Services
A service is one thing a client can book: "Family Portrait Session", "Wedding Photography", "Autumn Mini Sessions". Everything about how that booking behaves is set here.
Open Bookings → Services to see what you have.
Creating one
Click Add service. The New service dialog asks for two things:
Name. What clients see, so write it the way you'd say it out loud.
How can clients use this service? Pick one of three cards:
- Inquiry, "Clients send an inquiry for you to review first."
- Direct booking, "Clients choose a time and book directly."
- Mini sessions, "Clients choose from short time slots on specific dates."
Click Continue and the service opens in its editor. The mode cannot be changed afterwards, so if you pick wrong, create a new one.
How the editor is laid out
A direct booking or mini session service has four tabs:
| Tab | What's on it |
|---|---|
| Details | Name, description, Service URL, cover image |
| Price & duration, or Price & slot on mini sessions | Currency, price, tax, session length, add-ons |
| Availability & location, or Dates & location on mini sessions | Where it happens, when it can be booked, cancellation policy |
| Booking flow | The six numbered steps your client walks through |
An inquiry service has two tabs, Details and Inquiry flow. It has too few pricing and location settings to earn tabs of their own, so its pricing and location fold into Details.
The Booking flow and Inquiry flow tabs are covered in The booking flow.
The Details tab
Service name and Service description are what clients read on your booking page. The description is worth writing properly: what's included, what to wear, how long editing takes.
Service URL is the end of the link this service answers at. CoreHue checks the address as you type and tells you whether it's Available or Unavailable. Use lowercase letters, numbers and hyphens.
Cover image appears on the service's card on your booking page and, with the Atelier theme, at the top of the summary on the service's own page. With the Classic and Ledger themes the service page shows no cover. The photograph across the top of a Classic page is the banner you set under Client pages. The image is shown at different shapes on different screens. Set the focal point so the crop keeps the important part of the frame.
Publishing
A service has four states, and only one of them is visible to clients.
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Draft | Still being built. Nobody can see it. |
| Published | Live on your booking page and bookable. |
| Unpublished | Was live, now switched off. Its link stops working. |
| Archived | Put away. Clients can no longer inquire or book, and your setup and history stay available. |
To publish, click Publish at the top of the editor. One of two things happens.
If something is missing, the dialog lists exactly what. Each line names the tab and step the field sits on. Each line is also a button that takes you straight there. Fix them and try again.
If everything is ready, the dialog shows the public address the service will answer at, and you confirm. If your booking page is off, it warns you under the heading Your booking page is off, "This service won't be visible yet." The button then reads Publish anyway rather than Publish. Publishing a service and turning on your booking page are two separate switches. You need both.
Once published, the button at the top becomes View page, or Turn on booking page if the page is still off.
Draft and Unpublished look the same to a client. The difference is for you: one was never finished, the other was.
The service list
Each row shows the cover image, the name, a status badge, the description, the duration and the price. The three-dot menu carries:
- Unpublish, on a published service. It asks to confirm: "Clients won't be able to inquire or book until you publish it again."
- View page, or Turn on booking page when the page is still off. Both appear only on a published service.
- Archive, which asks to confirm: "Clients can no longer inquire or book. Setup and history stay available."
- Restore, which replaces the three entries above on an archived service
- Delete, which permanently removes the service and its setup. Past bookings, inquiries and proposals stay in your history.
How many you can publish
The Core plan allows five published services at once. The count sits next to Add service as "3 of 5 published". Pro has no limit. Drafts, unpublished and archived services don't count towards it.
If you move from Pro down to Core with more than five live, CoreHue unpublishes the extras and tells you. See Changing or cancelling your plan.
Currency
Every service carries a Currency, at the top of the Pricing section. On a direct booking that section is the Price & duration tab, and on a mini session it is Price & slot. On an inquiry service it folds into Details. On Core the field is fixed to your account currency and reads "Upgrade to Pro to select another currency". Pro lets you pick a different one for each service.
Once a booking made from a service has an invoice attached, that booking's currency is fixed. Invoices created from a booking use the booking's currency and offer no currency choice.
The mode decides what you get
An inquiry service is a conversation starter. Most of the settings that govern a booking simply aren't there, because there's no booking to govern yet.
| Inquiry | Direct booking | Mini sessions | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price on the service | A signal only, four ways to show it | Yes, per slot | Yes, per slot |
| Duration | No | Yes | Yes, slot length |
| Add-ons | No | Yes, on the booking page | Yes, on the booking page |
| Taking payment at booking | No | Yes | Yes |
| Deposits | No | Yes | Yes |
| Contract signed while booking | No | Yes | Yes |
| Questionnaire during the flow | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Follow-up questionnaires | No | Yes | Yes |
| Cancellation policy | No | Yes | Yes |
| Own opening hours | No | Yes | No, it has its own dates |
| Location | Five types, on Details | Four types, on Availability & location | One per date, on Dates & location |
| Automatic meeting links | No | Yes, on Virtual and In person or virtual | No |
What else a service holds
Most of the depth is in these, each covered on its own page:
- Pricing and deposits
- Add-ons
- Where sessions happen
- The booking flow
- Longer sessions
- Unpaid bookings
- Per-service availability
Changing a published service
Edits apply to new bookings straight away. Bookings already made keep the terms they were made under. Changing your price does not alter what someone already agreed to.
Anyone part-way through booking is sent back to the start, though. Saving a change to a published service releases any slot being held and tells that client, "This booking service changed. Refresh before continuing."
Most of the time nobody is mid-booking and it costs nothing. But the moment you're most likely to edit is exactly the moment someone is in the flow: launching mini sessions, or fixing a price on a busy day. Make edits when things are quiet, or accept that a booking in progress may be lost.