New Patient Email

This is typically a Welcome email format, used as the initial email contact with a new patient. It can include useful information such as surgery hours, road map and available parking.

Select a template for automatically sending an email to each new patient.

For information on creating these templates please refer to the email templates section.

Appointment Confirmation

An email template for confirming a booking by means of an email from EXACT to the patient.

Note that if you include iCal appointment information you can also configure an iCal Appointment Alarm (default 60 mins), which is a calendar-based alarm generated in the patient calendar.

TIP: With modern security concerns patients may be reluctant to open attachments. Perhaps it is worth explaining the nature of the .ics attachment to patients at the time of booking, and / or modifying the Appointment Confirmation template email message to include an explanation of the attachment.

For information on creating these templates please refer to the email templates section.

Delay email delivery

EXACT holds the confirmation email in the EXACT outbox for this period before sending it to the patient.

Why?

Receptionist booking of appointments is often a trial-and-error process... "How about this one Mrs Jones, at 3pm on Wednesday? No? OK then what about 2pm on Thursday?"

If EXACT emailed the confirmation immediately there would be many false start confirmation emails that the patient would need to delete from their email inbox. The delay period allows time for a definitive appointment slot to be chosen before EXACT sends the confirmation.

This setting is configurable in minutes, with a default of 10 minutes and a maximum of 99 minutes.

0 minutes will cause emails to be sent within about 10 seconds of creation, depending on your email server speed.

Prompt before sending

Normally this is a prompt to the receptionist where EXACT queries "Can I send this email now?"

If your practice uses the email delivery delay the prompt is likely unnecessary.

Sample prompt:

We recommend that you un-check this option if using iCal because at the time of the prompt receptionists may click Cancel, which would cancel the automated confirmation email with its .ICS attachment.

Include iCal appointment information

Check this option if you wish to attach iCalendar (.ICS) format appointments to confirmation emails.

Patients will see this attachment, and can double-click to insert the appointment slot into their personal calendar.

Outlook example:

Their calendar software will then ask for confirmation:

Online Booking: With a configuration that includes iCal, patients booking online will also receive a confirmation email with .ICS attachment.

TIP: With modern security concerns patients may be reluctant to open attachments. Perhaps it is worth explaining the nature of the .ics attachment to patients at the time of booking, and / or modifying the Appointment Confirmation template email message to include an explanation of the attachment.

Appointment alarm

This is a patient calendar pre-appointment alarm that can be included in the .ICS attachment.

Configurable, with a default of 60 minutes. Leave it blank to have no alarm.

It doesn't apply if the Include iCal checkbox is un-checked:

Note that the Appointment Alarm does not replace the normal appointment Email or SMS reminders in EXACT; it is a calendar-based reminder that works with the calendar appointment.

Appointment cancellation

This is a template email for cancelling an appointment.

Specify an email template or leave blank to use no template (with no specified template you would need to manually create cancellation emails).

Email Signature

If you do not use email templates but manually create emails, this is a means of having a standard footer or signature.

Configure an email signature or footer for automatically adding to any email messages that are not created via email template.

To add a signature or footer, click in the entry box, then select the required template file using the List or up/down buttons.

If the email template file does not already exist, you will have to create one. When you create a template, the footer or signature can simply be written into the template.