When you need to close the practice for holidays (or other occasions), instead of just scheduling an event for operatories in the schedule, the best thing to do is to close the practice on that day in the Appointment Book. Closing the day will ensure that the hours will not be counted as available time when scheduling patient appointments, and your weekly and monthly production totals won’t be affected.
Closing the office for a holiday that occurs on the same date each year, such as Christmas or Independence Day, is pretty straightforward.
- In the Appointment Book, from the Setup menu, select Practice Schedule.
- Navigate to the date you want to close in the calendar (such as December 25).
- From the Office Closed menu, select Set Yearly Holiday on selected day.
- Repeat for other holidays that occur on the same date each year, and click Close.
However, for holidays that don’t fall on the same date each year, such as Victoria Day, you’ll need to take a different approach. Let’s say that your practice will be taking a half day on the day before Victoria Day, and a full day on Victoria Day.
- In the Appointment Book, from the Setup menu, select Practice Schedule.
- Navigate to the day you want to close for a half-day, and double-click the date.
- Enter a Start Time and End Time for the workday and click OK.
- Then navigate to the date you want to close for the whole day.
- From the Office Closed menu, select Close Office on selected date, and click Close.
Additional Information
When closing the office for holidays, take a quick look at those days in the Appointment Book to make sure there aren’t any appointments already scheduled that you’ll need to move.
