Share your calendar so appointments can be booked

Open calendar.google.com on a computer, or your Outlook calendar if that is your tool.

The tip that changes everything. Create a separate calendar for your customer appointments, instead of sharing the one your whole life lives in. It takes 2 minutes and you will never again have to wonder what the other person can see.

In Google Calendar, in the left-hand column, look for the Other calendars line and click the plus sign, then Create new calendar. Give it a clear name, along the lines of Customer appointments. Check the time zone it suggests, which should say London for a business in the UK.

• If you already have a work calendar that is properly separate, you can use it as it is.
• If everything is mixed together, a dedicated calendar really is the right idea.

On a computer, and only on a computer. Sharing with a specific person does not exist in the mobile app. If all you have is a phone, open calendar.google.com in your browser and ask for the desktop version. The buttons will be small, but everything is there.

In the left-hand column, hover over the name of the calendar you want to share. 3 dots appear to the right of its name. Click them, then Settings and sharing.

You land on the settings page for that calendar. Scroll down to the Share with specific people or groups section.

On Outlook, the logic is identical. Right-click the name of your calendar, then choose Sharing and permissions. The vocabulary differs, the approach is the same.

Be careful not to confuse it with the other section. Just above it there is a sharing option open to everyone, or to your whole organisation. That is not the one you want. What you are looking for is sharing by name, the one where you type in an email address.

Click Add people and groups.

• Enter our address contact@metabacklinks.com.
• In the permissions list, choose Make changes to events.
• Confirm with Send.

Why that level exactly. Google offers 4 permissions, from the most discreet to the broadest. See only free/busy, see all event details, make changes to events, and finally make changes and manage sharing.

The 3rd one is the one you want. It allows an appointment to be booked and moved, without allowing your calendar to be shared with anyone else. That is the right balance.

If Google rejects the address as invalid, it is almost always a space stuck to the front or the back of it. Type it out by hand rather than pasting it.

Our address now appears in the list, with the permission you chose beside it. That is the only check to make.

The sharing takes effect straight away. There is nothing to install, nothing to send us, and no file to download.

A word on wording. Google and Microsoft rename these screens regularly. If you read Make changes (see private events as free/busy) instead of Make changes to events, it is the same permission. Trust the meaning rather than the exact word.

Your agent fills your calendar while you work. That is exactly the idea.

What it does in practice. It answers a prospect at 10 in the evening on a Sunday, offers them your next 3 free slots, books the appointment and sends the confirmation. You find out the next morning, in your calendar.

What it never does. It does not touch your existing appointments, it does not read your emails and it sees nothing of the calendars you have not shared.

Remember to block out the times you are not available. Your lunches, your travel, your closing days. Anything sitting in the shared calendar is never offered to a customer.

To stop sharing one day, you come back to this same page and click the cross to the right of our address. It is immediate, with no notice period and with no need to tell us.