System News & Updates Updated Jul 3 2008 Attention Client Members Your Personal Appointment Center will store your upcoming appointment information and up to 20 records in your online history. Login at any time to check times and dates and to book your next appointment. You were not required to submit your street address in the registration process. So if you are booking with a mobile service provider then be sure to inform them of your address. Once you book your first appointment then an e-mail link for that business will appear in your PAC. Remember to protect your login information. Multiple Client Memberships Multiple client memberships are discouraged. Business owners do not want duplicate client entries in their records. You do not need to get a new membership if your email address has changed. You can change your email address from within your personal appointment center. Please contact your service provider or an administrator if you have any questions about a disabled client membership. Important New Feature ! 05/2008 We are pleased to announce that owners can now hide any number of appointment book columns. For example, if an owner has 4 columns and wants to retain one for internal use only, then just 3 of those columns will be available to clients for online booking. Moreover, if an owner does not want to allow any client booking whatsoever, then all columns can be hidden from everyone but that business owner. This update means that owners can now maintain a completely private appointment management system online and access it from anywhere in North America. Booking Walk-ins and Call-ins 05/2008 One of the business members asked if it was possible to permit owners and managers to book walk-in and same-day call-in appointments, even though the owner had restricted online booking to 24 or 48 hours in advance. Now it is possible. Online clients will still be forced to abide by the business's advance booking policy, while owners and any of their managers can book appointments into the current date. Thanks for the suggestion Venisia! Bookmark Added to PAC 05/2008 A functional, cross-browser bookmark button has been added to the personal appointment center. Now clients can easily add that page to their list of favorites and regularly check their PAC for upcoming appointment times and dates. Clients currently receive an email reminder of their appointment details at the time of booking. At least one more additional appointment reminder method is forthcoming. So check this page monthly for system updates. Auto Refresh Added 04/2008 We've added an automatic page refresh to the appointment book. This is a client-side JavaScript function that reloads the page every 5 minutes. We did this so that owners will encounter fewer scheduling checks when booking, which might require them to select a different start time for a walk-in or call-in appointment. Web 2.0 Links 03/2008 That wide ranging collaboration and friendship network known as Web 2.0 has now been added to all homepages. Clients and visitors can easily share the business member's homepage link with their friends at Facebook, MyYahoo, Newsvine and more. The friends of clients will still have to register as members and login, as well as meet any booking restrictions that have been put in place by the owner. Site Downloading 03/2008 This website is equipped with an automatic IP trap for those who attempt to download any of these pages. This is to stop those who think that this is a downloadable user-side JavaScript application, robots that fail to obey instructions, and web strippers. Do not attempt to download any of these pages. Otherwise, you will end up in the "nogo" zone. Listing at HotScripts.com 02/2008 Beautybyus is now listed at HotScripts.com. Anyone can view our listing and rate us, but you must have a HotScripts membership to write a review about this online appointment application. Click the logo to open a new window and view the listing or to rate this application. Thank you. Homepage Menu Updates 10/2007 The homepage menus have undergone some slight modifications. First, the less often used Live Help link has been moved down to make room for the grouping of more important system links, i.e. the contact and help links. Second, title tags and alt tags have been added to each menu item. These are the little tool-tip boxes that appear when the mouse hovers over one of the buttons. Client Registration Instructions 09/2007 The instruction page for new client members has been modified to clearly explain their login options. Clients can access the appointment system from their business member's homepage or from the business member's own web site. Clients can also login with their member ID and password directly from the main system pages. However, this login method will provide them with immediate access to their PAC (personal appointment center) and indirect access to a business member's appointment book. New Services Added 09/2007 We have added some new services to the "Facial Treatments" category. Contact an administrator if you are a business member and would like to have a service added to the list. At the outset the intent was to provide business owners with a flexible appointment system that is easy to use. At the same time, it is imperative to keep sex related content out of the system. For this reason business owners must request to have services added to the list. Owners cannot add their own service items. Live Help Module 09/2007 The Live Help feature of this web site serves two purposes. First, it provides members and visitors with a direct link to system administrators. Second, it allows administrators to monitor site activity and to ensure that business members remain protected from abuse. "Unavailable" Category Now Hidden on All Homepages 08/2007 Owners can include different UNAVAILABLE time spans, ranging from 15 minutes to 4 hours, in their list of services. These allow owners to easily book time off for themselves. In the past, when owners opted to use these time spans, these time spans were listed as services on their homepage under the heading UNAVAILABLE. In an effort to "tidy up" the homepages we decided to exclude this category from displaying on the homepages. For the sake of convenience owners can still select these time spans from their list of services in the booking process, but they will no longer be seen as service items on the homepage. Appointment Notes Modification 08/2007 The code for creating appointment notes has been safely modified so that notes in the appointment