> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.tellem.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Appointments

> Your appointments live on the Schedule page. There are four ways to get them into Tellem — use any combination.

Your appointments live on the **Schedule** page. There are four ways to get them
into Tellem — use any combination.

## Bring in your jobs

### Google Calendar

On **Integrations**, click **Connect Google Calendar** and authorize. Tellem
reads your events and turns them into appointments. It's read-only — Tellem never
changes your calendar. Plain calendar events often don't include a customer phone
number or precise address, so some will land in **Needs attention** until you
add those.

### Jobber

On **Integrations**, click **Connect Jobber** and authorize. Tellem imports your
scheduled jobs and their assigned technicians, including the service address.
Read-only — nothing is written back to Jobber. Re-importing refreshes existing
jobs instead of creating duplicates.

### Import a CSV (Smart Importer)

On the **Schedule** page, choose **Import from CSV** and upload a spreadsheet
export. Tellem suggests how your columns map to its fields (customer, email,
time, address…); review and adjust the mapping, then confirm. Great for a backlog
or a system Tellem doesn't connect to directly.

> **Imported numbers arrive un-texted.** You can map a phone column now — Tellem
> just won't text any of those numbers right away. Each one lands as a
> "notice pending" number: not consent, just a placeholder that keeps them from
> being texted by mistake. To start texting a customer you imported, open their
> appointment and confirm the continuing-updates notice (see below) the next
> time you're in touch with them.

### Add by hand

On the **Schedule** page, open a day and choose **+ Add to this day**. Enter the
customer, time, address, and worker. No integration required.

As you type the address, Tellem suggests matching ones — **pick the one you
mean from the list**. That's what pins the job on the map, and the save button
stays greyed out until you do, so an address can't be saved as text with no
location. If none of the suggestions is right, open **Advanced — coordinates**
and paste the latitude and longitude from a map instead.

## Text-message consent

Whenever you enter a phone number Tellem hasn't texted for you before, you'll be
asked to confirm one thing while you're booking the job. There's no script to
read and no yes/no question to ask — **just tell the customer why you're texting
them before you ask for their number.** Something like *"Can I get a number for
appointment text updates?"* is enough. Once you've said that, the customer
handing you their number is the consent — tick the box to confirm you said it,
and Tellem sends that customer a short enrollment confirmation so they have a
receipt and a working **STOP** before any appointment texts start.

**You only do this once per customer.** Consent carries over to all their future
appointments with you, so when you book them again you'll see *"Text updates
already authorized"* with the date it happened — nothing to tick, and no second
confirmation is sent. It stays that way until the customer replies STOP, which
suppresses their texts immediately and permanently.

Adding a phone number to an appointment that didn't have one asks the same
question, for the same reason: that's the first time Tellem would be texting that
number. Without consent on file, Tellem won't send — so if you skip it, the
appointment saves but the customer never hears anything.

### Numbers that were already on file

A number can also arrive on an appointment with no consent captured yet — most
often a phone number you imported (see the CSV callout above). Tellem calls this
**"notice pending."** It's not a defect: the appointment saves normally and
nothing is blocked. It just means the customer hasn't been told yet that Tellem
will be texting them.

To clear it, open the appointment the next time you're in touch with that
customer and tell them one sentence — something like *"We'll text you appointment
updates at this number going forward, and you can stop them anytime."* — then
tick the box that appears. That's the moment the number becomes textable; Tellem
sends the enrollment confirmation right after, same as a brand-new number.

## Assigning work to a technician

Open a day on the **Schedule**, tick the checkboxes next to one or more
appointments, choose a worker, and assign. You can assign a single job or a whole
batch at once, and reassign or unassign the same way. (A worker has to be sharing
location for live ETA — see [Field workers](/field-workers).)

### If nobody is assigned

If a job's start time arrives and no technician has been assigned, Tellem warns
your business — once on the morning of the job, and again about two hours before
it starts. The customer isn't affected; they still get their usual appointment
messages. Once you assign a worker, the alerts stop. If you reschedule an
unassigned job, it gets fresh alerts on its new date/time.

This runs automatically for every account — there's no trigger to turn on. What
you *can* choose is which channel(s) reach you: email, text, or both, from the
**Alerts to your business** card on the **Account** page. A text needs a cell
number on file (see [Business alerts](/business-alerts) for the full picture,
including what happens if you turn on texting without one).

## Closing out a job

Open a day on the **Schedule** and click an appointment to expand it. Alongside
**Edit** and **Cancel appointment** you'll find **Mark complete** — use it when
the work is done.

Marking a job complete stops Tellem's automatic customer messages for it: no
more reminders, arrival alerts, or delay warnings. The appointment stays on the
schedule with a **Completed** badge so you keep the history.

Both **Mark complete** and **Cancel appointment** are one-way. Once an
appointment is completed or cancelled it can't be reopened, and the two buttons
disappear from it — if the job comes back, book it again.

## What "ready to notify" means, and Needs attention

To notify a customer and predict arrival, an appointment needs a **customer phone
or email**, a **service address that pins on the map**, and an **assigned
worker**. Appointments missing any of these appear on the **Needs attention**
page — fix them there before they'd otherwise notify a customer.
