Appointment Booking Calendar Plugin

Appointment Booking Calendar is an appointment calendar plugin for accepting online bookings from a set of available time-slots in a calendar. The booking form is linked to a PayPal payment process.

You can use it to accept bookings for medical consultation, classrooms, events, transportation and other activities where a specific time from a defined set must be selected, allowing you to define the maximum number of bookings that can be accepted for each time-slot.

Features:

• The customer can book an available time slot from a defined set.
• The booking form is connected to a PayPal payment page
• You can define the appointment booking capacity for each time-slot.
• A notification email is sent to the specified email addresses (one or more) after completed the booking payment.
• A confirmation email with the appointment data is sent to the user after completing the booking payment.
• You can assign a user to the appointment booking calendar. Users with “Editor Access Level” will get access to the appointment calendar only if it has been assigned previously.
• Exports the appointments to iCal format (Google Calendar, Outlook).
• Includes captcha validation for preventing spam from the appointment calendar form.
• The appointment calendar has a printable list of bookings.
• You can edit the text of the notification/confirmation emails.
• Allows defining the product name at PayPal, the currency, the PayPal language and amount to pay for an appointment booking (you can set zero to let the user pay/donate the desired amount).
• Allows defining the working days, the exact time slots available and the appointment capacity of each time slot.
• Multi-page calendar: You can setup it to show many months at once.
• Multiple time-slot selection: The custom can book many time-slots at once if allowed in the settings.
• Configurable date format: mm/dd/yyyy or dd/mm/yyyy
• Supports both am/pm and military time.
• Export appointment data to CSV / Excel files.
• You can define the start day of the week on the appointment calendar.
• You can define the minimum available date and the maximum available date for the bookings.
• You can block specific dates.
• New WP Gutenberg Editor Block
• Elementor Editor Block
• Pretty modern administration interface.

Please note that this is a plugin originally designed to accept appointment bookings linked to PayPal payments. The feature for accepting appointments without PayPal is implemented/available in the commercial versions: https://abc.dwbooster.com/download

Payments processed through the plugin are SCA ready (Strong Customer Authentication), compatible with the new Payment services (PSD 2) – Directive (EU) that comes into full effect on 14 September, 2019.

Available Languages and Adding New Languages / Translations

The current translations are already available in the appointment calendar plugin:

• Afrikaans (af)
• Albanian (sq)
• Arabic (ar)
• Armenian (hy_AM)
• Azerbaijani (az)
• Basque (eu)
• Belarusian (be_BY)
• Bulgarian (bg_BG)
• Catalan (ca)
• Central Kurdish (ckb)
• Chinese (China zh_CN)
• Chinese (Taiwan zh_TW)
• Croatian (hr)
• Czech (cs_CZ)
• Danish (da_DK)
• Dutch (nl_NL)
• Esperanto (eo_EO)
• Estonian (et)
• Finnish (fi)
• French (fr_FR)
• Galician (gl_ES)
• Georgian (ka_GE)
• German (de_DE)
• Greek (el)
• Gujarati (gu_IN)
• Hebrew (he_IL)
• Hindi (hi_IN)
• Hungarian (hu_HU)
• Indian Bengali (bn_IN)
• Indonesian (id_ID)
• Irish (ga_IE)
• Italian (it_IT)
• Japanese (ja)
• Korean (ko_KR)
• Latvian (lv)
• Lithuanian (lt_LT)
• Macedonian (mk_MK)
• Malay (ms_MY)
• Malayalam (ml_IN)
• Maltese (mt_MT)
• Norwegian (nb_NO)
• Persian (fa_IR)
• Polish (pl_PL)
• Portuguese Brazil(pt_BR)
• Portuguese (pt_PT)
• Punjabi (pa_IN)
• Russian (ru_RU)
• Romanian (ro_RO)
• Serbian (sr_RS)
• Slovak (sk_SK)
• Slovene (sl_SI)
• Spanish (es_ES)
• Swedish (sv_SE)
• Tagalog (tl)
• Tamil (ta)
• Thai (th)
• Turkish (tr_TR)
• Ukrainian (uk)
• Vietnamese (vi)

If you want to add a new translation you can add a new PO/MO file into the “languages” folder. If you want to provide the translation for a new language you can send us the texts and we will create the PO/MO files for you. We will appreciate if you allow sharing your translation with other WordPress users.

