Planning annual boiler and water heater servicing visits

Spread annual servicing over the year instead of letting it land in the weeks before winter: open servicing slots months ahead, group them by area on set days, and keep part of each week free for repairs and breakdowns. Make servicing its own service with a fixed slot length, so customers book the right time online, and ask for the appliance type and access details in the booking note. When a job is done, book next year's visit with the customer before you leave.

A boiler that works all summer is easy to forget until the heating goes back on, which is also when breakdowns start. If servicing and emergencies hit your diary in the same weeks, one pushes the other out: either customers wait weeks for a service, or a family without hot water waits behind a routine visit. Servicing is predictable work, and predictable work can be moved to quieter months if the slots are there to book.

On Book, each service has a name, a price and an optional description shown on your public page, and each slot belongs to one service with its own start and end. A servicing visit is a known job with a known length, which makes it a good fit for online booking, unlike a leak or a breakdown that needs a phone call first.

Lengths and prices are examples: set your own, and only list appliances you are qualified to service. If a visit is free, leave its price empty: an empty price isn't shown on your page, while a price of zero is displayed as €0.00.

Customers who book in June get the date they want; you get a steady flow of servicing through the summer instead of a queue in October.

Servicing is a series of short visits, so driving time can eat the day. Name servicing services by area, such as "Boiler service, north side", and open each area's slots on its own day. Customers pick their area's service and only see that day's slots. Ask for the full address in the note, and leave a travel gap between slots if the area is spread out.

The public form asks for name, email and phone, all required, plus that note. You get it all in your new-booking email, so you arrive with the right parts. If a landlord books for a tenant, ask for the tenant's name and phone in the note.

Don't fill every hour with servicing. Leave afternoons, or one day a week, without servicing slots, so you can fit in repairs and emergencies you book by phone. For a breakdown, you can create a slot at a free time and book the customer into it yourself from your calendar; once booked, it doesn't show on your page.

At the end of a service, suggest next year's date, create a slot for it and book the customer into it from your calendar with their name and email: they get a confirmation and calendar file straight away. Book doesn't send reminders, so a date already in their calendar does that job. If they need to move it, they call you and you move it from your bookings list; Book doesn't email customers about changes, so confirm the new date yourself. Book costs €5/month, everything included: unlimited services and bookings, no commission, no contract.