Free mental health scheduling software that protects the same hour every week

Therapy runs on a standing appointment: the same fifty minutes, the same day, week after week. Picktime shows only the hours you really work, lets a client book and move that session without ringing anybody, and puts a cancelled hour back on the booking page while there is still time to fill it. There is no receptionist in the middle of any of it.

  • Free forever plan
  • No receptionist needed
  • No card required
A therapist and a client talking in two armchairs set at an angle, a lamp and a box of tissues beside them

Blu PracticeBook online

First session60m · in the room$110.00

Therapy session50m · Wed 18:00$85.00

Online session50m · link on the inviteBook

Next free5:00 PM6:00 PM7:00 PM

Booked online

11:04 PM

Without having to ring and explain

Cancelled at 21:40

Back on sale

The hour reappears on the page

Confirmation

Sent

Email, the moment the hour is taken

How it works for you

Built for how a private practice actually holds a weekly hour

Every one of these belongs to a practice with no front desk, where the therapist is the only person who could answer the phone and is in session when it rings.

The same hour every week, booked without a phone call

On the free plan a client takes their six o’clock on a Wednesday from your page themselves, week by week, and it is never a call to you. On the paid plans it books as a series instead, so it is theirs until the work ends rather than something you both rebook every seven days.

A client’s six o’clock on a Wednesday held as a weekly series, the next three Wednesdays already booked in their name

A first appointment booked without having to ring and explain

The hardest phone call some people make is the first one. A booking page lets them pick an hour at their own pace, at eleven at night, without rehearsing what to say to a stranger.

A first session picked from the open hours on the Blu Practice booking page at 23:04, Saturday 11:00 taken without speaking to anybody

The hour somebody cancels the night before does not stay empty

A client cancelling from their own confirmation frees the slot immediately, and it reappears on the booking page. Somebody who wanted a session this week can take it without either of you making a phone call.

Thursday’s 17:00 cancelled from the client’s confirmation at 21:40 the night before, back on the booking page at once and taken by somebody else at 21:58

What a client tells you sits on their record

Your own questions on the booking form (what brings them, and how they would rather be contacted, which matters more here than almost anywhere) are on the paid plans. What a client tells you is kept against their name either way, and nothing you have not asked for is collected.

Alex’s answers to the practice’s own booking questions, what brings them and how they would rather be contacted, kept on their client record before the first session
Evenings and Saturdays

Only the hours you actually work are ever offered

Most of a therapy practice happens outside office hours, and most of the harm a booking page does is offering an hour you were never going to work. Picktime shows only the times you have opened (two evenings, a Saturday morning, nothing in August), and each therapist in a group practice keeps their own. Somebody who works with adolescents is not offered for a couples session, somebody supervising on a Friday is not bookable on a Friday, and a week you have blocked out is simply not there rather than being there and refused.

Maya’s week as her booking page offers it: Tuesday and Thursday evenings and Saturday morning open, Friday kept for supervision, and August blocked out
Online and in the room

An online session and a session in the room are booked the same way

Half a caseload is remote and half is not, and the difference should be one line on the appointment rather than two systems. Connect Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams or GoToMeeting on the paid plans and a session booked as remote carries its own joining link on the confirmation, so nobody is sent a separate email ten minutes before. On the same plans a client in another time zone sees the hour in theirs, because the booking page converts it rather than leaving them to. The room-based sessions sit in the same diary.

A Wednesday 18:00 session booked as remote between two in-room sessions in the same diary, its joining link on the confirmation, and shown to a client in Denver at 17:00 their time
Thursday, 9:40pm

A text at twenty to ten cancels tomorrow, and tomorrow is already lost

Twenty to ten on a Thursday night. A text arrives cancelling the five o’clock tomorrow. You will not see it until the morning, and by the morning there is no way to offer that hour to anybody, because the only route into your diary is you.

A practice with no receptionist has no second chance at anything. The enquiry that came in at four went to voicemail because you were in session, and it will go somewhere else before you finish the notes on Friday.

Picktime gives your diary a front door that is open when you are not. The cancellation frees the hour the moment it is made, the hour goes back onto the booking page, and the person who rang at four books themselves at half past eleven without ever needing to reach you.

Getting started

Your practice bookable by the end of the evening

A first session and an ongoing session listed with their length and fee, and the weeks away blocked out
01

Add your session types and your real hours

A first session, an ongoing session, a couples session if you offer one, with the length and the fee on each. Open only the evenings and weekend mornings you actually work, and block the weeks you are away.

A 24-hour window typed in for how late a client may move or cancel their own session from the confirmation
02

Set the cancellation window, and what a client may move

Set how late a client may move or cancel their own appointment, so the window is a rule rather than a conversation you have on the phone. Asking your own questions before a first session, including how they would rather be contacted, is on the paid plans.

