The WOWAPPS booking widget has a number of blockouts and how you use them varies slightly depending on which mode your booking widget is in (Max Pax, Table Mode, or Request).

The four methods for performing Blockouts in MaxPax are discussed below.

Rolling Blockout:

A Rolling Blockout is used to prevent customers from booking within a specified time frame. For example, you might require customers to give you 30 minutes' notice before making a reservation.

In this configuration, you would have a 30-minute rolling blockout that would continue to ''roll'' until you turn it off.

Here's How to Do It:

1. Click the Blockout & Override tab.
2. Check the box next to Enable Rolling Blockout. Once chosen, you will be prompted to select a Rolling Blockout time.
3. Choose the Rolling Blockout time by clicking on the empty field and typing in the desired time (in this case 30 minutes).
4. Do not forget to Save.

To put this in context, imagine you have a 30-minute Rolling Blockout on. If a customer arrives at your booking system at 7 pm, the earliest they can book is 7.30 pm (this will vary depending on your interval time slot and any other blockouts)

If we had a 60-minute blockout, the earliest time would be 8 pm, and so on.

It should be noted that unless manually turned off, a Rolling Blockout will remain active.

Instant Blockout:

This is the emergency switch. An Instant Blockout, as opposed to a Rolling Blockout, will turn off after the specified time and is useful if you need to close bookings for a few hours.

When an Instant Blockout is activated, customers will be unable to book within the specified times, but will be able to book outside of those times and in the future.

Here's How to Do It:

1. Click the Blockout & Override button.
2. Check the box next to Enable Instant Blockout. Once selected, you will be prompted to select a time for the Instant Blockout to end.
3. Select the time by clicking on the time field and dragging the cursor to the desired time (within a 24-hour window).
4. Do not forget to Save.

Scheduled Instant Blockout:

Scheduled Instant Blockouts are ideal for restricting bookings to specific times, such as 5:00 PM, 7:00 PM and 8:00 PM. The previous article contains a more detailed explanation of Scheduled Instant Blockouts.  Keep an eye on your booking intervals. When your booking intervals are 15 minutes, session times work best.

Single/Full-day Blockouts:

This feature will not show up in the Blockouts tab if MaxPax is turned ON. If you want to add a single/full day blockout, you can follow the instructions given in the previous article, or you can also go to the Pages tab, then click on Trading Hours, scroll down to Block Out dates and add the days you will be closed by selecting the date and ticking All Trading. 

What's Next?

Step 8 - Making Your Widget Live