Book awning measures without promising Saturday
Quick summary
- The assistant reads the book before it offers a morning, so a wind-sensor look is never offered as a café measure-up.
- A time to look at a motor and a morning on a terrace are different bookings. Get that wrong and a café sits in twenty minutes reserved for a wall.
- Measure-up or sensor first. Then motor or crank. Then the book. Saturday's install is not a visit type from a photo.
- Anything that sounds like a price, a kit choice, or a weekend fit stays a callback.
- If the assistant cannot read the book, it takes a callback. It does not guess.
- The assistant texts the window, the type, and to clear the chairs, so the wall that arrives is a wall you can measure.
TL;DR
You are on a terrace with the tape. A caller who wants a morning will not wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday is free. An assistant can book those mornings if it reads the book first, treats a sensor look as different from a terrace measure-up, and asks motor or crank before it places anything. A photo is a measure-up. A measure-up is a measure-up. Saturday's install is not a visit type from a picture. If the book cannot be reached, the assistant does not guess. It takes the request and says so. The assistant texts the window, the type, and to clear the chairs.
Key takeaways
- Give the assistant the types and their real durations before you let it book — terrace measure-up, balcony, sensor look, torn fabric.
- Mark install days and April hold-mornings in the same book it reads, including August.
- Test a move on an existing sensor look and on a measure-up, separately, before you test a new café.
- Turn on the SMS at the moment of booking, with motor or crank and to clear the terrace of chairs.
- If the book cannot be reached, the only answer is a callback.
- Check the first fifty bookings by hand. That is when you find the morning that was a Saturday install put into a measure-up.
When someone wants a morning and the tape is on a cassette
One of you is on the wall. The other is cutting fabric. The phone rings.
A café wants Thursday morning to measure the terrace. A balcony wants a look at a sensor today. A hotel wants ten minutes to note torn cloth. You cannot pick up. The cassette is not marked yet.
Those three callers are asking for a morning. They are not asking for Saturday from a picture. They will not wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday is free. If the assistant can read the book, it can put the right type in the right window. If it cannot, it must say so. A café at a wall you did not write down is worse than no visit.
The first question is still measure-up or sensor, then motor or crank. Cloth on tables is not a gap at eleven. Saturday’s install is not a visit from a photo. Only then does the assistant look at the book.
Two kinds of morning, and a third that is not a morning
Terrace measure-up. You, a tape, a wall, a window of hours. Motor or crank, drop, wind. Mark that the chairs must be in. If the assistant offers this window as a sensor look, a café arrives expecting a wall and finds a screwdriver.
Sensor look. Twenty minutes at the wind sensor, the motor, the arms. Mark these as their own type. Do not let the assistant drop a look into a six-metre measure-up.
Pergola. A yard, not a cassette. Its own type if you marked it. Not a balcony slot.
Not a visit. “Fit it Saturday from the photo”, “book the install now, we’ll measure later”, “just pick motor for me”. The assistant does not book those. It takes a name and a number. The tape goes on the wall. An install is not an appointment type you offer from a picture.
If you only give the assistant one column called “visit”, it will fill the week with the wrong bodies at the wrong walls.
Moves, chairs, and a morning the book does not have
A caller who says “move Thursday” has not said which visit. Ask the address first. Ask measure-up or sensor, then motor or crank. Cancel, then book. If Thursday is still their own measure-up, say that morning is not free. Do not invent a second Thursday because they sounded rushed.
Clearing the chairs is not a courtesy. A measure-up with the terrace full is a morning of moving furniture. Put it in the SMS. A sensor look without a ladder point is not a completed look.
If the book cannot be reached, the only honest sentence is a callback. Guessing a hole is how two cafés arrive at the same van.
Install days belong in the same book. A measure-up at 09:00 on a morning you are fitting fabric in Glyfada is not a hole. Mark it closed, or the assistant will offer it.
