An appointment may need to be cancelled for a variety of reasons, such as that a patient can no longer attend, or that your practice changes its open hours. You can quickly cancel or delete appointments from the calendar.
Cancelling retains a record of the appointment, while deleting removes the record entirely. When you cancel or delete an appointment, you also cancel all scheduled reminders and notifications related to it.
You cannot cancel or delete an appointment when:
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An electronic payment has been processed through Halaxy for the invoice
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An electronic rebate has been processed through Halaxy for the invoice
You can cancel or delete an appointment where the invoice has been paid offline or outside of Halaxy.
Note
An appointment cannot be deleted if it has a linked clinical note with content. If there is no payment or rebate processed, you can delete the clinical note and then delete the appointment.
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From the calendar, open the appointment.
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In the Appointment Information panel, click the
X icon.
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In the pop-up, a summary of previous cancellations is listed at the top. First, select the option for cancelling the appointment.
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Cancel appointment: Removes the appointment from the calendar and sets the invoice balance to $0. This retains a record of the appointment cancellation in Halaxy and the patient's profile.
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Cancel appointment and delete invoice: Removes the appointment from your calendar and deletes the invoice, but retains a record of the appointment cancellation in your Halaxy on the patient's profile.
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Non-attendance: Changes the appointment status to Did Not Attend but keeps the invoice, allowing you to charge the appointment fee.
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Delete appointment: Deletes the appointment, invoice and linked clinical notes permanently.
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Optional: For Reason, select the cancellation reason. For Time, enter the cancellation time. Add comments, if needed.
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Click Save.
Note
You cannot delete an appointment if the attached invoice has already been sent. If you need to delete the appointment, open the invoice then delete it. After the invoice is deleted, you can then delete the appointment.
Tip
Cancelling an appointment from the calendar changes the invoice amount owing to $0. If you want to cancel an appointment but retain the invoice amount, click the pencil icon for the appointment and set the Status to Cancelled instead.
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Create communication templates that will be the content for your cancellation notification. (Tip: Use dynamic terms for the appointment date and time so the patient knows which appointment is being cancelled.)
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Click Settings > General.
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Under Appointment Settings, next to Group Cancellation Settings, click the
pencil icon.
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In the pop-up, configure your settings:
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Delivery Method: Tick the Email and/or SMS checkboxes for how you want to send the notification. (SMS requires Halaxy credits.)
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Email Template / SMS Template: Select the communication template/s you created in Step 1.
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Click Save.
You have successfully enabled automatic cancellation notifications for patients.
To disable cancellation notifications, untick both SMS and Email under Delivery Method.
When a patient cancels, you can select the reason for their cancellation for your records. You can customise this list of cancellation reasons in your settings.
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Click Settings > General.
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Under Appointment Settings, next to Group Cancellation Settings, click the
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In the pop-up:
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Preset Cancellation Reasons: On the left column, tick the Active checkbox for any of the preset cancellation reasons you want to include as available options.
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Group Cancellation Reasons: On the right column, you can create your own custom cancellation reasons. Tick the Active checkbox for your new cancellation reasons to make them available for selection.
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Click Save.
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