Smart Waitlist: Revolutionizing Appointment Management

What Is a Smart Waitlist?

Smart Waitlist is an innovative CRM feature that automatically fills cancelled appointments by texting patients who have opted in to receive notifications about earlier availability. Available for both online and CRM-based scheduling, this intelligent system matches patients’ preferences with newly available slots, creating a seamless experience for both practices and patients.  

Key Benefits to Your Practice

Enhanced Revenue Protection

• Minimize revenue loss from last-minute cancellations by quickly filling vacant slots
• Reduce no-show rates by offering more convenient times to patients who might otherwise miss appointments
• Maximize provider productivity by maintaining a consistently full schedule

Improved Patient Experience

• Offer greater scheduling flexibility to accommodate patients’ busy lives
• Reduce wait times for patients seeking earlier appointments
• Build patient loyalty by demonstrating your commitment to convenient care
• Decrease frustration associated with long waits for appointments

Streamlined Administrative Operations

• Eliminate manual waitlist management and time-consuming phone calls
• Reduce administrative burden with automated patient communication
• Decrease front desk workload by automating the rebooking process
• Free staff time for more valuable patient interactions

Superior Practice Control

• Customize Eligibility by Appointment Type, Location and Provider
• Set Specific Cancellation Windows
• Set Target Appointment Ranges

Competitive Advantage

• Differentiate your practice with cutting-edge scheduling technology
• Appeal to tech-savvy patients seeking convenient healthcare options
• Improve online reviews by addressing a common patient complaint: appointment wait times

 

Implementation Benefits

• Seamless integration with existing scheduling workflows
• Minimal training required for staff adoption
• Quick ROI through immediate improvement in schedule density

 

Recommended Implementation Best Practices

Optimal Initial Settings

1. Strategic Appointment Selection:
   • Begin with all new patient consultations
   • Include all cash pay cosmetic appointments
   • Focus on your busiest providers first to see maximum impact
2. Time Windows:
   • Look for cancellations occurring within the next 2-7 business days
   • Target patients currently scheduled 14-28 days out for replacement offers
3. Notification Strategy:
   • First phase: Offer to 3 qualified patients
   • Wait time: 1 hour before extending to next batch
   • No maximum offer limit: Continue until slot is filled or no qualified patients remain
   • Limit offering any individual patient no more than 2 alternative appointments per appointment type
4. Operating Hours:
   • Set notification hours from 8am-7pm to respect patient preferences
   • Consider your demographic when setting these boundaries
5. Opt-in Method:
   • For testing, enable both front desk manual opt-in and online scheduling opt-in
   • Track which method generates higher acceptance rates
6. Performance Metrics to Monitor:
   • Monitor the Useability Report in RSI to track availability by provider
   • Percentage of cancelled slots successfully refilled
   • Patient acceptance rate of earlier slot offers
   • Time from lead to available appointment
   • Attended rates of appointments
   • Staff time saved vs. manual waitlist management

How to Get Started

Step 1: Log into the CRM Step 2: Select Settings Step 3: Select Waitlist

Configure Waitlist Settings

You can automatically opt all patients to your Smart Wait List options, or make this a self selected opt-in at the point of scheduling.  

Activate Waitlist

• Off:  The waitlist feature is disabled for all patients and internal users of the CRM.
• On for All Patients: The waitlist feature is enabled for all patients by default.  Patients who have appointments that meet your criteria of Appointment Type, Location and Provider will automatically enroll in the wait list and be notified if an earlier appointment becomes available.
• Require Patient Opt-in: Patients are given the option to join the waitlist when scheduling an appointment that meets selected criteria.

 

Waitlist Available From:  Select where you would like the waitlist to be available

• Online Scheduling: If your practice utilizes the RSI online scheduling feature, patients who schedule an appointment that meets allowed criteria of appointment type, location and provider will be given an option to be added to the waitlist.
• CRM: When scheduling an appointment within the CRM the User will have the option to add the patient to the wait list if the appointment meets the set criteria.

