Appointment reminder text templates you can copy today

• The day and time, written the way people say them: tomorrow at 2:30 PM, not 14/10 14:30.
• Who they're seeing, or the name of the business.
• A way to cancel or move. A client who can cancel in one tap tends to tell you. A client who has to phone often just doesn't come.
• Your name, so the text doesn't look like spam from an unknown number.

Stay under 160 characters. Past that, the text is split into two SMS, which costs twice as much on most plans and can arrive in the wrong order. Emoji and some accented letters lower the limit to 70 characters per SMS, so leave them out of reminders.

The day before, around midday, suits most appointments. It's early enough for you to offer the slot to someone else and late enough that the client knows their plans for tomorrow.

For an appointment booked weeks ahead, send a short confirmation when it's booked as well, so the date is in the client's messages. Skip the reminder on the morning itself for early slots: a text at 6 a.m. for a 7 a.m. session arrives too late to change anything.

Name the service when it's a long one. A client who reads silk press remembers they need to arrive with washed hair, or that they booked three hours.

Keep health details out of the text. A reminder can be read by whoever holds the phone, so the name of the practice and the time are enough.

When a parent books for a child, write the child's name in the text. The parent may have booked lessons for two children.

• Sending from a number the client doesn't know, with no name in the text.
• Pasting the whole cancellation policy into the message. Link to it instead.
• Giving no way to cancel, so clients who can't come simply don't come.
• Sending at eleven at night.

Typing twenty texts a day by hand doesn't last a month. OnTime sends one at noon the day before each appointment, with a link that frees the slot if the client cancels. It works for phone numbers in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire and 32 European countries. How the reminders work.