Customizing Appointment Reminders
Once your Appointment Reminders are set up, you can customize them to fit the needs of your practice and your patients. Use the guide below to adjust your reminder settings to your liking. You can also use the Table of Contents to jump to instructions for adjusting a single setting.
If you're setting up your Appointment Reminders for the first time, we recommend checking out Setting Up Appointment Reminders first and setting your reminder start date, then returning here to make edits.
Table of Contents
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Accessing the Reminders Tab
All settings for Appointment Reminders can be found in the Reminders tab of Global Setup. To access it:
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From the YAPI Dashboard, click the Setup and Manage
button and select Global Setup. -
When prompted, enter your YAPI password.
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In the Global Setup window, click the Reminders tab.
Enabling Reminders
If your reminders aren't already enabled, you'll need to do so to customize them. If you don't want reminders to start going out while you're making changes, don't click Save until you're finished.
To enable, select the Enable checkboxes boxes for the reminders you want to use and customize:
Adjusting Save the Date Settings
Save the Dates send to your patients the day they book their appointment. By default, YAPI sends one Save the Date by email unless patients book within 30 days of their appointment, in which case, it skips sending the Save the Date. See below to add a text Save the Date, remove the email Save the Date, or make adjustments to when they send out.
Note: Email and text Save the Dates work separately.
- Email: The email Save the Date setting needs to be enabled in YAPI and the patient's email must be on file in Dentrix, Open Dental, or Eaglesoft.
- Text: The text Save the Date setting needs to be enabled in YAPI and the patient's mobile number must be on file in Dentrix, Open Dental, or Eaglesoft.
Adding a Text Save the Date
If you want a Save the Date to send to your patients by text:
- Click the double-arrow >> button next to the Save the Date Template in the pink text section.
- In the Templates window that pops up, select Text Reminder Save the Date, then click Select.
- Set Don't send if less than to 30 or see Changing the Range that Save the Dates Don't Send below.
Removing the Email Save the Date
If you don't want a Save the Date to send to your patients by email:
- Click the double-arrow >> button next to the Save the Date Template in the blue email section.
- In the Templates window that pops up, click Empty.
- Set Don't send if less than to 0.
Changing the Range that Save the Dates Don't Send
By default, YAPI skips sending a Save the Date if an appointment is made less than 30 days in advance. To change how close to the appointment date YAPI skips send a Save the Date:
- Locate the Save the Date for the type of reminder you want to adjust (email or text).
- Change the number of days in the Don't send if less than setting.
Tip: If you want patients to always receive a Save the Date regardless of how soon they book their appointment, set Don't send if less than to 1.
Adjusting Reminder Frequency
YAPI's email and text reminders all work on together on a timeline so that patients aren't receiving the same communication every time and they're more likely to confirm. You can change the frequency of reminders in this timeline to best fit your practice's and patients' needs.
To change the number of days prior to an appointment each reminder sends, adjust the Day(s) Prior setting next to each reminder:
Adjusting Confirmations Settings
Once patients confirm their appointment, they stop receiving reminders until their appointment date when they receive one final same-day reminder. If you want your patients to keep receiving their scheduled reminders regardless of whether they've confirmed, uncheck the Don't send reminders if already confirmed checkbox for the type of reminders (email or text) that you want them to keep getting.
Editing Reminder Templates
To make edits to the the language of a reminder template, see Editing Appointment Reminder Text, Email, & Postcard Templates.
Mobile Nanosite
As shown in our Setting Up Appointment Reminders article, the Mobile Nanosite automatically displays the appointment date and time and your practice's contact information. While the language here can't be removed or edited, more information can be added to the nanosite.
To access Mobile Nanosite settings from the Reminders tab, click Edit under More Options.
Adding Appointment Details
Appointment Length: Check the Show appointment length box to display the length of a patient's appointment as scheduled in your practice management software.
Provider name: Check the Show appointment provider box to display the provider's full name for the patient's appointment.
Show appointment note: Check the Show appointment note setting to display the contents of your patients' Appointment Notes from your practice management software. Enabling this setting is not recommended unless you're sure that no private internal notes are ever written in this section.
Note:Use provider's friendly name is a deprecated feature; checking this box has no effect on the nanosite.
Adding a Cancellation Policy & Extra Text
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Next to Appointment Cancellation policy section, click Edit and select Edit English or Edit Spanish (if using Spanish reminders).
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Type in your practice's cancellation policy in a sentence or two. We recommend "To avoid a $50 late cancellation fee, please give our office 48 hours' notice if you need to cancel or change your appointment."
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Click Save and when the Upload Content Warning pops up, click Agree, then OK.
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Optional: You can add another text section by following the same procedure above but clicking Edit next to Extra Section instead. This text displays just above your contact information at the bottom of the nanosite.
Note:
The Appointment scheduling section is a deprecated feature and is no longer functional. Adding text here has no effect on the nanosite.
Adding the Patient's Outstanding Balance
To display each patient's balance, click Enabled in the Patient Balance section. To only show this for patients with an outstanding balance, also click Show only if has balance.
Reminder Date Format
In the Date Format section, you can select how the date displays on appointment reminders. To access these options from the Reminders tab, click Edit under More Options. To select a format, click the circle next to it:
Note: You may see slight differences in your Date Format options depending on the Windows calendar settings on your server, especially if your practice is outside the United States.
Reminder Exclusions
For information about excluding reminders for appointments with a particular provider, operatory, or procedure, see Excluding Appointment Reminders for a Specific Provider or Excluding Appointment Reminders for an Operatory or Procedure.
Emails Sent to Your Practice
The following settings are both enabled at installation. To access them from the Reminders tab, click Edit under More Options. To disable either, uncheck the box next to it.
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Email practice when appointment is confirmed: When unchecked, YAPI will still confirm patient appointments in your practice management software (as long as Update appointment status in PMS is checked above), but won't send you an email each time a patient confirms.
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Email Practice Reminders Log: When unchecked, YAPI won't send an email each day telling you which reminders were sent out. You can still view what was sent in the Reminders Sent Report and what didn't send in the Reminders Sent Exception Report.
Additional Reminder Settings
The following settings are all enabled at installation. To access them from the Reminders tab, click Edit under More Options. To disable any of them, uncheck the corresponding box:
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Update appointment status in PMS: When unchecked, YAPI doesn't update patient appointments to confirmed in your practice management software (Dentrix, Open Dental, or Eaglesoft). Disabling this setting is not recommended.
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Multiple same day appointments - one reminder: When unchecked, patients with multiple appointments for the same day receive reminders for each appointment separately.
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Single reminder for all family members: When unchecked, each family member receives separate reminders for their own appointments.
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Use parent's email and mobile for minors: When unchecked, if a minor patient doesn't have an email or mobile number in your practice management software, YAPI can't send the reminder and skips it. You can also choose what age you consider a minor to be for this setting next to A minor is considered a person under ___ years of age.
Warning! ALWAYS keep the By default, all are opted-in feature selected. Without this enabled, your patients can't receive reminders.
Related Articles
- Introduction to Appointment Reminders
- Introduction to Appointment Reminder Setup
- Setting Up Appointment Reminders