The Appointment Scheduler application was developed to simplify appointment bookings between clients and specialists, empowering institutions to deliver personalized service. This guide provides an overview of the application's functionality, key features and setup process.
- Overview
- Features and Benefits
- How to Set Up the Appointment Scheduler
- How to Book Appointments as an Agent
- How to Book Appointments as a Client
Overview
The Appointment Scheduler Application Preview is now available for Talkdesk Industries Experience Cloud customers. It enables contact center agents to book appointments between clients and specialists as well as for clients to book their own appointments via self-service.
With this application organizations can:
- Create and manage teams of specialists by topic/specialty.
- Integrate the specialists’ Outlook or Google calendar to get their availability.
- Configure automated email notifications for booked appointments.
- Streamline the appointment booking process for clients and agents.
Features and Benefits
- Specialist calendar integration: Specialists can grant calendar access to the application, ensuring their availability information is always up to date. At the moment, Google and Outlook integrations are available.
- Automated notifications: Specialists and clients receive calendar invitations with all appointment details, ensuring everyone stays informed.
- Client and agent-focused workflow: clients and agents can quickly schedule appointments by selecting a topic, date, and time slot.
The Appointment Scheduler Application simplifies appointment booking, improves operation, and enhances customer satisfaction. With its robust features and seamless integration, it’s an efficiency-boosting tool for institutions looking to deliver personalized customer service.
How to Set Up the Appointment Scheduler
Step 1: Configure Email Invitation
Administrators can customize the email that is sent to specialists asking them to share their calendar permissions. This helps ensure clear communication and builds trust with your team.
Step 2: Create and Manage Teams by Topic/Specialty
Administrators can create teams of specialists based on expertise or service type. For example, teams can be organized by topics like "Home Loans" or "Investment Advice."
- Navigate to the Appointment Scheduler application.
- Add specialists to specific teams.
For each specialist, define:
- Name
The specialist’s name as it should appear in the meeting invite and throughout the scheduling experience.
The email address that will be connected to the specialist’s calendar. This must be the email associated with their Google or Outlook calendar account.
- Email provider
Select the calendar provider used by the specialist.
Appointment Scheduler currently supports:
- Google Calendar
- Outlook / Microsoft 365 Calendar
The selected provider determines how availability is retrieved and how meeting invitations are generated.
- Fallback Link (Optional)
An optional conferencing link that will be included in the meeting invite when no unique conferencing link is provided.
This can be any type of meeting link (Zoom, Teams, Google Meet, Webex, etc.).
Use this if:
- The specialist prefers to use the same meeting room for all appointments, or
- Their organization does not support automated unique link generation.
- Define team availability for client appointments.
Step 3: Specialist Calendar Integration
When a specialist is added to a team, they will receive an automated email prompting them to grant calendar access.
- The email includes a secure link to grant calendar permissions.
- Once permissions are granted, the system syncs with the specialist's calendar to view availability.
- Specialists receive a confirmation message upon successful integration.
How to Book Appointments as an Agent
Agents can use the Appointment Scheduler to quickly book meetings on behalf of clients using the Banking workspace.
- Select a team or service: Choose the appropriate team or topic for the appointment (e.g., Home Loans).
- Choose a date and time slot: The system will show available time slots based on the specialist’s calendar.
- Fill in client details: Enter the client’s information, such as name, contact details, and the reason for the meeting.
When scheduling an appointment, you can choose how the conferencing link for the meeting will be generated. Appointment Scheduler offers two options:
1. Use Default Email Provider
What it does:
- Automatically generates a unique conferencing link for this appointment.
- The link is created using the specialist’s connected calendar provider (Google or Outlook).
- Ensures that each appointment has its own dedicated meeting space, preventing overlap or reused links.
When to use it:
- Most standard scheduling scenarios.
- When the specialist wants each meeting to have its own secure, one-time link.
- When the organization prefers automated calendar-managed meeting links.
2. Use Fallback Conference Link
What it does:
- Inserts the generic conferencing link configured for this specialist during setup.
- This is a static link (e.g., a Zoom room, Teams room, Google Meet link, or any other provider).
When to use it:
- The specialist prefers to use the same meeting room for all appointments.
- The organization uses different conferencing link and email providers.
- Confirm the appointment: The system assigns a specialist, and both the client and the specialist receive a calendar invitation with all meeting details. Appointments made can be edited/rescheduled as needed.
How to Book Appointments as a Client (self-service)
Clients can quickly book meetings via self-service using a digital chat AI Agent for Appointment Scheduling. Clients can click on the Talkdesk Chat widget while on their financial institution’s website and/or online banking portal and proceed to book an appointment from there.
Conversing with the AI Agent, clients can communicate what they want to meet about (topic or type of specialist), when they would like to meet, and provide contact information for receiving appointment confirmation and reminders. Appointments made can be edited/rescheduled.
Important Note on Compliance with Google API Services User Data Policy: Our application complies with Google's Limited Use requirements. We only use Google user calendar data to provide and improve user-facing features that are visible and prominent in the app's user interface. We do not use this data for any other purposes such as advertising or customer profiling. Learn more: Workspace API user data and developer policy, Limited use of user data requirement and Limited use of user data requirement of the Photos API User Data and Developer Policy .