrings`. The header, footer and notices switch locale together with the host; the components take their text only from the strings table, and the i18n checklist greps for literals left in JSX.
- Tags are keyed by `tagSlug`, never by spelling. Case, hyphens and plurals drift across authors, so every variant lands on one page; the tag tests merge spellings under one slug and the validator warns on variants and plural pairs.
Not this:
- A blog: dated, authored posts with covers and localized slugs: The sibling [`blog-markdown`](https://github.com/timerise-ai/blog-markdown) skill; a different content model
- Docs generated from code (OpenAPI, TypeDoc): Their generators; link to the output
- A CMS-backed help site with editors publishing at runtime: The index contract still applies, but the loader, static params and validation change; see the CMS note in `references/extensions.md`
- Marketing pages that happen to be markdown: The host's renderer; this module is the navigation, search and locale model around many articles
What to tell your agent:
- Add a help center to this Next.js app from markdown files in content/help: category pages, article pages, search, and a sitemap entry for every article.
- Our docs are markdown files in English and German. Build /help with a locale fallback, so an article missing in German shows the English one instead of a 404.
- Audit our help center: search misses articles, categories sort inconsistently and some tags are spelled two ways.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.2.16, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.2.16, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.2.16, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
Recent releases:
- v0.2.16 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.2.15. The templates are unchanged.
- v0.2.15 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.2.14. The templates are unchanged.
- v0.2.14 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.2.13. One template defect was fixed; the shipped suite grows from 23 to 27 tests in five files.
---
## blog-markdown (Agent Skill)
> A multilingual blog served from markdown files: localized slugs tied by one translation key, tag pages, related posts, RSS, sitemap and hreflang. No CMS.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/blog-markdown
Agent Skill `blog-markdown`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/blog-markdown. Category: Content. Runs on Next.js; backend: Repository files, no CMS.
Latest release: v0.1.10 (2026-10-07).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/blog-markdown. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
A company blog has two jobs: read well and be found. The second job fails once there is more than one language. Translated posts get separate URLs with nothing tying them together. Tag pages split on a spelling variant. The feed goes stale. Search engines see duplicates instead of translations.
This skill builds the blog from markdown files, with one field that ties an article's language versions together: the translation key. That key drives hreflang, the language switcher, related posts and cross-language redirects. Slugs stay localized for search.
Tag pages, RSS, sitemap and cover art come with it. A validator in CI refuses a build with a broken post, so a bad file never publishes as an empty page.
Build a file-based, multilingual blog from markdown content: locale-partitioned posts, per-locale slugs joined by a shared translation key, tag pages, related posts, cover art, RSS, sitemap and hreflang. Use when: (1) adding a blog, changelog, news or article section backed by markdown files rather than a CMS, (2) making an existing markdown blog multilingual, or adding tag pages, hreflang, feeds or related posts, (3) the content lives in a repo folder and must be statically generated, (4) the user mentions: markdown blog, MDX blog, frontmatter, gray-matter, content/blog, translationKey, tag pages, hreflang, related posts, generateStaticParams for posts, blog RSS feed. Carries the cross-locale slug model, the tag-slug collision rule, the frontmatter parser that survives smart quotes, and the loader memoization that removes a measured 71x build-time read amplification. Next.js App Router oriented; the content source is a seam, so a CMS can replace the filesystem. Not a CMS integration skill and not a docs/help-center skill.
The whole design turns on one idea: **a post's identity is its `translationKey`, not its slug.** Slugs are localized for SEO and differ per language; the key is what makes three files one article, and it is what powers hreflang, the language switcher, related posts and cross-locale redirects. This skill was written by the engineer who has shipped this module; the earlier implementation it was audited against was a multi-locale, statically generated marketing blog. The templates hold the properties such a blog has to hold: every translation resolves to its siblings through the key, every tag page lists every post that carries the tag under any spelling, a file that `gray-matter` cannot parse still loads, and each content file is read once per build. The content-layer suite and the build verify each one; [references/provenance.md](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- Localized slugs
- Tag pages
- Related posts
- RSS
- Sitemap, hreflang and a CI content validator
When to use:
- Content authored as markdown in the repo, deployed with the app
- More than one language, with different slugs per language
- Tag pages, related posts, feeds, or hreflang are in scope
- You want the whole thing statically generated at build time
Non-negotiables:
- `gray-matter` caches a failed parse as an empty result. It writes its cache entry before parsing, so the second and every later parse of a file whose YAML throws returns `{}`, with no error and no frontmatter. Always call `matter(contents, {})`; any options object opts out of the cache. The re-parse test in the suite holds it.
- Relations are authored once, in the default locale. A translated file that omits `related` resolves through `translationKey` to the default locale's relations, so every translation renders the same related section. The fallback test holds it.
- A tag's identity is its slug, not its label. `"AI Agents"` and `"AI agents"` slug to the same URL; group and match by slug, so every spelling variant's posts appear on the one tag page. Two tests hold it.
