Top 5 Microsoft 365 Booking Systems: Find the Perfect Fit for Your Needs

Ever witnessed an office battle over the conference room, reminiscent of a kindergarten sandbox squabble? I have.

In my first job, I managed work schedules, meeting room reservations, and shuttle service allocation. So, I know firsthand how important it is to have an efficient booking system for resources to ensure everyone gets what they need when they need it.

In this post, we'll explore the tools within the Microsoft 365 ecosystem for designing a resource management system. We'll cover both well-known and less obvious approaches, along with recently released and hidden features of these Microsoft products:

• Resource Mailbox and Outlook
• Microsoft Bookings
• Shifts in Microsoft Teams
• PowerApps
• SharePoint and Custom Forms

Before diving in, take a moment to consider these key questions:

• What resources do you need to manage? This could be people, workspaces, hot desks stationary or portable equipment, vehicles, and more.
• How many of each resource do you have available?
• What are the reservation conditions? Should these include limitations on duration and working hours?
• Do you need buffer time between bookings to allow for setup or cleanup?
• Should users be able to edit their reservations?
• Do you need notifications sent to confirm bookings or remind users of upcoming reservations?
• How much time are you willing to dedicate to setting up the system?

Now that you've kick-started your mind towards the requirements for your perfect reservation system, let's move on.

Resource Mailbox and Outlook Booking system

Introduced in Microsoft Exchange Server 2010, Resource Mailboxes is the first dedicated tool for managing resources. Essentially, it is a specialized mailbox used to schedule and manage the availability of shared resources. The classic way to reserve a resource is to create an event in Outlook.

There are three types of Resource mailboxes:

• Equipment mailboxes—for tools and devices.
• Room mailboxes—for physical locations such as conference rooms, auditoriums, or training rooms. It can be reserved just once for a specific time slot.
• Workspace mailboxes—for physical locations where employees can work. Multiple users can reserve it simultaneously, up to a set capacity.

Resource Mailboxes offer a range of features to simplify and organize your resource management:

• Booking Approvals: Choose whether bookings should be manually approved by a resource manager or automatically accepted or declined based on conditions.
• Maximum duration: Set a maximum allowed length for booking requests.
• Working hours: Limit booking availability to specific hours.
• Recurring reservations: Enable users to book resources repeatedly (e.g., every Friday at 7 p.m.).
• Booking lead time: Specify the maximum number of days in advance users can book the room.

And how do I reserve a resource?

In Outlook, create a new event and either add the specific resource or choose a conference room to reserve it.

There is a great tool, Room Finder, for simplifying room and workspace searches based on criteria such as location, capacity, available equipment, accessibility, and custom tags:

 

Unfortunately, Room Finder doesn't work for equipment. To find and reserve equipment, you'll need to know its name or mailbox address. However, you can use the Scheduling Assistant to quickly find available time slots:

 

Bonus tip! Here are two cool things you might not have known about room reservation in Outlook:

• When creating a recurring event, you can see if a room is available for the entire series. If not, Outlook suggests rooms that are available for most of the events and tells you how many times each room is available.
• You can reserve multiple rooms at once. It comes in handy when your team is located in different time zones; you can book a conference room for all attendees at once, taking into account everyone's location.

Despite the advantages and impressive features of Outlook and Resource mailboxes, there are also drawbacks to consider:

• Technical complexity: Setting up and handling resource mailboxes needs technical skills. Some settings, such as creating a Workspace mailbox, can only be done using PowerShell cmdlets.
• Limited customization: Adding custom rules, enhancing search, or including buffer time between bookings is not possible.
• Confirmation confusion: Meeting attendees receive invitations before room availability is confirmed, which can cause confusion if the room is unavailable.
• Limited reporting: There is no built-in reporting tools for analyzing resource usage. You can get resource usage statistics only with PowerShell and the Microsoft Graph.

Microsoft’s core calendaring service is robust but has a few gaps—for example, it currently lacks the ability for attendees to say whether they’re going to attend a Teams meeting remotely or in-person. This makes planning office visits to see colleagues or organising the best room size for a hybrid meeting a bit of a challenge.

Though Microsoft announced the release of the hybrid meeting experience in late March 2024, it's unclear how it will function and whether it will consider the 'capacity counter' for workspace resources.

Wrapping up, Outlook and Resource Mailboxes are a pretty good option for booking conference rooms or workspaces. However, for more complex booking systems with specific scheduling needs and diverse resource requirements, this duo might not offer enough flexibility and customization options.

For a deeper dive, I recommend reading the Introduction to Desk Booking Using Microsoft Resource Mailboxes post to navigate potential roadblocks and outline the benefits of choosing resource mailboxes.

Microsoft Bookings for Reservation system

Ever booked a therapy session, scheduled a sales call, or visited a spa online?

If so, you've experienced online appointment scheduling apps in action. Microsoft Bookings is one such app, helping businesses manage schedules and clients book appointments with ease.

 

Launched in 2016, Microsoft Bookings is now gaining popularity. You can find many articles, overview videos, and guides about it. I recommend watching this video, which comprehensively describes all the main features of MS Bookings:

And I would like to highlight the following features in particular:

• Flexible scheduling options: Set up lead time, time increments, buffer time, working hours, and block out time for meetings or breaks. These settings are available for both the service category and each specialist.
• Automated notifications and reminders: Send booking confirmations, reminders, and follow-up messages to clients via email or SMS.
  • SMS notifications are new (June 2023).
  • Additional email address "Cc" for confirmation and reminder emails coming in 2024.
• Client appointment management: Clients can cancel or reschedule appointments directly through the booking page.
• Specialist selection: Allow clients to choose their preferred specialist or have them automatically assigned based on availability.
• Maximum attendees: Set the maximum number of attendees for each service, effectively controlling the service capacity.
• Mobile-friendly and customizable booking page: Create a responsive booking page displaying your business information, available services, and staff profiles. Share it via a direct link or embed it directly on your website:    
• Integration with Microsoft Teams: Users can schedule appointments directly within the Teams environment.
• Single or multiple staff appointments: Support both single-staff and multi-staff appointments. The multi-staff appointment feature, released in January 2023, empowers customers to schedule a service with multiple specialists at once.
• Custom domains: Add custom domains and define which domain to use for Bookings page.
• Restricted access: Allow reservation for users within your organization or for everyone. You can also set up email verification by requiring a one-time password for booking creation.
• Integrated reporting: Generate service usage reports and calculate service prices.

