⭐ Free for all of November (Beta). Every MPC customer can use Diary Optimiser free until 30 November. From December, it’s part of the Explorer plan.
The Diary Optimiser answers three questions every week: how full is the diary, what is the free time worth, and which patients could fill it. It puts a value on the unbooked time in every provider's diary, then gives your team ranked call lists of cancellations to rebook, recalls due and missed appointments, highest value first.
Watch the walkthrough below:
🗓️ Live webinar: Get the most from Diary Optimiser. Tuesday 10 November, 1.15pm. A live walkthrough and Q&A. Register here.
Finding the Diary Optimiser
There are two ways in:
From the left hand menu, open Appointment Diary and click Diary Optimiser (Beta) underneath it.
From the Appointment Diary report. When you create the report, the Diary Insights panel opens with a MAC Pro insight. It tells you how much unbooked time you have this week, what it's worth, and how many patients could fill it. Click Optimise your diary to open the Diary Optimiser for the same practices.
The line under the page title shows how up to date the figures are, for example "Data as of 21 Oct, 19:43 (appointments complete to 21 Oct)". The Diary Optimiser uses your overnight data refresh, so a booking made this morning shows up tomorrow.
Choosing Practices
Use the practice selector at the top of the page to choose which practices you're looking at, then click Apply. Everything on the page (MAC's summary, the weeks, the diary and the call lists) updates to match.
Underneath, MAC sums up the selected week in one line: how booked the diary is, how many hours are unbooked and what they're worth, and how much revenue is available across how many patients.
The Weeks
The row of weeks shows the six weeks before this one, this week, and the six weeks after. Each week shows:
The percentage of diary time that's booked, shown as a ring. Green is 85% or above, amber is 72% to 84%, and red is below 72%.
The number of unbooked hours.
Click any week to see it in the rest of the page. A week ahead with a red ring is the one to work on while there's still time to fill it.
A padlock on a past week means its figures are final. They were saved when the week closed and won't change.
The Diary
The diary card shows the selected week across your practices.
The three figures at the top are for the week as a whole:
Figure | What it shows |
Booked | The share of this week's diary time that is booked. Blocked time isn't counted. |
Unbooked | Diary time that's still free this week. Blocked time isn't counted. |
Unbooked value | An estimate of what the free time is worth, based on each clinician's own revenue per hour. On a past week it turns red, because that time can no longer be booked. |
Below them, each practice has a row with a bar for each day: green is booked time, red is whitespace, and a pale bar means the practice was closed that day. On the right are the practice's Booked percentage and Unbooked value for the week. Click a column heading to sort, and click Show all to see every practice.
Drilling Down to a Provider
Click a practice to see a row for each of its providers. Click a provider to open their week as a diary, hour by hour:
Green blocks are booked appointments.
Pink blocks are gaps, each with the amount it's worth if filled.
Grey time is not available (blocked, or not working).
The provider's revenue per hour, which the gaps are valued at, is shown in the bottom right.
Use the Back to button to go up a level, or pick providers from the All providers selector to look at just those providers.
💡 Top Tip: Sort practices by Unbooked value to see where the most money is sitting in the diary, then drill into that practice to find the provider with the biggest gaps.
Available and Secured Revenue
The revenue panel shows what you could win back this week, and what you already have.
Figure | What it shows |
Available revenue | The estimated value of the patients on this week's call lists who could be booked into the free time in the diary. |
Estimated secured revenue | The estimated value of the patients who have been booked in this week, even if their appointment is in a later week. |
Flagged this week | Available and secured added together, with a bar showing how much has been secured so far. |
Click Available revenue or Estimated secured revenue to switch the call lists between the patients still to call and the patients already booked back in. Past weeks show secured revenue only, so you can see what last week's calls actually won back.
The Call Lists
There are three call lists. Each shows how many patients are to call, the percentage already secured, and the revenue still available.
Cancellations to rebook: patients who cancelled and haven't rebooked. Shows the cancelled appointment, when it was cancelled, and the reason if your practice system records one.
Recalls due: patients whose recall is due. Shows the recall type and due date. If a patient is due both a dentist and a hygienist recall, each row says so, so one call can cover both.
FTA follow-up: patients who failed to attend and haven't rebooked. Shows the missed appointment and how many times they've failed to attend in the last 24 months.
The lists cover the selected week and the six weeks before it, so a patient who cancelled a month ago stays in view rather than disappearing.
Click a list to open it. You'll see the top patients, ranked in priority order:
Patients are ranked first by whether their provider has free time this week, then by value, then by how recent the cancellation, recall or missed appointment is. Each row shows the patient, the appointment, their provider, their mobile number and email, and an estimated Value. Dentally users can click the patient's name to open their record.
📝 Please Note: How is the value worked out? Hover over (or tap) any value to see how it was estimated. Usually it's the practice's usual fees for the treatments booked, or the typical value of that type of appointment. Recalls use the practice's usual exam or hygiene fee. NHS appointments are valued at the practice's UDA rate, and exams and hygiene visits covered by a capitation plan are valued at £0.
Seeing the Whole List
Click View all patients at the bottom of a list to open every patient on it.
Search by patient or provider.
Filter by follow-up status, for example to see only the patients nobody has called yet. The count at the top shows how many have been contacted.
Click a column heading to sort, or drag a column to move it.
Click Export to download the list as a CSV file.
Recording Follow-up
Each patient has a Follow-up status, which starts as To call. Once you've tried to reach them, set the status to what happened:
No Contact: you tried but couldn't reach them
Left Voicemail, Email Sent, SMS Sent or Letter Sent
Appointment Booked
Click the note icon to open the patient's contact history and add a note (up to 140 characters). The last person to update a patient is shown as its Owner.
Everyone at the practice sees the same statuses and notes, so two people never call the same patient.
💡 Top Tip: You don't need to mark a patient as secured. When they're booked back in, they move from available to secured automatically after the next overnight refresh.
Common Questions
Why doesn't a booking I made today show yet?
The Diary Optimiser uses your overnight data refresh. The line under the page title shows when the figures were last updated.
Why don't the counts match my Action Today tiles?
The call lists look back over the selected week and the six weeks before it. Action Today tiles look back 30 days, so the numbers won't always match.
Is secured revenue money that has been paid?
No. It's the estimated value of the appointments patients have booked. Revenue is counted in your other reports once the treatment has been done.
Why are some patients shown without a value?
If there isn't enough information to estimate a value reliably, the patient stays on the list but isn't given a value, rather than showing a figure we can't stand behind.
What does the padlock on a week mean?
The week has closed and its figures are final, so they won't change if you come back to it later.
Does it work on my phone?
Yes. Tap a figure to see its explanation.