The Troubleshoot Area

Use the troubleshot if you are having problems with special or non-latin characters. In most cases changing the charset to UTF-8 through the option available for that in the troubleshot area will solve the problem.

You can also use this area to change the script load method if the booking calendar isn’t appearing in the public website.

There are also two fields related to the iCal settings: the “iCal time zone difference vs. server time” and the “iCal timeslot size in minutes”. The “iCal time zone difference vs. server time” can be updated to match the desired time zone. The difference is calculated referred to the server time, you may have to test some values until finding the one that matches the desired time-zone. The “iCal timeslot size in minutes” can be modified to have a specific slot time in the exported iCal file.

The Restricted Dates Tab

The “Restricted Dates” tab into the calendar settings lets you to completely disable selected dates from the appointment calendar. This is useful for excluding public holidays or other specific dates where no appointments will be offered.

To restrict a date just click it into the date picker calendar that appears in this tab. To remove an already restricted date, just click it again.

The Special Dates Tab

The “Restricted Dates” tab into the calendar settings lets you use a different time-slots schedule for specific dates. For example you can have the same time-slots available for all Tuesdays in the appointment booking calendar, but if you want to offer different time-slots on a specific Tuesday then you can use the “Special Dates” tab to overwrite the time-slots for that date.

To use this section click a date into the date picker that appears on the “Restricted Dates” tab and a floating panel will appear for editing the available time-slots for the selected date.

The Notification Emails

The notification emails with the appointment data entered in the booking form can sent in “Plain Text” format (default) or in “HTML” format. If you select “HTML” format, be sure to use the BR or P tags for the line breaks into the text and to use the proper formatting.

Displaying a List of Appointments

A list with the appointments set on the calendar can be displayed by using this shortcode in the page where you want to display the list:

[CPABC_APPOINTMENT_LIST] 

… can be also customized with some parameters if needed, example:

[CPABC_APPOINTMENT_LIST from="today" to="today +30 days" fields="DATE,TIME,NAME" calendar="1"] 

… the “from” and “to” are used to display only the appointments / bookings on the specified period. That can be either indicated as relative days to “today” or as fixed dates.

There is also a “group” attribute to join the names of the appointments made on the same time-slot (for time-slots with multiple capacity):

[CPABC_APPOINTMENT_LIST group="yes"] 

The “fields” can be used to modify the columns to display, that field accepts the following items (uppercase):

CALENDAR DATE TIME NAME PHONE COMMENTS 

… however, in most cases, probably you don’t want to display the phone or comments.

The styles for the list are located at the end of the file “all-css.css”:

.cpabc_field_0, .cpabc_field_1, .cpabc_field_2, ... 

Clear the browser cache if the list isn’t displayed in a correct way (to be sure it loads the updated styles).

Opening the Calendar in a Different Month

There is a field in the settings area named “Open calendar in this initial month/year”. This can be used to display the calendar initially in a specified month. This is useful, for example, for bookings of an event that will happen in a future month, so you can display the calendar exactly on that month.

Allowing Booking Multiple Appointment Slots

These settings fields are available for each appointment calendar:

• Minimum slots to be selected: This is the minimum number of slots that the customer must select in the booking form.

• Maximum slots to be selected: This is the maximum number of slots that the customer can select in the booking form.

• Close floating panel after selecting a time-slot?: Default: “Yes”. Set to “No” in the case the user has to select various slots in the same date. The price should be set for each total number of slots below (request cost setting).

Note that the request cost field will be automatically updated for allowing entering the price for each number of time-slots, giving total freedom at this price setting.