What it will not put in the book
It will not book a weekend install from a photo. It will not book “a chat to pick motor or crank”. It will not put torn fabric over tables into a free hour as if a van were a slot. It will not offer a measure-up on an install day. It will not confirm a morning it has not written.
It will not send an SMS that names a price, a Saturday fit, or which kit they should buy. The confirmation is the type, the window, the address, motor or crank, and to clear the chairs.
If they ask for Saturday because the terrace opens, the assistant offers a measure-up if Saturday mornings are in the book. It does not invent an install from the greeting.
What you set first
Give it the types and the minutes they actually take. Mark install days and April hold-mornings, including August. Write the chairs line for the SMS. Write the sentence that forbids a Saturday install as a visit type from a photo. Test a move on a sensor look and on a measure-up, separately, before you let it touch a new café.
Check the first fifty bookings by hand. That is when you find the morning that was a weekend demand, filed as a sensor look.
Rates live on the pricing section of the home page. They are not repeated here.
Torn fabric is not always a booking
Cloth over tables is a flagged note or a transfer. It does not become “come at four” unless a human who can see the van says so. If the assistant is allowed to turn every tear into a visit, the book fills with hours nobody can keep, and the real measure-up for the Koukaki terrace is pushed to next week.
Teach it the stop: fabric over people stays a flag. Quiet fabric note stays a note. Measure-up stays a measure-up. The three meet only when you, looking at the van, decide a human should go.
A café that wants a measure-up at 07:40 is still a measure-up, and 07:40 is not a terrace hour unless you marked it. Most shops do not. The assistant offers the next window. It does not tell them the install is Saturday.
Who must be on the terrace
A measure-up without the person who can say motor or crank is a morning of a waiter and no decision. Put the name they gave in the booking. The SMS repeats it. If they say “whoever is on shift will show you”, write that, and flag it. Whoever is on shift is how you arrive to a full terrace and no key to the cassette.
A sensor look without access to the wall box is twenty minutes of a closed cover. Ask whether they can open it. Put that in the note.
Do not let the assistant add a second café to the SMS who was not on the call. The next frontage is not this wall. A supplier who “might come” is not the owner of the terrace.
When two visits share one phone
A client rings to move the measure-up and, in the same breath, wants a look at the sensor. That is two bookings or one booking and a callback. If the assistant writes both into the same Thursday window, you will do the wall and miss the sensor.
Ask which is moving. Book that one. Take the second as a new request, with its own type and its own morning. If they insist it is “the same visit”, say a terrace and a sensor are not the same visit. Offer two windows. Let them choose.
A caller who wants a measure-up and also wants Saturday from the photo is one booking and one refusal. Do not create a third type called “measure plus install”. There is no such type from a picture.
After the SMS goes out
The confirmation is the record. If the type is wrong on the text, the type is wrong at the wall. Read the first week’s messages. A measure-up that went out as “installation” is how a café brings a crowd and a list of questions you did not staff.
Reminders go out on the schedule you set. A reminder that names the address and the chairs is useful. A reminder that says “we will fit it Saturday” is an install. Do not allow that sentence in the template.
Cancellations come back into the same book. A measure-up cancelled at 18:00 is a morning you can give to the next café. A cancellation that sits in a chat until morning is a window you already lost.
If they cancel because they wanted a Saturday all along, keep the refusal on the file. Do not rebook them as a look so they will stop asking. A look is a look. An install is still not a visit from a photo.
The week you actually staff
April is a week of measure-ups. Mark it. The morning after a windy night is a week of sensors and flags. Mark that too. The assistant cannot know the difference unless the book says so.
A two-person shop that tries to book eight measure-ups in a week you already closed for an install will fail in public, at the wall, with a café that took the morning off. Put the closed mornings in first. Then let it book what is left.