Eligible Appointment Types

Smart Wait List allows you to control which appointments are eligible.  You can allow patients to be added to the waitlist based on your chosen criteria of the following:

• Select Appointment Types
• Select Providers
• Select Locations

 

1. Click on each of these criteria to select your combinations.
2. Hit Save

 

Step 2: Set Cancellation and Contact Windows

Customize the timeframe in which the waitlist will search for available appointments. Cancellation Window – How far in advance will Waitlist try to fill canceled appointments?

• • Starting from today’s date, Waitlist will attempt to reschedule any appointments that are canceled within the next _____ to _____ days.

• Appointments canceled beyond this window won’t trigger the waitlist system

Future Appointment Window – Which patients will be contacted when a slot opens up?

• • Waitlist contacts patients whose original appointments fall _____ to _____ days after the canceled appointment date.

• This ensures patients are moved to earlier slots, not later ones

How It Works: Step-by-Step Example

Using example settings: 

• Cancellation window = 2-7 days, 

• Future Appointment Window = 10-21 days

Scenario: Today is June 6, 2025, and John cancels his appointment scheduled for June 8, 2025.

1. Cancellation Check: Since June 8th falls within 2 days of today (within our example 2-7 day cancellation window), Waitlist activates to fill this slot.
2. Patient Selection: The system identifies patients with appointments between June 18-29, 2025 (10-21 days after the canceled June 8th appointment, using our example contact window)
3. Outreach Begins: Starting immediately, Waitlist contacts these eligible patients to offer them John’s June 8th time slot.

Key Benefit: Patients get moved to earlier appointments while maintaining adequate notice for scheduling changes.  

Step 3: Set Messaging Preferences

Batch Size and Timing

• Send open appointment messages to batches of ____ patients at a time
• Wait ____ hours between each batch
• This prevents overwhelming your phone lines and allows time to assess response before contacting additional patients

Patient Priority Order Choose your preferred contact sequence:

• Furthest out appointment dates: Contact patients with appointments farthest in the future first (gives them the most schedule flexibility).
• Nearest out appointment dates: Contact patients with appointments closest to today first (may create more urgency to respond).

Contact Frequency Limits

• • Waitlist can only contact the same patient once every ____ days

• This prevents patients from receiving excessive messages and maintains a professional communication standard.

How Messaging Works: Example

Using example settings: 5 patients per batch, 2-hour intervals, furthest appointments first, 7-day contact limit When John’s June 8th appointment becomes available:

1. First Batch: Waitlist contacts 5 patients with the furthest-out appointments (those scheduled for late June)
2. Wait Period: System waits 2 hours to see if anyone responds
3. Next Batch: If the slot remains unfilled, contact the next 5 eligible patients
4. Repeat: Continue until the appointment is filled or all eligible patients have been contacted
5. Protection: Any patient contacted today won’t receive another waitlist message for 7 days

This approach ensures efficient slot filling while maintaining patient satisfaction through controlled, respectful communication.

Step 4: Messaging Preferences

Configure how and when appointment offers are sent to patients:

• Batch Offer Settings
  • Determine how many patients are offered the open appointment slot at one time.
  • Set the time interval before the appointment is offered to the next set of eligible patients.
• Offer Prioritization
  • Choose whether to offer open appointments first to patients with the closest upcoming appointments or to those with the furthest appointments in the future.
• Repeat Offer Frequency
  • Define how often the waitlist feature will offer the same patient another appointment time if they do not accept a previous offer.

Step 5: Customizing Patient Notifications

Personalize the messaging sent to patients when a sooner appointment becomes available:

• Text Message: Customize the SMS notification content to alert patients of an earlier available appointment.
• Email Message: Modify the email notification text to inform patients of the opportunity to reschedule for a sooner date.

Summary

Once all settings are configured, the Smart Waitlist feature will automatically manage and offer earlier appointment slots to eligible patients, improving schedule utilization and patient satisfaction. Ensure that all settings align with your clinic’s scheduling policies for optimal efficiency. For further assistance, contact your CRM support team.