Exporting Appointments to CSV / Excel Files

The appointment data can be exported to a CSV file (Excel compatible) to manage the data from other applications. That option is available from the “bookings list”, the appointments can be filtered by date and by the text into them, so you can export just the needed appointments to the CSV file.

Appointment Calendar Theme Selection

The current Appointment Booking Calendar version has three pre-built CSS themes:

• Default – Classic
• Light
• Blue

The theme can be selected into the administration area, below the calendar on the settings field labeled “Calendar visual theme”. Once selected a new theme, the CSS file “all-css.css” will be loaded from a different subfolder, be sure to edit the related CSS file if you need further modifications to the appointment booking calendar theme styles.

Other Versions and Features

The free version published in this WordPress directory is a fully-functional version for accepting appointments through PayPal as indicated in the plugin description. There is also a pro (commercial) version that includes the following additional features (not present in the free version):

• Ability to process forms/appointments without PayPal
• Form builder for a visual customization of the booking form
• Email reminders for the appointments
• Coupons / discount codes
• Additional drop-down fields for multiple prices/services
• Display calculated appointments price below the calendar
• … and a lot more of rich features

Please note that the pro features aren’t advised as part of the free plugin in the description shown in this WordPress directory. If you are interested in more information about the pro features go to the plugin’s page: https://abc.dwbooster.com/download

To install Appointment Booking Calendar, follow these steps:

1. Download and unzip the Appointment Booking Calendar plugin
2. Upload the entire appointment-booking-calendar/ directory to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory
3. Activate the Appointment Booking Calendar plugin through the Plugins menu in WordPress
4. Configure the settings at the administration menu >> Settings >> Appointment Booking Calendar.
5. To insert the appointment calendar form into some content or post use the icon that will appear when editing contents

1. 

   Appointment booking form.

2. 

   Inserting an appointment calendar into a page.

3. 

   Managing the appointment calendar.

4. 

   Defining time-slots on the appointment calendar

5. 

   Appointment Booking Calendar settings.

1.0.1

• Interface modifications.
• Compatible with WP 3.6
• More features added
• Fixing tags in wp directory
• Two additional calendar themes added
• Tested and fully compatible with WordPress 3.7.x
• Language updates to make them compatible with the latest WP versions

1.1.3

• Interface modifications.
• New admin settings
• New translations added
• Fixed bug in multisite installations
• PayPal Sandbox mode added
• Fixed warning that appeared with PHP safe mode restrictions
• Sanitized GET parameters used in queries
• Fixed issue with the site home URL in WP with folders in non-default locations

1.1.4

• Fixed bug in the function that generates the https url
• Sanitized query parameters
• Fixed bug that caused the Sunday not being selectable in the calendar.
• Automatically repaid corrupted databases
• Fixed SQL issues and improved database structure
• Compatible with the latest WordPress 4.2.x version

1.1.6

• Removed incorrect parameter from product name forwarded to PayPal
• Fixed: IPN address was generating an incorrect address under SSL environments
• Updated the Export to CSV function to include manually added appointments
• Removed feature that auto-fills the name and email due to multiple user requests
• Update to the captcha image generation to add the content size

1.1.7

• Compatible with WordPress 4.3
• Replaced h2 to h1 headers for WordPress 4.3
• Fixed bug in ajax loading
• Dutch language updated.

1.1.8

• Fixed XSS and SQL injection vulneravilities

1.1.9

• Fixed bug in settings submission

1.1.10

• Fixed bug in admin area
• New options for appointments slots

1.1.11

• New options for adding appointments.

1.1.12

• Added access to the calendars for subscribers

1.1.13

• Fixed menu slug to match the plugin name.

1.1.14

• Increased max number of slots in a single booking

1.1.15

• Tested and compatible with WordPress 4.4
• Fixed bug in query filter

1.1.16

• Fixed CSS issues in the new WP theme

1.1.17

• Fixed issues in captcha filess

1.1.18

• Fixed typo in settings
• Fixed null value issue in query

1.1.19

• Improved query security

1.1.20

• Added upgrade referrer

1.1.21

• Fixed captcha issue in Win serve

1.1.22

• Improved captcha security

1.1.23

• Admin intf. updates.

