Visits rarely go exactly as planned. This article helps you build the right schedule for your study, then pick the right action when a participant needs to move, cancel or come back.
🔑 Prerequisite: in your role, Recruitment › Access, and in the Calendar section: Access to see the schedules, Add to create them, Edit to book, reschedule and delete visits, and Update Visits › Update to confirm, cancel and update them.
Which one do you need?
Your study | Choose | What happens |
A single visit (a screening, an information session) | 1 planned visit | Enter 1 as the number of planned visits: there is no type to choose. The participant picks any free slot. |
Several visits, and each participant picks the date and time of every visit | Open | For each visit, the participant chooses among the slots you created. You decide how much choice they get: spread the slots over several days, or put all Visit 1 slots on one day and all Visit 2 slots on another and let them pick their time. |
Several visits that must stay in a fixed sequence | Sequential | The participant only picks a slot for Visit 1. The next visits follow automatically from the sequence: the 1st slot of Visit 1 comes with the 1st slot of Visit 2, the 2nd with the 2nd, and so on. |
Set up the schedule
🛠️ Step by step guide
Open the recruitment study and go to Schedules.
Select Create new schedule.
Enter the Appointment Schedule Title, the Number of planned visits and the Expected maximum slots per visit.
If you planned more than one visit, choose Sequential or Open under Type of schedule. With one visit, this choice does not appear.
Select Start creating.
Then build each visit:
Visit title, and Mark as anchor visit or Mark as qualifying visit if needed.
Appointment duration and Scheduling interval.
Slot capacity: how many participants per slot.
General availability: the date and the time range in which slots are created.
Coordinator: required.
Optional: Scheduling window, Location (prefilled), Instruction and Event color.
The counter at the top (for example 4/10 Slots) compares what you created with the Expected maximum slots per visit.
💡 Tip: in a Sequential schedule, Datacapt pairs the slots in order: the 1st slot of Visit 1 goes with the 1st slot of Visit 2, the 2nd with the 2nd, and so on. Every visit must have the same number of slots: otherwise Datacapt does not save the schedule (Visit creation error). Create the slots in chronological order. The Slot capacity of Visit 2 onward follows Visit 1 and cannot be changed there. Visit 2 also starts with the Appointment duration and Scheduling interval of Visit 1, and its date picker greys out the days before Visit 1.
When you save the last visit, choose who can book in Booking mode. A new schedule starts in Manual only, and you can change it later from the schedule's ⋮ menu.
Booking mode | Who books | Choose it when |
Manual only | Your team only | You call participants and book for them |
Link only | Participants who receive the link, and your team | You want participants to pick their slot, but only the ones you send the link to |
Public | Participants of the study without a link, and your team | You want the widest reach with the least work for your team |
Participants can only book. Rescheduling, cancelling and confirming visits is always done by your team.
⚠️ Warning: once a participant is booked, the schedule can no longer be edited (Edit is greyed out in its menu). Check visits, slots and capacity before the first booking.
Book a participant
🛠️ Step by step guide
In Schedules, select the visit, then the slot.
In Booking details, click the search icon in Invite participant.
Select the participant. They appear in the slot with the status Scheduled.
In a Sequential schedule, you invite on Visit 1 only: Datacapt creates the next visits at the same time. In an Open schedule, you book each visit separately.
Change a booked visit
Go to Schedules › Booked visits list and open the ⋮ menu on the visit. The options depend on the visit's status.
Visit status | Options in the ⋮ menu |
Scheduled, first visit of the schedule | Confirm visit, Reschedule, Cancel, Delete |
Scheduled, Visit 2 onward | Confirm visit, Reschedule, Cancel (no Delete) |
Completed, Not done or Cancelled | Update visit, Delete |
Reschedule a visit
🛠️ Step by step guide
On the visit, select ⋮ › Reschedule.
Choose the new date and time.
Turn Free slot on to leave the old time open for another participant, or leave it off to remove it.
Select Reschedule.
Rescheduling always creates a new place at the new date and time. The visit keeps its status and its payment, and only the visit you reschedule moves.
Confirm or cancel a visit
Both open the same 3-step window: the visit status, the application status, then the payment.
