A form attached to a service can now be a required step in your online booking flow. When you turn this on, a client booking that service has to complete the form before the booking is created; therefore, the intake, consent, photo, or document you need is always there, without chasing anyone afterward.
To create a form and assign it to your services in the first place, see How can I add forms to my online booking page?
Who Can Use It
Forms are a Pro Plus feature, and this setting is part of them. Creating and editing forms is done by the account owner, so the new setting follows the same permission.
The requirement applies to online bookings made by your clients. Appointments you create yourself in the app are unaffected — those forms are still completed after the appointment is booked, as they are today.
Turning It On
To set this up in Goldie, go to Menu (☰) → Forms, open the form you want, and find the Settings section.
Under the services and frequency options, you will find Mandatory before booking online appointments. It is off by default. Switch it on, and the form becomes a required step for any online booking that includes a service the form is assigned to.
Adding a reason
Once the setting is on, a Reason field appears. It is optional and worth filling in: whatever you write here is shown to your client on the form step, so they understand why they are being asked before they can book. Think consultation details, consent, allergy checks, or the photo you need to quote properly.
What Your Client Sees
The form appears as its own step in the booking flow, after the client enters their details and before the payment step. The step only shows when a service in their basket has a form set as mandatory.
If more than one form is required, each gets its own page, and the client works through them in order; Next form takes them onward, and Submit & continue finishes the last one.
When The Booking Is Created
Submitting the form does not create the booking on its own. If you have no-show protection set up, the booking is created at checkout as usual. If no payment is required for that booking, the button at the end of the last form is what confirms the appointment.
Either way, the booking cannot be created until the required forms are submitted, and the answers are attached to the appointment you receive.
If a form is set to Once per client and that client has already submitted it, they are not asked again; the booking proceeds without the extra step.
The Held Time Slot
From the details step onwards, your client sees a countdown showing how long their slot is being held. Filling in a form takes a little longer than a normal booking, so there is a way to keep the slot.
A minute before the hold runs out, Goldie asks the client whether they still want it, and tells them that their answers so far will be saved. Choosing Keep my slot extends the hold by another five minutes, and they can do this up to three times. Choosing Cancel booking releases the slot straight away.
If the client doesn't answer within that minute, the slot expires, and they are invited to pick a new time. When a slot is released this way, any answers submitted against it are discarded too — nothing half-finished reaches you.
Good To Know
Because a mandatory form is completed before the appointment exists, the Form not completed reminder no longer applies to it — there is nothing left to chase.
You can turn the setting off again at any time. The form then goes back to being completed after booking, the way it works today.
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