1.1.24

• Security related to SQL injection
• Language updates

1.1.25

• Added nonces and other security updates

1.1.26

• Fixed PHP session issues

1.1.27

• Shortcode paramters sanitization

1.1.28

• Updated API URLs

1.1.29

• Added Catalan language

1.1.30

• Additional POST params sanitization

1.1.31

• Added nonces to calendar settings

1.1.32

• Fixed bug in booking form

1.1.33

• Added reply-to header to emails

1.1.34

• Tested in WP 4.5

1.1.35

• Added Stripcslashes to post

1.1.36

• SQL query optimizations

1.1.37

• Fixed bug in calendars list

1.1.38

• Old changelogs placed in changelog.txt

1.1.39

• Changed init actions to plugins_loaded

1.1.40

• Use of less DB queries

1.1.41

• Deleted old versions of the Appointment Booking Calenadr

1.1.42

• Timezone difference set to zero

1.1.43

• Fix in “from” email address

1.1.44

• Fixed issues in previous update

1.1.45

• iCal bug fixed

1.1.46

• GET params sanitized

1.1.47

• From email auto-formatted

1.1.48

• Added Norwegian language

1.1.49

• New options for mindate

1.1.50

• New translations

1.1.51

• Compatible with WP 4.6

1.1.52

• New website and documentation

1.1.53

• New doc and support URLs

1.1.54

• Fix to the placeholder from email for compatibility with WP 4.6

1.1.55

• Modified POST processing

1.1.56

• Updates to export feature

1.1.57

• Fixed magic quotes issue

1.1.58

• Misc code improvements

1.1.59

• Interface update

1.1.60

• Update to Hungarian language

1.1.61

• Update to French language

1.1.62

• Replaced default placeholder email

1.1.63

• Better support tracking

1.1.64

• Database updates

1.1.65

• PayPal IPN improvements

1.1.66

• Added korean calendar

1.1.67

• List option updated

1.1.68

• Compatible with WP 4.7

1.1.69

• Removed use of iconv

1.1.70

• PayPal integration improvement

1.1.71

• Instructions update

1.1.72

• Database fix

1.1.73

• New support page

1.1.74

• DB update

1.1.75

• Database improvements

1.1.76

• Improvements to calendars list

1.1.77

• Improved view in mobile devices

1.1.78

• Admin interface modification

1.1.79

• Removed jquery scripts not longer needed

1.1.80

• Product name update

1.1.81

• DB fix for upgrades

1.1.82

• Dashboard updates

1.1.83

• Option to add more time slots

1.1.84

• PayPal button update

1.1.85

• Help link update

1.1.86

• Compatible with WP 4.7.3

1.1.87

• Update related to the parameters in the PayPal IPN notification

1.1.88

• Use less parameters for the PayPal IPN notification

1.1.89

• Code improvements

1.1.90

• Field specialDates now supports more information

1.1.91

• Mobile friendly update(email types for fields)

1.1.92

• New anti-spam rule for public booking form

1.1.93

• Corrected bug in anti-spam rule

1.1.94

• Captcha code security and speed improvements
• Better SQL query sanitization through $wpdb->prepare

1.1.95

• Optional review panel

1.1.96

• Review panel correction

1.1.97

• Better CSS styles linking in admin area

1.1.98

• Sanitization for PayPal email address

1.1.99

• MySQL query sanitization

1.2.10

• Tested and compatible with WordPress 4.8

1.2.11

• Removed deprecated PayPal parameters

1.2.12

• Cleanup for PayPal parameters

1.2.14

• Validation and accessibility updates

1.2.15

• iCal URL modified to prevent issues with robots.txt restrictions

1.2.16

• Moved plugin website and links to SSL

1.2.17

• Removed use of deprecated MySQL functions

1.2.18

• Database installation bug fixed

1.2.19

• PayPal return address santized

1.2.20

• Server time note in iCal settings

1.2.21

• Improved print view

1.2.22

• Better PayPal currency selection

1.2.23

• Formatting for price number

1.2.24

• Automatic validation of price settings

1.2.25

• Default values for get_option actions

1.2.26

• Admin settings validation improvements

1.2.27

• Color fields for captcha settings

1.2.28

• Admin intf updates

1.2.29

• Currency automatic correction

1.2.30

• Removed fields not longer needed

1.2.31

• Compatible with WordPress 4.9

1.2.32

• Easier file for form customization

1.2.33

• Optimized code. Removed queries and fields no longer needed.

