Scheduling · Approvals
Approving booking requests
With approval on, nothing gets confirmed without a human. Carrier requests land in a Review queue where you can approve them, approve them at a different time, or reject them with a reason.
Open ReviewTurning it on
Approval is per location, under Settings → Scheduling → Require approval for new bookings. Switch it on and a Review item appears in that location's sidebar, badged with the number of requests waiting. Switch it off and new bookings confirm themselves the moment a carrier submits.
Worth having on when you need to check a PO against your system, or when a wrong booking is expensive. Worth leaving off when your hours and doors already encode the rules — every request you were always going to approve is a step you added for both sides.
What a carrier sees while waiting
The request is submitted normally and the carrier is told it's awaiting facility approval, not confirmed. They get an email confirming you received it, and a second email when you decide. Until then, the appointment sits as pending.
Your three decisions
| Action | What happens | Carrier gets |
|---|---|---|
| Approve | Confirmed at the requested time. | An approval email with the confirmed details |
| Approve at a different time | Confirmed at the time you pick. The door is re-picked from live availability so the new time stays conflict-free. | An approval email showing the new time |
| Reject | Marked rejected and the slot is released. | A rejection email, including your reason if you gave one |
A rejection reason is optional but worth typing. “Dock closed for inventory that morning — try Thursday” gets you a workable rebooking; a bare rejection gets you a phone call.
Proposing a different time
Approving at a different time is the useful middle path: the carrier wanted 09:00, you have 11:00. Rather than rejecting and waiting for them to rebook, you approve into the slot that works and they get one email with the real answer.
Because staff booking isn't bound by minimum notice and can scan the whole day, you can place the truck outside your posted hours when you genuinely want to — an early slot before the dock officially opens is marked as outside hours so you know you're making an exception.
Requests whose time has already passed
Sometimes a request sits unreviewed until its slot is in the past — and the truck showed up anyway. The Review queue has an escape hatch for that: record it as completed. The appointment keeps its original requested time and door and moves straight to completed, so your history and analytics reflect what actually happened.
Making sure someone sees the queue
The badge only helps people already looking at SimpleDock. To catch requests as they arrive:
- Email — each member sets their own per-location notifications under Settings, so the right people are alerted without spamming everyone
- Slack — post events into a channel in real time, or take one daily digest each morning
- Webhooks or Zapier — route requests into whatever your team actually watches
Common mix-ups
| What you're seeing | What's going on |
|---|---|
| No Review item in the sidebar | Approval is off for that location, or you're looking at a different location. It only appears where the setting is on. |
| Booking page looks full | Pending requests hold their slots. Check the Review badge before assuming your calendar is genuinely booked. |
| Turned approval on, older bookings didn't become pending | The setting applies to new bookings only. Anything already confirmed stays confirmed. |
| Carrier says they never heard back | Rejections and approvals both email the address on the booking. Check the request had a valid email — company name and email are always required, so it will be there. |