The value in the worked example is a used morning, not a signed terrace. A measure-up that nobody attends still cost you the van. A text that names the chairs is cheaper than that morning. Put your own figure in. A shop that lives on cafés and a shop that lives on balconies are not the same book.
Whoever takes the first measure-up often takes the order. That is why a booking that never reached the book is not only an empty morning. It is a café that is now standing under someone else’s fabric.
AI receptionist, in-house staff, or a call centre
| CITT | In-house | Call centre | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reads the book before offering a morning | Yes, the book the shop works from | Yes | Usually not — takes a message |
| Books evenings and Saturday mornings | Yes, if you marked them as measure-ups | No | Sometimes |
| Treats a sensor look as different from a measure-up | If you marked the two types | Yes | Rarely sees the week |
| Starts with measure-up or sensor, then motor or crank | Yes — before it looks at the book | Yes | Often jumps to what morning |
| Books Saturday's install from a photo | Never — the tape goes on the wall first | Only after the quote is signed | Sometimes books "a weekend fit" |
| Sends the confirmation and to clear the chairs | Automatically, by SMS | If they remember | Sometimes |
What a month of empty terrace measure-ups costs
Worked from these assumptions — change any of them and the answer changes:
- Two people. About 30 booked mornings a month to measure a terrace, look at a sensor, or note torn fabric.
- An empty measure-up morning is not given to someone else the same day.
- About 10% of booked times arrive with chairs still out, or nobody comes. Check your own figure. Shops vary.
- Recoverable value of a used morning, €160. Put your own figure in. A terrace measure-up and a twenty-minute sensor look are not the same.
- A reminder that names clearing the chairs cuts empty times by a third. Challenge this first.
- 30 times × 10% = about 3 empty times a month.
- 3 × €160 = €480 of reserved time sitting empty.
- A third avoided returns about €160 a month.
- Over the eight busy months this example uses — 8 × €160.
Roughly €1,280 a year, from a text that names the chairs, not only the morning.
What it costs
CITT is pay as you go: no packages, no minimum, no contract. The current rates — the monthly fee per number and the per-minute rate — are on the pricing section of the home page, which is the only place they are published.
Frequently asked questions
Can it book a measure-up while the tape is on another cassette?
It reads the same book the shop works from and checks the morning before offering it. A day you have closed because you are on an install, or because the other person is already on a terrace, is never offered as a measure-up, if you marked it. Times to look at a sensor can still be offered that day if someone will be in the workshop. If the assistant cannot reach the book at that moment, it does not guess. It takes the request as a callback and says so. A visit the shop has no record of is worse than no visit. The café turns up with the chairs out and nobody is there with a tape.
What about someone moving an existing morning?
The assistant asks measure-up or sensor first, then motor or crank and the address, and treats the move as one change. Handled as cancel, then book, Thursday is still taken by their own visit, and they are told that morning is not free. A client who has a sensor look and a terrace measure-up on the same phone must say which visit is moving.
Will it book Saturday so the terrace can open?
It will book a measure-up on Saturday morning if you marked that diary. It will not book an install on Saturday because a café is in a hurry. An install is a crew and fabric that has already been made. After the quote is signed, you — or the assistant, from a list you gave it — book the fit.
Should it book torn fabric against any free hour?
Fabric over tables is a flagged note or a transfer, not a gap at eleven. A quiet fabric note is a short visit you mark. The assistant takes the address. It does not invent that a van is free at eleven. It does not put a terrace measure-up into a sensor slot.
Who sends the confirmation?
The assistant, by SMS, in the language of the conversation, at the moment of booking, including motor or crank and to clear the chairs. The reminder goes out ahead of the time on the schedule you set. Neither requires anyone in the workshop to type a number.
Can clients cancel through it too?
Yes, and you should let them, especially on measure-ups in April. A cancellation the shop hears about the day before is a morning that can go to a café that still has to have a wall taken. The same cancellation arriving as a no-show is a morning gone. Cancellations are written back to the book the same way bookings are.
