How to sign in and set up Salon Booking OS for the first time
8 min read
Sign in as the owner #
Open /login (Team sign-in, for the salon’s owner, managers and staff; the website’s footer links to it) and sign in with the e-mail address and password you gave in the installer’s Owner account step. After repeated wrong passwords, sign-in for that account and address pauses for a while; wait and try again.
Video tutorial #
How to set up Salon Booking OS by OsDot™ 1.0.0 for your first online booking
The administration area opens at /admin. Its menu has these groups:
| Group | Pages |
|---|---|
| Overview | Overview, Get started |
| Front desk | Calendar, Find an appointment, My day, New booking, Walk-in, Call-backs, End of day, Reminders, Online booking — see Front desk and Booking online |
| Salon | Hours, staff and services, Business hours, Closures and holidays, Location, Home visits, Staff, Services, My schedule, Staff sign-in, Business settings |
| Clients | Clients — see Clients and their data |
| Reports | Reports — see Reports |
| Payments | Orders, Reconciliation, Discounts, Taxes — see Deposits and paying at the salon |
| Shop | Shop orders, Products, Categories, Stock, Returns, Delivery, Shop reports — see The shop |
| Website, Appearance, Media, People | The website’s content, its look, the media library, and people and accounts — see The website, the team and your profile and Your team’s sign-ins |
| Messages | Messages — see Messages, reminders, text messages and push |
| System | Website settings, E-mail (SMTP), SMS (text messages), Push notifications, Stripe, PayPal, Razorpay, Payment options, Google sign-in, Audit log, About this software, Licences, Before you go live, Updates; in the licensed edition also Software license (see Software license) |
Each person sees only the pages their role allows (Roles and permissions). Each member of your team signs in with their own account (Your team’s sign-ins). My day appears once your account is linked to a staff member (Staff sign-in).
Set up your site’s e-mail first, under System → E-mail (SMTP): setup links for your team, password resets, the codes clients confirm with, booking and shop e-mails and reminders all need it (see Messages, reminders, text messages and push).
System → Before you go live (the owner) shows the list of the installer’s last page again: the scheduled tasks — each schedule and command in its own field with a Copy button, your installation’s own folder filled in —, the backup set and the note on e-mail.
The sign-in lasts while you work: it ends after 120 minutes without a request, and 12 hours after you signed in at the latest. A page you open after that sends you to the sign-in page, which says that your sign-in has ended; after signing in you return to that page.
Get started #
Overview → Get started lists the steps that make the front desk work, with a progress count. Each step links to its page:
| Step | What it needs | Page |
|---|---|---|
| The salon’s location: country, address and phone | The country (the front desk reads phone numbers typed without a country code by it), the time zone, the address and the phone | Salon → Location |
| Business hours | The days and times the salon is open | Salon → Business hours |
| One bookable staff member with hours | A stylist and their working hours | Salon → Staff |
| One bookable service | Name, duration, price, who can do it | Salon → Services |
| Legal pages: Terms, Cancellation policy and Privacy policy | Reviewed with your own lawyer for your salon and your country, then published — a new site has a draft of each to start from | Website → Legal pages |
| Website theme chosen | Linen, Onyx or Bloom, in Light and Dark | Appearance |
| Taking bookings online (optional) | “Take bookings online” turned on, once e-mail is set up | Front desk → Online booking |
| Software license activated | Your installation activated with the license key of your purchase | System → Software license |
A step is ticked as soon as its data exists. Optional steps never block anything.
The page also has a Good to know panel — whether you take bookings online yet; messages go out only once the site’s e-mail is set up, and nobody is told when a message arrives through the website’s contact page; deposits are taken only with online booking; clients can continue with Google once it is set up — and it shows the scheduled tasks (cron lines) again, for when you need them after the installation.
Your first online booking, step by step #
From a finished installation to a first booking on your website, in this order (each page is linked from Get started):
- Salon → Location: the country, the time zone, the address and the phone.
- Salon → Business hours: the days and times you are open.
- Salon → Staff: one stylist with their working hours, Clients can book … online ticked (it is, for a new one).
- Salon → Services: one service with its duration and price, Bookable online ticked (it is, for a new one), and the stylist who does it.
- Website → Legal pages: publish your Terms, Cancellation policy and Privacy policy (clients agree to the first two when they book).
- System → E-mail (SMTP): your site’s e-mail, checked with Validate saved configuration — clients confirm their booking with a code sent by e-mail.
- Front desk → Online booking: choose Take bookings online. The button stays unavailable, with the note “Set up e-mail first: clients get their booking codes by e-mail.”, until step 6 is done.
- Open your website, choose Book now, and book as a client would: the service, the time, your name and e-mail address, the code from the e-mail. The appointment shows in Front desk → Calendar, and the client gets a confirmation e-mail with a link to change or cancel it.
