Account, Calendar and Integrations FAQ

Answers to common TidyCal account, calendar and integration questions: sending email, which calendar events block your time, approvals, deleting booking types and testing payments.

Overview

This page covers questions that are not answered in the main TidyCal FAQ. For plans, pricing, availability basics, payments and most booking type settings, start there — the More answers in the TidyCal FAQ section below links straight to each answer.

Account and Email

Can TidyCal send emails from my own domain?

No. TidyCal does not support adding DKIM, SPF or CNAME records to send email from your own domain. Confirmation and reminder emails come from TidyCal's sending address with your name as the sender, and replies go to your account email — or to the booking type's custom reply-to address if you set one (see How to Set Custom Reply-To Email Addresses).

Calendar invites come from the calendar the booking type writes to: your Primary Calendar, unless you picked a different calendar for that booking type under Advanced → Calendar (paid plans).

Note: A custom domain for your booking page is a different feature. See Custom Domains.

How do I create a booking for someone else?

From the sidebar, open Bookings and click Create a booking. Choose a booking type, pick a date and time, and enter your guest's name and email. TidyCal emails your guest a link to confirm, and the time is held until they confirm or the invite expires. This works on every plan. The button is on your personal Bookings view, not on a team's. See Create a Booking on Behalf of a Guest.

Calendars

Why do some calendar events block my availability and others don't?

TidyCal only reads calendars that have Reading enabled on the Integrations → Calendars page (see What do Reading enabled and Primary Calendar mean?). Within those calendars, what blocks your time depends on the provider:

Google Calendar: events marked Free, cancelled events and events you declined do not block your time. Everything else does.
Outlook / Microsoft 365: events shown as Busy, Out of office, Working elsewhere or Tentative block your time. Events shown as Free do not.
Apple (iCloud): only events marked Busy block your time.

To stop TidyCal blocking time for certain events, set them to Free in your calendar, or turn off reading for that whole calendar. To make one booking type ignore your connected calendars entirely, turn on Ignore external calendar conflicts. in its Restrictions section — it then checks only its own bookings. For more, see Why aren't my calendar events blocking my availability?

How can I see which events TidyCal has synced?

Go to Integrations → Calendars. The name of every calendar with reading enabled is a link — click it to see the events TidyCal has synced from that calendar. Calendars with reading disabled show their name in grey and cannot be opened.

What happens if I delete a booking's event from my calendar?

Deleting the event in Google, Outlook or Apple Calendar does not cancel the booking in TidyCal. The booking stays active, the time stays blocked on your booking page, and TidyCal still sends its reminder emails. The booker is not told anything has changed.

To cancel properly, cancel the booking from the Bookings page, or use the cancel link in the confirmation email or calendar event. That notifies the booker and frees the time.

How should a booking be cancelled or rescheduled?

Use TidyCal's own cancel or reschedule links, so TidyCal, the video meeting and your connected calendars all stay in step. Bookers find these links in their confirmation email and, for single-booker booking types (not group bookings or date polls), in the calendar event — unless you replaced the invite text with a custom calendar invitation. As the host, you can also cancel from the Bookings page.

Booking Types

Can I approve bookings before they are confirmed?

Yes, on Individual Lifetime, Pro and Agency Lifetime. Open the booking type, go to its Restrictions section and turn on Manually approve bookings. It is off by default and set separately on each booking type. Your client is emailed when you approve or reject the request.

What happens when I delete a booking type?

It disappears from your booking page, and its link sends visitors to your main booking page instead.
Its existing bookings are not cancelled. They still appear on the Bookings page with the booking type's title crossed out, and they keep blocking your time.
Upcoming bookings of that booking type no longer get TidyCal reminder emails or SMS.
If it was a subscription booking type, its subscribers' active subscriptions are cancelled.

If you only want to stop new bookings, disable the booking type instead of deleting it.

Can I use TidyCal for room or office rentals?

Partly. Two settings help:

Allow group bookings. with Max attendees per slot: lets several people book the same time (paid plans).
Ignore external calendar conflicts. (all plans) makes a booking type check only its own bookings, so you can run one booking type per room without the rooms blocking each other.

Each booking type still follows your availability hours, and TidyCal has no resource or inventory management beyond that.

Integrations and Payments

Can I connect Mailchimp or another email marketing tool?

TidyCal has no built-in Mailchimp integration. You can connect Mailchimp or similar tools through Zapier, or build your own connection with the TidyCal API — both are under Integrations → Automations and need a paid plan. SendFox is connected natively: click Connect SendFox account on the same page.

How do booking question answers arrive in Zapier?

All of a booking's answers to your booking questions come through together in a single questions field — a list of question and answer pairs — rather than as one field per question. This is the same booking data the TidyCal API returns.

Which Microsoft accounts work with Microsoft Teams?

Microsoft Teams meetings need a Microsoft Office 365 Business or Education account. Personal Microsoft accounts cannot be used, so connect a work or school account, or use Google Meet or Zoom instead.

How do I test a paid booking?

TidyCal has no test mode — Stripe and PayPal payments always run live. To test, create a low-priced booking type, book it yourself, then refund the payment in Stripe or PayPal. A 100% coupon lets you test the booking flow, but it skips the payment step.

Troubleshooting

My booking links suddenly stopped working

A booking type's link follows its title only while you are creating it. After it is saved, changing the title does not change the link. A link breaks when the booking type's URL: field is edited. If the booking type was deleted or disabled, its old link sends visitors to your main booking page instead.

Find the original link in your emails, website or social posts.
Go to Booking types and open the booking type.
In the URL: field, enter the part of the original link after the last /.
Click Save at the top of the drawer.

TidyCal booking type URL field showing custom slug business-strategy-consultation

I set up two reminder emails, but only one was sent

Each reminder is sent at its set time before the booking. If a booking is made after a reminder's send time has already passed — for example, a booking made 3 hours ahead with a 24-hour reminder — that reminder is skipped. Reminders whose time is still ahead are sent as normal.

I can't edit anything on my account

Clear your browser's cache and cookies, then try again.
Try a different browser or device.
If it still does not work, contact TidyCal support.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where did the other questions on this page go?

Questions that were also answered in the main TidyCal FAQ now live only there, so there is one up-to-date answer. See More answers in the TidyCal FAQ for the full list of links.

How do I contact TidyCal support?

Email support@tidycal.com, or open the Help chat from the TidyCal logo menu. See How do I contact TidyCal support?