The booking link added to the practice website, a directory profile and an email signature, and a first session booked from the website at 23:30
03

Put the link where people already find you

The booking page is a link, so it goes on your own site behind a Book Now button, in your directory profile, in your email signature and in the reply you send to a first enquiry.

AI receptionist

The four o’clock enquiry does not go to voicemail

A single-handed practice cannot answer the phone, because the person who would answer it is in the room with somebody. Picktime’s AI receptionist answers around the clock, guides the caller through what they are looking for, captures their details and turns the call into a confirmed first appointment, against the same availability your booking page uses, so it can never offer an hour you are already working. It transfers the call to you when somebody needs a person rather than a system, and every call is transcribed into your dashboard, so an enquiry taken at four is something you can read at seven instead of a voicemail light.

A first-time caller at 16:10 booked into a first session by the AI receptionist while the therapist was in session, with the call transcribed to the dashboard
What it costs

Start free. Pay when there are more therapists, not more clients.

The free plan is a plan, not a trial. There is no date at which it stops, no card to add, and nothing that quietly turns off in a fortnight.

Free, and it stays free

What a single-handed practice gets without paying

  • Your own booking page, showing only the hours you work
  • Clients book, move and cancel their own sessions
  • Email notifications on every booking and cancellation
  • Client records, imported and exported when you want them

Start free

Works with what you use

It fits the calendar you watch and the video call you already use

Nothing gets typed in twice

A session lands in the calendar you already have open, and the paid plans sync it both ways, so when it moves there it moves here. A remote session generates its joining link on the booking, so the client has it on their confirmation rather than in a message you have to remember to send.

It runs from a phone

Picktime runs in a browser on a phone as well as a laptop, and there are iOS and Android apps, so you can see tomorrow between sessions without opening a laptop in front of somebody.

Questions

Mental health scheduling: common questions

What is the best scheduling software for therapists?

It depends on whether you want a diary or a whole practice platform with notes and claims in it. Picktime is the diary: your own booking page, only the hours you really work, and a cancellation that puts the hour back on sale, with a standing weekly appointment and a booking form you write yourself on the paid plans. A practice that wants clinical records in the same tool will want a behavioural health platform. If you are the practitioner and the front desk at once, therapist scheduling for a practice with nobody else in it is written for exactly that.

Is there free scheduling software for a private therapy practice?

Picktime’s free plan includes your own booking page, clients booking and moving their own sessions, email notifications on every booking and cancellation, and client records you can export. No card, and no date at which it stops. It is a plan, not a trial.

Can clients book a first session without ringing me?

Yes, and for a lot of people that is the point. The booking page shows the hours you have opened, they pick one at whatever hour suits them, and the form asks what you need to know before you meet. Nobody has to make an introductory phone call to a stranger.

Can I hold the same hour every week for a client?

Yes. A standing appointment books as a series at one hour on one weekday, so it stays theirs rather than being rebooked every week, and it ends on the date you set. Recurring bookings are on the paid plans. Holding one hour a week for as long as the work takes is the page that goes through it properly, assessment and all.

What happens when a client cancels a session the night before?

The link in their confirmation cancels it, within the window you set, and the hour returns to your booking page straight away. Anybody looking for a session that week can take it without either of you making a phone call in the morning.

Can I run online sessions and in-person sessions in one diary?

Yes. Connect Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams or GoToMeeting on the paid plans and a session booked as remote carries its own joining link on the confirmation. In-person sessions sit in the same calendar, and on the same plans a client in another time zone sees the hour converted into theirs.

Can several therapists work under one account?

Yes. Each therapist keeps their own hours, their own days off and their own list of what they take, so somebody who works with adolescents is never offered for a couples session. Everything appears in one calendar, and more team members are on the paid plans.

What is the best EHR for mental health?

Picktime is not the answer to that one, because it is not an EHR and holds no clinical notes. The behavioural health platforms that put notes, billing and claims in one place are the category to look at, and the choice usually turns on what your insurer and your supervisor expect a note to look like rather than on the diary. Picktime is the diary in front of one of those: the booking page, the standing hour, and the cancelled session that goes back on sale.

What is the most used scheduling software?

Nobody publishes a figure worth quoting, and a page naming a winner is usually counting its own customers. For a therapy practice the more useful test is what the software has to survive: a client moving a session at ten at night, a standing hour that has to stay the same hour, and a cancellation you can still fill before the week goes. Judge on those three.

Which scheduling apps are HIPAA compliant?

Ask each vendor directly, ourselves included, because this rests on an agreement signed between you and them rather than on anything in a feature list. Ask what they will sign, and which parts of the service it covers. For Picktime, write to support@picktime.com and get the answer in writing before any client information goes into it.

Open your diary at the hours people actually ask

Free forever for a single-handed practice. No card, no trial clock, and clients can be booking their own first session tonight.