Workflows & Reminders

Automate what happens around bookings — confirmation emails, day-before SMS reminders, follow-up nudges, webhook deliveries to your CRM.

Quick Start

1. Open an event type and click the Workflows tab.
2. Click + New workflow.
3. Pick a trigger (e.g. Booking created).
4. Add an action (e.g. Send email to the attendee).
5. Save.
6. Publish changes in the toolbar.

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Trigger Events

A workflow runs in response to one of these booking events:

Trigger	Fires when
Booking created	A new booking is confirmed.
Booking rescheduled	The booker or host moves it to a different time.
Booking cancelled	Either side cancels (or it's marked no-show).
Reminder	A configurable lead time before the meeting. Defaults are 24h and 1h before; both can be customised per workflow.
Booking completed	The meeting end-time has passed. Useful for "thanks" follow-ups.
Booking no-show	A host marks the booking as no-show after the meeting.

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Actions

Action	What it does
Send email	Templated email to attendee, host, or a fixed address. Supports merge tags.
Send SMS	Templated SMS via Twilio. Requires a phone number on the booking.
Webhook	POSTs the full booking JSON to a URL of your choice. Retries on 5xx with backoff.
Add tag	Adds a tag to the booking and (if database-backed) the row.
Create task	Spawns a follow-up task assigned to the host. (Pro+)
Create database row	Writes to a database other than the booking's backing one (e.g. log to an audit DB). (Pro+)

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Email Template Merge Tags

Inside an email body, use these placeholders:

Tag	Resolves to
{{attendee.name}}	Booker's name
{{attendee.email}}	Booker's email
{{attendee.timezone}}	Booker's IANA timezone
{{host.name}}	Host's display name
{{event.title}}	Event-type title
{{slot.start}}	Meeting start (in attendee's timezone, friendly format)
{{slot.end}}	Meeting end
{{slot.duration}}	"30 minutes" / "1 hour"
{{cancel.url}}	Tokenised cancel link
{{reschedule.url}}	Tokenised reschedule link
{{answers.fieldId}}	Custom-question answer by field id (e.g. {{answers.q-budget}})

Always include cancel and reschedule URLs

The default templates do this automatically. If you build your own, include them — bookers expect to be able to change without emailing you.

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Reminders

The most common workflow. Out of the box, every event type has two default reminders:

• 24 hours before the meeting → email to attendee.
• 1 hour before → email to attendee.

Both are workflows you can edit, disable, or replace. To switch one to SMS:

1. Workflows tab → click the 24h reminder.
2. Change the action from Send email to Send SMS.
3. Save.

The lead time is configurable to any value (15 minutes minimum).

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SMS via Twilio

SMS actions need a Twilio account configured at the team level (Settings → Integrations → Twilio). Add the Account SID, Auth Token, and a from-number. Once configured, every event type can send SMS without re-entering credentials.

Per-message cost is charged by Twilio. Optivation doesn't mark up SMS — see Twilio pricing for your country.

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Webhook Action

POSTs a JSON payload to your URL on every matching event. Payload shape:

{
  "event": "booking.created",
  "booking": {
    "id": 123,
    "status": "confirmed",
    "startTime": "2026-05-08T14:30:00Z",
    "endTime": "2026-05-08T15:00:00Z",
    "attendee": { "name": "...", "email": "...", "timezone": "..." },
    "host": { "id": 7, "name": "..." },
    "eventType": { "id": 1, "title": "...", "slug": "..." },
    "answers": { "q-budget": "$10k", "q-team-size": "12" }
  },
  "deliveredAt": "2026-05-05T11:42:00Z"
}

Retries on 5xx and network errors with exponential backoff (1s → 2s → 4s → … up to ~5 minutes), maximum 8 attempts. Persistent failures are surfaced in the workflow's run log.

To verify a webhook came from Optivation, check the X-Optivation-Signature header — HMAC-SHA256 of the raw body using your webhook signing secret.

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Workflow Run Log

Every workflow execution is logged with:

• Trigger event + timestamp
• Action attempted + outcome (success, retrying, failed)
• For webhooks: response status code + first 4KB of response body
• For emails / SMS: provider message id

Inspect from the Workflows tab → click a workflow → Run log sub-tab.

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Plan Limits

Plan	Workflows per event type	Total monthly runs
Free / Solo	0 (default reminders only)	n/a
Pro	10	5,000
Studio	unlimited	25,000

When you hit the cap, the + New workflow button disables and a banner shows the upgrade link.

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Related

• Custom Questions — Available as {{answers.fieldId}} merge tags
• Calendar Integrations — The calendar invite is its own automated message, separate from workflows
• Payments — Refund-on-cancel is a built-in workflow, not user-configurable