Deposits are optional: to take one, set up a payment gateway (System → Stripe, PayPal or Razorpay) and give the service a deposit rule (see Deposits and paying at the salon).
Website settings (owner only) #
System → Website settings holds the installation-wide settings, each with its value in words (On or Off, a choice’s name); a setting that was never changed shows its default, marked “(default)”. The owner changes them; before the first change the owner confirms the password (see The owner’s password confirmation below).
| Setting | Default | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Site name | from the installer | Shown in the site’s pages, the e-mails and the administration area. |
| Currency | from the installer (USD preselected) | Any ISO 4217 code. |
| Time zone (shown as Location) | from the installer | “Managed on the Location page.” — not changed here. The salon’s time zone is set on Salon → Location (Open links there); this row only keeps the installer’s starting value. |
| Show “Powered by OsDot™” in footer | on | The public footer’s attribution. The administration area’s footer always shows it. |
| Language and formats | en-US | An English locale with its region, such as en-GB or en-AU. It sets 12- or 24-hour times on the administration pages. |
| E-mail the owner a summary of the day each morning (from 7:00, the salon’s time) | off | See The owner’s daily summary. |
| Booking widget: the sites allowed to show it | none | One https:// address per line; see Booking online. |
| Booking: … | see below | The booking rules. Some of them can be handed to a manager (see Business settings). |
| One-time codes: … | see below | The rules for the codes clients receive when they book, order or sign in online. |
The salon’s country (it lets staff type phone numbers of that country without the country code) is set on Salon → Location too.
The booking rules #
| Setting | Default | Who may change it |
|---|---|---|
| Booking: minimum notice for online bookings (minutes) | 120 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: how many days ahead clients can book online | 60 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: default slot spacing (minutes) | 15 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: who is chosen for “any available” | Balanced (fewest booked minutes that day) | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: clean-up time may run past closing time | on | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: free cancellation and online rescheduling until this many hours before the start | 24 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: online reschedules allowed per appointment | 2 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: services per appointment | 5 | owner, or settings.business |
| Booking: hold minutes while the client pays a deposit | 10 | owner only |
| Booking: paying on site may replace a required deposit | off | owner only |
| Booking: active holds per verified client | 1 | owner only |
| Booking: active holds per network address | 3 | owner only |
| Booking: future online appointments per client | 5 | owner only |
The one-time code rules #
| Setting | Default |
|---|---|
| One-time codes: channel | |
| One-time codes: minutes a code stays valid | 10 |
| One-time codes: codes per contact per minute / per hour / per day | 1 / 5 / 10 |
| One-time codes: code requests per network address per hour | 10 |
| One-time codes: wrong entries before a code is void | 5 |
| One-time codes: minutes a verified code lets the client finish | 30 |
Business settings #
Salon → Business settings lists only the booking rules the owner has handed over, and only to accounts allowed to change them (the permission Change business settings delegated by the owner, settings.business). The owner holds it; a manager holds it only if the owner grants it under People → Roles and permissions. The salon’s name, the currency, the deposit rules, the abuse limits and provider keys stay with the owner.
Open a rule, change its value and save. Every change is checked against the rule’s allowed range and written to the audit log.
Below the rules, Where each detail is changed shows each of the salon’s details with its current value, the one page where it is changed, and what reads it:
| Detail | Changed on |
|---|---|
| Business name | System → Website settings (owner only) |
| Time zone, Country, Address, Phone, Map point | Salon → Location |
| Opening hours | Salon → Business hours |
The owner’s password confirmation #
Owner-only settings change how the whole salon works. The first time you open one, the Confirm your password page asks for your password. Once confirmed, it stays confirmed for 10 minutes; after that you are asked again. A wrong password does not sign you out. Each confirmation is written to the audit log.
A few changes ask for the password again when you save them, not when you open the form: the Location page, the website’s brand and business profile, publishing a legal page, switching the website to another theme, an account’s state or roles, and a role’s permissions (People → Roles and permissions). They ask whoever may make the change — a manager the owner allowed confirms the manager’s own password. If the password is needed, what you typed is kept and nothing is saved yet: confirm your password and your changes are saved right after, as you typed them. Two things are never kept — a provider’s secret key and a chosen file; the page names them, and you type or choose them again. Cancel returns to the form; kept changes are dropped after an hour.
Licences #
System → Licences (owner) states the licence of this software and its attribution: the administration area’s footer shows “Powered by OsDot™” in every edition, the Reseller / White-Label edition included, and it cannot be switched off; the website’s footer shows the same link by default, and the owner can switch it off under System → Website settings (“Show “Powered by OsDot™” in footer”). It also lists the website’s fonts, with a link to each font’s licence text, and the social marks, and says where every other third-party component is listed (THIRD-PARTY-LICENSES.html in the package).
About this software #
System → About this software shows the product name, the version and the package you installed. Quote them when you contact support.
