The Today page in the Reception workspace is your view of the day. It lists every appointment, shows who is waiting, and lets you mark a patient as arrived with one press.
Before you start
- Make sure you are in the Reception workspace. The Today page is headed Today at the desk.
- The counts at the top show Booked today, Waiting, Unconfirmed, Enquiries, Forms to review and Recalls due. Each opens the relevant page.
Steps
Confirm an appointment
- When a patient confirms by phone, open Diary, click the appointment and press Confirm. The status changes from Scheduled to Confirmed.
- The Unconfirmed count on the Today page goes down as appointments are confirmed.
Mark a patient as arrived
- On the Today page, find the patient under Due in Today's diary.
- Press Arrived on their row. The row moves up to Arrived & waiting and the Waiting count goes up.
- If a patient is late, their time shows in amber until you mark them arrived or the appointment is cancelled or missed.
Check the record before they go in
- Click the patient's name on the row to open their record. Medical alerts appear as chips next to the name on the Today page and as badges in the record header.
- A New tag on the row means this is the patient's first visit. Check Forms to review under Welcome & communications in case their Welcome form is waiting for approval.
Complete the visit
- When the patient has been seen, open Diary, click the appointment and press Complete. Clinicians can also do this.
- The row moves to Seen, missed & cancelled on the Today page.
- If the patient did not turn up, right-click the appointment and choose Did not attend.
Print the day
- In Diary, with the Day view selected, press Print day to print the day list for the clinician or the desk.
What happens next
Marking a patient as arrived does not change anything else on the record; it simply tells the team they are in the building. Completing the appointment is what matters downstream: a completed appointment with a cost estimate appears under Charges on the patient's Invoices & payments tab, and a completed recall visit creates the next recall automatically.
Once the visit is complete, take any payment due using the steps in Taking Payments.
Common problems
- There is no Arrived button — it only shows for appointments that are Scheduled or Confirmed, and only to roles that can manage appointments. If the appointment is already Arrived or Completed, the button is hidden.
- The Today page shows nothing — the practice may have no bookings today, or you may be viewing a different practice. Press Open diary to check the date.
- The patient arrived but is not on the list — they may be booked for another day. Find them under Patients, open the Appointments tab and check Upcoming.