How drop-offs and rush turnarounds work
The core Velobook pattern: a customer books a day and arrival window to drop in, you work to your own schedule, rush is an optional surcharge.
Last updated 29 June 2026
A drop-off reserves a date and an arrival window for the customer to bring their item in, rather than a fixed appointment slot. You then work on it on your own schedule and tell them when it is ready. This is the pattern Velobook is built around, and it is what sets it apart from a generic "30 minute meeting" booking tool.
Why drop-offs, not time slots
Repair and workshop trades do not work in fixed appointments. A service might take twenty minutes or it might wait two days for a part. Drop-offs match that reality: the customer commits to a drop-in day and a window such as morning or afternoon, and you keep control of the bench.
Set up a drop-off service
- 1Open Catalogue → Services and add or edit a service.
- 2Give it a duration label that sets expectations, such as "Same-day" or "1 to 2 days".
- 3Save.
Each day is split into arrival windows (for example morning and afternoon), and you set how many drop-offs each window can take. There is also an optional per-mechanic daily limit. Together these cap busy days automatically rather than overbooking. If a plain job count does not fit how your work varies, you can fill the day by total work-time instead; see booking capacity.
Rush turnarounds
Customers can choose rush for a faster turnaround. Rush adds a fixed 25% surcharge to the booking. The one setting you control is whether that surcharge is collected online at booking or taken in store, which lives with your online payment settings.
Rush bookings are flagged with a rush pill on the Workboard, in Schedule's Today view, and in your booking history, so the bench knows what to prioritise at a glance.
The e-bike surcharge
If servicing an e-bike is more work for you, set a flat e-bike surcharge under Integrations, in Payments & POS (it sits beside the rush setting). It is added automatically whenever a customer says their bike is an e-bike during booking, so there is nothing for them to tick and nothing for you to adjust by hand. Choosing rush lifts it along with the rest of the job, and the amount is frozen onto the booking, so changing your rate later never re-prices past work. Leave it at zero to charge e-bikes the same as anything else.
Working the job
Once a drop-off is in, staff move it through its stages on the Workboard, a kanban with columns for Booked, In progress, Waiting, Ready, and Done, or from the phone-first Today view of Schedule. Each job can carry a checklist, and jobs stuck waiting on parts are flagged with how long they have been waiting. As the job progresses, the customer can follow it on their manage page and gets a notice when it is ready to collect.