book interface will display even if the owner includes a single ['] or double ["] quotation mark in their notes [i.e. Sharon's]. Previously the single quotation mark was breaking the code and preventing the note from showing if it contained a quotation mark. Appointment Book 07/2007 The appointment booking interface was displaying a <div> tag incorrectly in some older versions of Internet Explorer, resulting in a black bar appearing at the top and bottom of the booking columns. This has now been corrected with <style> tags. Appointment Categories 05/2007 We have added some new categories, but more importantly, the numbering system for categories and services has been manually adjusted in the database. Everything will now display in alphabetical order. This process took several days but has resulted in the proper ordering of services on the homepages and in the service selection area. Faster Loading Pages 01/2007 The ever evolving world of web-based business applications and browser technology has allowed us to tweak the page load time for all connection speeds. Happy New Year ! Appointment Notes 10/2006 Owners and their managers can now insert appointment notes for both call-in and owner booked appointments. The notes are stored in the database and can be edited at any time. Salon and business owners will now see a form for adding notes on the appointment confirmation page. Client members do not see that section of the page. Navigational Menu 07/2006 We added some height and well-space to the general menu items to facilitate easier control of the menu layers. Lots of News 11/2005 We have installed a new general menu in the public areas of this site. Members can also access their personal pages from that menu. All of the homepages now have a link to Google News. It will open a new browser window to display the latest headlines in that business member's home town. This system includes 1000's of files and snippets working in unison with an efficient mySQL back end. Together with the MSS modifications it will provide anyone .. in any industry .. with a flexible and secure online appointment management system. Homepages Linked to Live Help 10/2005 All of the business homepages are now indexed and connected into LIVE HELP. Each template has an online/offline button so if a client, business member or visitor needs assistance, we can point them in the right direction. Live Help 09/2005 You may have noticed the new LIVE HELP image on the right side of these pages. It opens a new browser window and will let you chat live with one of the duty administrators. The alternate OFFLINE image will appear if no one is around. Business Homepage Buttons 07/2005 Sometimes the obvious isn't always that obvious. We work hard to present an intuitive link structure, but sometimes we fumble. So to make things easier we have clarified the business homepage links. As well, all of the business homepages have a register button and a password recovery button. If you are required to login prior to entering one of the member areas the system will automatically return the appropriate page once you have logged in. The Client to Business Contact Form 06/2005 The contact form that client members use to send mail to business members has been modified. Both it and the e-mail confirmation page now look the same as the personal appointment center. In the rewriting of those pages we overlooked one line of code that was preventing anyone but an admin from sending mail. This oversight lasted only a couple of days and was immediately corrected. All is working and we apologize for any inconvenience. Free Web Mail 05/2005 Beautybyus.net was the brainchild of Jennifer Aiken. Jennifer is a BBU business member. Now anyone can have their own free beautybyus.net web mail account. http://beautybyus.mail.everyone.net As long as you do not publish or make an e-mail addresses available on the internet, your chances of being spammed will remain minimal. If you do happen to receive spam in your beautybyus.net inbox, then use the available tools to filter out any unwanted mail. E-mail filtering rules can be individually customized by each account holder. PAC Has New Look 04/2005 The Personal Appointment Center has a new look and is more efficient for both you and the server. Hair Say Forum Upgraded 03/2005 The Hair Say Forum has been updated from YaBB SE to Simple Machines. This provides users and members with a lot more security, it allows uploading of images and avatars and there are lots of new forum features. Enjoy! Discontinued May 2008 Hair Say Newsroom 02/2005 The newsroom is yet another new addition. It can be accessed through the Hair Say Forum. Styling and fashion headlines are regular features and we also have our own headlines. Articles range from internet security and web design to health and beauty. Everyone is welcome to submit articles for review and RSS publication. Discontinued April 2008 MapQuest® Now on Homepages 01/2005 Each business homepage now has a MapQuest link that will open a new browser window to display the exact location of that business. A very useful homepage feature. Welcome to 2005! System E-mail Notices 12/2004 The e-mail notices for the system have been rewritten. Appointment reminder notices now include a link to the appointment details of that appointment. We have made some additions to the Help Desk section as well. Merry Christmas! New Links 11/2004 The links in your Personal Appointment Center for future, past and canceled appointments have been renamed to provide more clarity. You can use the "Request Cancellation" link to simply contact a business as well. Your e-mail will be delivered. A New Addition 09/2004 We have put up a new message forum called Hair Say. It has lots of boards including buy and sell, free business ads and more. All are welcome to join. Discontinued April 2008. Practice Makes Perfect 07/2004 This really isn't news or an update, it's more like a reminder. If you would like to practice booking appointments in this system then login to the appointment book for Magic Wonders We created this demo so that new members can login and test the system. There is also a help link in your Personal Appointment Center that explains the features of BBU. If you are really stuck then use the BBU contact form. New Feature : Mobile Travel Time 06/2004 Mobile businesses can now insert a preset amount of travel time for their out-calls. This allows clients to book back-to-back appointments but also ensures that you will have sufficient time to get from one place to the next.