Fill a gap in the day
Someone cancels at two o'clock. The waitlist is the list of people who already said yes — and the calendar offers it to you the moment the slot opens.
3 min readUpdated August 16, 2026Front desk
Two o'clock cancels at half past one. That's forty-five minutes of a stylist's day gone, and the fastest way to lose it is to mean to do something about it later.
Someone cancels
The moment you cancel an appointment, a message appears at the corner of the screen: 1–2 PM with Nora Feld is now free, and under it, whose visit it was. It carries one button — Find someone — and it stays there until you dismiss it. That's deliberate. Refilling the slot is a decision, not a confirmation, and a notice that vanishes after four seconds is no notice at all.
Press Find someone and the waitlist opens with the service, the stylist, the date and the time already filled in, because you were just looking at all four. Every field stays editable — a cancelled 45-minute colour can be refilled with a 30-minute cut.
Who's waiting
The panel lists everyone currently waiting, with what they asked for, who they asked for, and how many days they've been waiting. Adding someone takes four fields:
- 1
Open the waitlist. Waitlist in the toolbar, or at the foot of the side panel.
- 2
Pick the client. Type a name; if they're new, you can create them without leaving the panel.
- 3
Choose the service, and a preferred stylist if they asked for one. Leave it on Any stylist and they'll match against everybody.
- 4
Set the earliest and latest dates they could come. This is what stops you offering a Thursday to someone who's away all week.
- 5
Press Add. They appear in the Waiting list, and the day counter starts.
Remove someone with the × beside their name — when they've been fitted in elsewhere, or when they've stopped asking.
Matching a slot
Match an open slot takes the service, stylist, date and time of the opening and comes back with the people on the list who fit, best first.
Each one shows how long they've been waiting, a line saying why they're a match, and a star if the opening is with the stylist they asked for. Underneath is a message written for that client and that slot, ready to send — Copy text puts it on your clipboard for whichever app you'd message them in.
Book puts them straight into the slot. No retyping the appointment in another panel: the grid updates, the client comes off the waiting list, and the confirmation names who went where.
If nobody on the list fits, it tells you so rather than offering you the nearest person. And if the AI is unavailable, you still get the list — ranked by how long each person has waited, just without the drafted message.
The other kind of gap
A cancellation isn't the only hole in a day. Where a service has processing time in it — colour developing — the stylist is free in the middle of an appointment that looks solid on the grid. Fill gaps, in the Assist panel, finds those and tells you who's free, for how long, and which of your waiting clients would fit. See Overlaps and processing time.
Common questions
Where do I find the waitlist?
Waitlist in the calendar toolbar, and again at the bottom of the side panel. Both open the same thing.
Do I have to add people to the waitlist for this to work?
Yes. The match runs against people who asked to be told — it never texts your whole client list. If nobody is waiting, it says so.
Does it message the client for me?
No. It writes the message and puts it on screen with a Copy text button. You decide whether to send it, and how.
What if I book someone in and they don't want it after all?
Cancel the appointment the way you'd cancel any other. The waitlist entry has already been used up, so add them again if they still want a slot.
It said the slot was taken while I was deciding.
Someone else booked it in the meantime — often the client themselves, online. Pick another time and match again.
Can a stylist do this, or only the front desk?
Anyone who can book appointments can use the waitlist. Someone with read-only access to the diary can't.
Related articles
- Move, cancel, and check out an appointmentCalendar · Everything that happens to an appointment after it's booked — walking it through the day, moving it, cancelling it, and sending it to the till.
- Overlaps and processing timeCalendar · Two clients in one slot on purpose — the setting that allows it, the confirm that stops it being an accident, and how to find the time a colour frees up.
- Asking the calendarAI in RewireBox · One panel above the grid that answers questions about the day, books an appointment from a sentence, and moves or cancels one the same way.
Can’t find what you’re looking for?
Book a 20-minute walkthrough and we’ll answer it on a screen share — or start free and try it on your own salon’s data.