With Cancel, Cancelled is preselected and you choose the cause: Cancelled by the participant or Cancelled by the Center.
Step 2 sets the application status. Show more statuses lists the others.
⚠️ Warning: choosing Completed, Disqualified or Excluded as application status cancels all the participant's other upcoming visits in the study, on every schedule. Only Excluded shows a warning first.
Correct a visit already confirmed
Once a visit is Completed, Not done or Cancelled, its ⋮ menu offers Update visit.
Update visit opens the same window. Step 1 offers the other statuses, including Scheduled to put the visit back on the calendar.
What changes with the booking type
You do | Open | Sequential |
Book | Each visit separately | Visit 1 only; the next visits are created automatically |
Reschedule | That visit moves | That visit moves. The other visits keep their dates, even if the order no longer makes sense. |
Cancel | That visit | Visit 1: the whole series is cancelled. Visit 2 onward: only that visit. |
Delete | From Visit 1 only: removes all of that participant's visits in the schedule, while they are all Scheduled | Same as Open |
Book again on the same schedule | After Delete: yes. After Cancel: no. | After Delete: yes. After Cancel: no. |
After a Cancel, the participant no longer appears in Invite participant for that schedule.
What changes with the study status
Study status | What you can do with visits |
Draft | Build and test freely: create schedules, book, reschedule, cancel, confirm. |
Recruiting | The same actions as in Draft. |
Ended | Your team can still book, and the visit menus offer the same actions. Ending the study does not lock the visits. |
When you move a study from Draft to Recruiting, Datacapt starts you on a clean study: participant pools, participant records, visits and payments from Draft are removed, and schedules are kept.
💡 Tip: use Draft to rehearse with test participants, then add your real participants once the study is Recruiting. Your schedules are still there, with all their slots free again.
What to do when…
A participant asks to move one visit
Reschedule that visit, whatever the booking type. In a Sequential schedule, check the next visits still come after it.
The whole series of a participant has to move (Sequential)
Reschedule each visit, one by one. If none of the visits was rescheduled before and all are still Scheduled, you can also Delete from Visit 1 and book the participant again on the new Visit 1 slot: the series is recreated on the matching slots.
A participant will not come
Before the visit: Cancel, with the cause. After the visit date: Confirm visit › Not done. In a Sequential schedule, cancelling Visit 1 cancels the whole series.
A cancelled participant comes back, on another Visit 1
🛠️ Step by step guide
On each cancelled visit of the participant in that schedule, select ⋮ › Update visit › Scheduled, keep the application status, then Finish.
On Visit 1, select ⋮ › Delete › Yes, delete all visits.
Open the new Visit 1 slot and use Invite participant.
Delete stays unavailable until every visit of the series is back to Scheduled. The cancellation is no longer kept in the visit history.
A visit was confirmed with the wrong status
⋮ › Update visit, then choose the right status.
A participant has finished, or is excluded
Confirm visit on their last visit with the application status Completed or Excluded. Their remaining upcoming visits are cancelled automatically.
Keep sequential series in order
A reschedule adds a one-place slot to that visit's calendar. If the participant's series is deleted afterward, that slot stays, and the next participant booked on Visit 1 can be given it for Visit 2: the wrong date, with no error.
⚠️ Warning: on a series where a visit was rescheduled, prefer Reschedule to Delete and book again.
Before booking new participants, look at each visit's calendar: an empty one-place slot at an unusual time is usually left over from a reschedule.
After each booking, check the dates of Visit 2, Visit 3… in the Booked visits list.
Cheat sheet
Open
You want to | Use |
Move a visit | Reschedule |
Record a cancellation | Cancel (only that visit) |
Record a no-show | Confirm visit › Not done |
Book the participant again on the same schedule | Delete from Visit 1 (all visits still Scheduled), then book |
Fix a wrong confirmation | Update visit |
Sequential
You want to | Use |
Move one visit | Reschedule (the others stay where they are) |
Move the whole series | Reschedule each visit, or Delete from Visit 1 and book again |
Stop the whole series | Cancel on Visit 1 |
Skip one later visit | Cancel on that visit only |
Bring back a cancelled participant | Update visit › Scheduled on each visit, Delete from Visit 1, book again |
Fix a wrong confirmation | Update visit |