1.2.34

• Fixed bug in calendar event editor

1.2.35

• Fixed z-index issue in datepicker

1.2.36

• Fixed bug in review panel

1.2.37

• Added CSS and JavaScript customization panel

1.2.38

• Improved submission to prevent duplicated booking submissions

1.2.39

• Better currency auto-correction

1.2.40

• Fix to editor access in admin appointments

1.2.41

• Fixed bug related to cancelled events appearing in iCal exports

1.2.42

• Corrected settings links in plugins menu

1.2.43

• Multiple code updates and captcha fixes

1.2.44

• Security improvement

1.2.45

• Fixed display issue in non-available special dates

1.2.46

• Misc code updates

1.2.47

• Security improvements: nonces in bookings list

1.2.48

• Changed to local jquery datepicker styles

1.2.49

• New feature for getting the timezone info

1.2.50

• Multiple code optimizations

1.2.51

• Interface updates

1.2.52

• Full support for Hebrew language

1.2.53

• Improved language autodetection

1.2.54

• Fixed compatibility issue with third party plugin (Beaver)

1.2.55

• Fixed conflict with autoptimize plugin

1.2.56

• New feature for excluding fields from CSV exports

1.2.57

• Fixed conflict with WP Rocket and itemnumber fix

1.2.58

• Fixed captcha reloading issue

1.2.59

• Clarification about calendar supported

1.2.60

• Min and max date edition validations

1.2.61

• Currency detection improved

1.2.62

• Added PayPal txnid tag to the confirmation emails

1.2.63

• Easier activation process

1.2.64

• Fixed initialization issue and added optional feedback

1.2.65

• SQL sanitization and doc updates

1.2.66

• Increased appointment intervals

1.2.67

• Added support for INR – Indian Rupee and ARS – Argentine peso currencies

1.2.68

• Database creating encoding fix

1.2.69

• Fix to activation process

1.2.70

• New fix to activation process

1.2.71

• Interface improvements

1.2.72

• High speed load improvement

1.2.73

• Compatible with Gutenberg

1.2.74

• Fixed bug in admin area

1.2.75

• Fix to Gutenberg integration

1.2.76

• Conflict avoid with Gutenberg editor

1.2.77

• Fixed magic quotes issue

1.2.78

• Gutenberg integration update

1.2.79

• Improved custom CSS and JS editor

1.2.80

• Improved CSS edition area

1.2.81

• Fixes to styles, translations and captcha

1.2.82

• Currency settings clarifications

1.2.83

• Fixed email edition issue

1.2.84

• Fixed issue with magic quotes

1.2.85

• Captcha image improvement

1.2.86

• Gutenberg compatibility updates

1.2.87

• Addded Vietnamese and Thai language to the calendar

1.2.88

• Fixed bug in CSV export option

1.2.89

• CSS styles updates

1.2.91

• Fixed Windows issue

1.2.92

• New option for adding bookings in admin area

1.2.93

• New feature for recurrent bookings

1.2.94

• Improved feature for recurrent bookings

1.2.95

• Removed old recurrent bookings code and improved error detection

1.2.96

• Added Bulgarian language

1.2.97

• Added Elementor Integration

1.2.98

• GPDR Compatibility fix

1.2.99

• Removed use of CURL

1.3.01

• New visualization / schedule calendar

1.3.02

• Fixed translation issue and optimized number of files

1.3.03

• Better integration with Elementor and Visual Composer

1.3.04

• Improved max slots validation

1.3.05

• Fixed cache issues

1.3.06

• Added Greek Language

1.3.07

• New calendar theme. Modern design.

