Best Practices for Rescheduling Clients

For every entrepreneur, priorities will inevitably require you to move a scheduled appointment occasionally. Everything from personal events to a last-minute change with a longstanding client can impact your schedule. 

Communicating professionally with clients about time slot or date changes can strengthen your relationship and reinforce the integrity of your business, despite the unexpected change. Read on for best practices and an example email for rescheduling your meeting times. 

How to reschedule an appointment

No two companies or clients are the same. That said, here are five best practices to keep in mind when you need to reschedule an existing appointment.

1. Send an update ASAP

Reach out to your client or customer as soon as you know you’ll need to cancel or reschedule their appointment. While last-minute surprises can happen, getting in touch sooner ensures that no one feels taken by surprise and they have ample time to find a new date or time that fits their schedule.

It also sets the expectation that if they need to reschedule, they owe you the same professional courtesy of letting you know promptly.

Read our tips for reducing no-shows

2. Personalize your communication

Take the time to customize your rescheduling email and any other related communication to your tone of voice and client. Even if your messages are automated, sending something personalized to them signals respect for your client’s time and needs. 

If you’re rescheduling with Acuity Scheduling, go to your automated Rescheduling Email section to create or update your rescheduling email template. Whenever you or a client reschedule an appointment, they’ll automatically receive that email to confirm the change to their appointment details.

3. Avoid over-explaining

You don’t need to go into details of why an appointment needs to shift. Tone is easy to misread over email and over-explaining the situation could potentially come off as scattered or unprofessional. Being apologetic about the unexpected change makes sense, but think about what type of communication you’d prefer in a similar scenario. 

Keep your email concise and straightforward, putting your client and their next steps first. For example, don’t say, “I need to reschedule our appointment because my dog has been ill the past few days, and tomorrow is the only time I was able to get in at the vet.” Instead, try something like, “I’ll need to reschedule our appointment tomorrow due to an unexpected conflict.” 

Your client gets the information they need and feels confident that you have the situation under control.

4. Suggest alternatives and make the next steps clear

Share clear information in your email about how your client can reschedule their time with you. If rescheduling impacts your work together, like changing deadlines, outline that as well.

For Acuity Scheduling users, the Insert Field option in your email templates makes it easy to share next steps with your clients. You can insert their old appointment time and their new appointment time if you manually rescheduled it for them. If you want to give them the option to make an appointment themselves, you can include a link to reschedule.

5. Express your appreciation

Gratitude has an important place in this process. A simple thanks shows clients that you value their time and appreciate their flexibility. When you meet with them for their rescheduled appointment, quickly thank them again at the start of your meeting.

Creating a rescheduling email template

Use the suggested best practices above to create a rescheduling confirmation email template. You can personalize the formatting and message of your template as needed, but having most of the pieces in place will help you send notifications faster.

Here’s one example to get you started.

Subject line: Rescheduling your upcoming appointment

[Client first name],

I avoid rescheduling client appointments whenever possible.

That said, unfortunately, I need to reschedule our session on [old appointment time].

For your convenience, I’ve rescheduled us for [new appointment time]. If this doesn’t fit with your schedule, just click the Reschedule Appointment button below and choose a time that works better.

Please feel free to reach out with any questions, and thank you so much for your understanding. 

Talk soon,

[Your Name]

Automate your rescheduling confirmation email 

If you’re already set up with scheduling software, all you need to do is plug your copy into an email template. Keep in mind that you may want different email templates for different appointments or different email copy for when your client reschedules something themselves.

With Acuity Scheduling, go to your Email Settings and select Rescheduling. From there, you’ll be able to create one general template for every appointment type you offer or customize each automated rescheduling email for different services and situations.

See the latest updates to Acuity Scheduling

This post was updated on June 28, 2023.