# Reservations > Let visitors book a table, an appointment or a visit in the chat — only really-free times, held while they fill in their details. Source: https://www.hey.support/docs/capabilities/reservations --- Reservations is the capability for businesses that book **a place and a time**: a restaurant table, a haircut with a stylist, a consultation, a class, a viewing, a stay. The agent takes the reservation in plain language on your website and on Telegram, offers only times that are genuinely open, holds the chosen time while the guest fills in their details, and lets them change or cancel later by chat or from a link in their email. Your team runs the day from the [Reservations calendar](/docs/conversations/reservations). It is a different tool from [Book a meeting](/docs/capabilities/booking), which puts a visitor on someone's Google Calendar for a call. Both can be on at once — a clinic can take appointments *and* book sales calls — and the agent tells the two apart. Reservations is available on **Growth and above**. On Free and Starter the panel shows an upgrade prompt. See [Plans](/docs/billing/plans). Open **Capabilities**, then **Reservations**. ## Three ways to take them **Book in the chat** — the agent checks what is open, offers times, and books. The guest sees a card with a day strip and the open times; picking one holds it for a few minutes while they add their name and email. Confirmed on the spot, or logged as a request if the service needs your approval. **Send them to your booking page** — you already use a reservations system. Add its https URL and the agent shares it when someone asks to book, with nothing held or written here. **Requests only** — for hotels, travel and anything where availability is not a grid of times. The agent collects what you need (dates, guests, the questions you set) and your team answers each request from the calendar. Nothing is confirmed automatically. ## Services A service is one thing a guest can book: *Dinner*, *Haircut*, *Consultation*, *Stay request*. Each has a kind — an **appointment** with a staff member, a **table** in an area, or a **request** — plus a duration, buffers before and after, how far ahead it can be booked, how much notice it needs, and a party size range. A party over the maximum is either refused or taken as a request for you to approve, your choice. A service can require **approval**: reservations land as requests and hold their time until someone on the team says yes. Add up to eight **questions** the guest answers when booking (allergies, occasion, preferred stylist, arrival dates). Prices are shown to the guest and never charged. ## Staff and areas Reservations are made **on** something. A **staff member** takes one reservation at a time; an **area** — the dining room, the terrace, a studio — takes a number of guests at once, its capacity in covers. A service can be limited to particular staff or areas, or take any of the matching kind, in which case the agent spreads the load. Staff and areas can have their own hours over the venue's, and their own days off. ## Opening hours Set the days and times you take reservations, with several windows a day if you split lunch and dinner, and a window that runs past midnight if you are open late. Hours are in the venue's own timezone, whatever the guest's. Hours are the one thing we never guess. A new agent set up from a template comes with services and a first area or staff member, but stays switched off until you confirm when you are open. Saving hours switches it on. **Holidays and special hours** close a day or give it different windows — for the whole venue or one staff member — without touching the weekly schedule. Everything already booked stays; the agent just offers nothing new there. ## How the agent books A guest says "table for four on Friday around eight" and the agent answers with the verdict on that time first — open, taken, or outside your hours — and the nearest alternatives, then the card opens on that day with the time already picked. If every detail was given in prose, or on a channel with no card, the agent restates it and books directly. It never names a time it has not checked. Every reservation is checked twice: once when the guest picks, once when the row is written, under a lock per venue. Two guests cannot take the last table, even at the same instant. ## Changing and cancelling A guest can change or cancel in the chat. Proof is the conversation the reservation was made in, or — in a new conversation — a six-digit code the agent emails them and they type back. An email address alone is never enough; the agent will not act on a reservation because someone knows the address on it. The same is possible from the **manage link** in every email: no login, one page, move it or cancel it, with the confirm button pre-selected when they arrive from a reminder. ## What the guest receives Each moment has an email, in English, with a calendar file where one applies: confirmation, request received, approved, declined, reminder (with one-tap *I'm coming* and *cancel*), cancelled, rescheduled. Replies go to the address you set in the panel, or your workspace's reply address. The agent itself answers in the guest's language, like everything else it says. ## Notifications A new reservation or request emails teammates who have reservation alerts on, posts to any Slack channel you have routed, and fires the `reservation.*` [webhooks](/docs/webhooks/events/reservation). Requests waiting on the team show in the notification bell and on Today.