- Loading is O(posts x locales) per page unless you memoize. Memoize per locale so each content file is read once per build; resolving alternates in `generateMetadata` is otherwise a 71x file-read amplification, measured on the earlier implementation.
Not this:
- A hosted CMS as the source of truth: That CMS's SDK; keep only `references/content-model.md`
- A docs site or help center with categories, sidebar and search: The sibling [`help-center-markdown`](https://github.com/timerise-ai/help-center-markdown) skill, a different navigation model
- A single-locale blog of under ten posts: Plain `fs` plus `gray-matter` inline; this skill is overhead there
- Rendering user-submitted markdown: A sanitizing renderer; see the XSS note in `references/rendering.md`
What to tell your agent:
- Add a blog to this Next.js app from markdown files in content/blog: post pages, tag pages, related posts, an RSS feed and sitemap entries, all statically generated.
- Make our markdown blog bilingual, English and Polish, with a different slug per language joined by one translation key, and hreflang between the two.
- Our blog build got slow as the posts grew. Find where the loader rereads the markdown files and fix it.
Agent eval results (newest per agent and prompt):
- Codex CLI (gpt-6.1-sol) on v0.1.10, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
- Gemini CLI (gemini-3.8-flash) on v0.1.10, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
- Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5) on v0.1.10, 2026-10-07: pass (Repository files)
Recent releases:
- v0.1.10 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.9.
- v0.1.9 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.8.
- v0.1.8 (2026-10-07): Fix release, from scoring the prompt-1 agent eval runs against 0.1.7.
---
## digital-signage (Agent Skill)
> Screens in your venue: a media library, playlists per screen, device pairing by PIN, and a fullscreen TV player that recovers from stalls and reports its health.
Page: https://timerise.ai/skills/digital-signage
Agent Skill `digital-signage`: https://github.com/timerise-ai/digital-signage. Category: In-venue. Runs on Next.js; backend: Firestore or Supabase.
Latest release: v0.1.12 (2026-10-08).
Install: npx skills add timerise-ai/digital-signage. Timerise builds it on a brief; the price comes from the brief.
Screens in a venue look simple: put a playlist on a TV. They fail in ways nobody notices. A video stalls. A portrait screen shows a rotated frame. A TV stick reboots and forgets which screen it is. The frozen frame stays for a week because nobody watches a console.
This skill builds the whole signage module: a media library, playlists per screen, a registry of displays, pairing by PIN or provisioning URL, and a fullscreen player written to run unattended for months on a cheap TV stick. The player recovers from stalls, rotates for portrait screens and reports whether it is alive.
It runs on Firestore or Supabase, inside your admin app. Each screen has its own token and can only read its own playlist.
Build a digital-signage module in a Next.js App Router app: an ad media library, per-screen playlists, a display registry, device pairing and a fullscreen TV player. Use when: (1) building or extending in-venue screens, digital menu boards, lobby or waiting-room displays, or an advertising-slot system, (2) implementing playlist scheduling, media upload with duration and orientation handling, device pairing by PIN or provisioning URL, screen health monitoring, or remote screen control, (3) auditing a player that freezes, never refreshes or shows portrait media sideways, (4) the user mentions: digital signage, display screens, TV player, ad playlist, signage module, kiosk display, screen management, proof of play, /api/display/pair, /api/display/playlist, ETag, 304 Not Modified, SIGNAGE_TOKEN_PEPPER, wake lock, video stall, firebase-admin, Supabase RLS. Carries player internals that recover from video stalls, rotate for portrait screens and survive TV-browser quirks, and a data and auth model with hashed per-device tokens and venue-scoped playlists, each pinned by a behaviour contract or a route test. Next.js App Router; the data layer is a seam, with Firestore and Supabase/Postgres both carried. Not web ad serving and not an interactive kiosk.
This skill was written by the engineer who has shipped this signage module; the earlier implementation it was audited against ran the screens of a multi-venue booking system. The templates hold the properties that keep a screen alive unattended: a player that skips a stalled video or a broken asset on its own and keeps looping through an outage, a poll that fires on a stable interval whatever the slide state, a per-device token stored hashed and revoked with one row update, and every playlist and route scoped to its venue server-side. The player's behaviour contract and the route tests state each one; [`references/provenance.md`](references/provenance.md) has the record.
What it builds:
- Media library
- Per-screen playlists
- Device pairing by PIN or URL
- Fullscreen TV player with stall recovery and health monitoring
When to use:
- Building or extending screens that loop media in a physical space, on Next.js App Router with Firestore or Supabase/Postgres.
When not to use:
- **Web ad serving** (impressions, bidding, tracking pixels, third-party tags): a different problem with different infrastructure.
- **Interactive kiosks** where the user taps to transact. Signage is one-way.
- **A single embedded video** on a marketing page. Use a `