1.3.08

• Email auto-config improvements.

1.3.09

• Fixed bug in email settings

1.3.10

• Fixed conflict with lazy loading feature of Jetpack

1.3.11

• Added Arabic language

1.3.12

• Review link update

1.3.14

• Compatible with WordPress 5.2

1.3.15

• Fixed bug in iconv function

1.3.16

• Compatible with Google Translate

1.3.17

• Update for compatibility with WordPress 5.2

1.3.18

• Code improvements

1.3.19

• Multiple validations and security improvements

1.3.20

• Additional sanitizations and validations

1.3.21

• New iCal link

1.3.22

• Fixed bug on adding bookings from dashboard

1.3.23

• Fix to table character encoding

1.3.24

• Updates to publish section

1.3.25

• Fixed bug in datetime processing

1.3.26

• Documentation updates

1.3.27

• Fixed bug when minimum available date is now

1.3.28

• Compatible with WordPress 5.3

1.3.29

• Improved mobile views

1.3.30

• Fixed bug in email delivery

1.3.31

• WP 5.3 compatibility update

1.3.32

• Preparing plugin for additional translations

1.3.33

• Interface improved

1.3.34

• Fixed bug in iCal settings

1.3.35

• Additional sanitization and new hooks

1.3.36

• Compatible with WordPress 5.4

1.3.37

• Interface improvements

1.3.38

• Gutenberg integration update

1.3.39

• PHP compatibility updates

1.3.40

• Improved captcha

1.3.41

• Load speed optimization

1.3.42

• Compatible with WordPress 5.5

1.3.43

• jQuery compatibility updates

1.3.44

• Captcha GD image library automatic detection

1.3.45

• Fixed CSS in non-military time mode

1.3.46

• Added new date tag %MAINDATE%

1.3.47

• Improved date picker interface

1.3.48

• Calendar CSS themes update

1.3.49

• Compatible with WordPress 5.6

1.3.50

• Datetime selection interface improved

1.3.51

• New calendar design: Modern II

1.3.52

• New calendar design: Rounded

1.3.53

• New date formats

1.3.54

• Schedule Calendar View update

1.3.55

• Compatible with WordPress 5.7

1.3.56

• Script improvements for WordPress 5.7

1.3.57

• Added Finnish language

1.3.58

• Fix to exclude fields in CSV reports

1.3.59

• Load speed optimization

1.3.60

• Improved min-date options

1.3.61

• Fix to current date availability

1.3.62

• New settings field “request address” at PayPal
• Compatible with WordPress 5.8

1.3.63

• Visualization improvements

1.3.64

• Compatible with WordPress 5.9

1.3.65

• Elementor compatibility update

1.3.66

• Scripts optimized

1.3.67

• Compatible with WordPress 6.0

1.3.68

• PHP 8 updates

1.3.69

• New ranges added

1.3.70

• Feedback window update

1.3.71

• Better captcha

1.3.72

• Compatible with WP 6.1

1.3.73

• PHP 8 related updates

1.3.74

• Code improvements

1.3.75

• Language fixes

1.3.76

• Fixed bug in price settings

1.3.77

• Compatible with WP 6.2

1.3.78

• PHP 8 update

1.3.79

• Compatible with WP 6.3

1.3.80

• Visual editor update

1.3.81

• Compatible with WP 6.4

1.3.82

• Captcha anti-spam update

1.3.83

• Additional nonce checks

1.3.84

• iCal fix
• Removed tags: booking form,paypal calendar,plugin,paypal bookings,paypal appointments,bookings,meeting,meet,scheduler,scheduler calendar,availability,availability calendar,agenda,reservation form,reservation calendar

1.3.85

• Compatible with WP 6.5

1.3.86

• Params update

1.3.87

• Fixed activation issue

1.3.88

• Compatible with WP 6.6