All these incredible features make Microsoft Bookings ideal for managing diverse specialist schedules.

Did you know that in Microsoft Bookings, you can book not only human resources but also physical objects such as desks, meeting rooms, and workspaces?

Not officially, but how can stop us? Just think of the service as a type of reservation, and the specialist as a tool.

I've found Microsoft Bookings being used in surprising ways beyond its original purpose. For example, it's used for booking hot desks and rooms. People use the same approach to reserve parking spaces and book transportation. Another interesting case is using MS Bookings for museum ticket reservations. This is achieved by setting a maximum number of attendees, mimicking the available tickets.

If there's no need for a highly customizable app, one could simply purchase a less customizable third-party tool or use Microsoft Bookings.

I personally find Microsoft Bookings to be a versatile option for creating a comprehensive reservation system, thanks to its wide range of features. Nevertheless, it's important to be aware of its limitations:

• No recurring events: If you want users to create recurring appointments, they will need to create them one by one.
• Limited service search: You can add service selection to a single booking page, but there is no hierarchy, search function, or ability to reserve multiple services at a time.

Booking system with Shifts in Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Shifts, a tool within Microsoft Teams, streamlines internal work scheduling and communication for managers and employees. This mobile-friendly app empowers teams with diverse schedules and roles to manage schedules on the go.

 

Let's explore some of Shifts' standout and new features:

• Organized scheduling: Invite users and organize them into groups for scheduling. Groups can have access only to specific shifts and job types, facilitating efficient scheduling for employees working on specific projects or departments.
• Mobile Clock In/Out: The time clock feature lets employees clock in/out on the go. While it doesn't track real-time hours, managers can monitor shifts for potential lateness or overwork.
• Downloadable reports (released in November 2023): Managers can generate a downloadable report of their team's schedule for a chosen timeframe. This report includes details on assigned shifts, employee time off requests, and open shifts.
• Enhanced visibility (released in December 2023): Managers can see the number of people scheduled on the Shifts calendar, providing better insight for staffing decisions. , this feature is available at both the team and group level:    
• Enhanced flexibility for employees: Since January 2024, frontline workers can set availability preferences for specific dates, complementing existing recurring availability options.
• Targeted communication: In Microsoft Shifts, tags are dynamic labels automatically assigned to employees based on their current shift schedules. When you @mention a tag in a chat, it notifies everyone currently working in that specific shift group. This allows for targeted communication within your team, ensuring only relevant individuals receive the message.

But can Microsoft Shifts be adapted for equipment or desk reservations? You bet it can!

Use it for managing work shifts for various resources, be it vehicles or meeting rooms. Simply create a resource mailbox, invite it to a team, and manage it the same way you would manage a frontline worker.

Alternatively, consider each shift as an available slot for reserving desks or tools. This approach allows users to self-assign to these "shifts," meaning they can effectively book the resource they need. Out-of-the-box features of Microsoft Shifts empower you to limit resource reservations by location, team, or time.

I found a great blog post of Vasu Sharma where he demonstrates a space management system designed with Microsoft Shifts, showcasing both manager and end-user views. The blog post describes the general idea of using Shifts to create a booking system. Therefore, I strongly recommend reading it if you're considering using Microsoft Shifts for creating an online booking system.

But before you get started, here are some important points to consider:

• No recurring shifts: While Microsoft Shifts allows copying schedules week-to-week, it currently lacks the ability to edit and apply changes to recurring shifts. This can be inconvenient if you need to modify a series of shifts.
• No reminders: Shifts currently doesn't have features for automatic reminders and confirmations. However, you can set them up using Power Automate.
• For internal use only: Microsoft Shifts does not currently support external accounts, including guest accounts added to your tenant.
• Manual Processes: Creating shifts manually increases the risk of scheduling conflicts or inaccuracies.
• No search: Microsoft Shifts currently lacks a dedicated search function, but you can filter by date, view the team schedule, or scan for keywords in shift titles.

PowerApps for Booking system

If the existing Microsoft tools aren't a perfect fit, no problem! Build your own app with Power Apps.

It is a development platform offered by Microsoft that empowers you to build the custom reservation system, tailored entirely to your exact requirements.

The benefits of creating a booking app using Microsoft’s Power Apps are that it’s relatively easy and low cost to produce something that looks good, is accessible from multiple platforms and is tailored to your user community. It becomes limited where you want to scale, either in organisation size or complexity. For example, a limitation is the lack of administrative access through graph API into exchange.

To showcase its true potential, let's delve into some of its key features:

• Customization: Design a system that covers all your requirements. Configure bookable resources, establish custom rules, and empower users to search by attributes such as size, price, format, or technical specifications.
• Low-Code Development: Power Apps is positioned as a low-code development environment, making it easier to build and maintain your reservation system.
• Integratied with other Microsoft platforms: Use Microsoft Dataverse, SQL Server, and Excel as a data source, and set up automation with Power Automate and Power BI.
• Accessibility: Build a booking app accessible on any device—mobile phones, tablets, and computers.

There are many tutorials and pre-built templates available to help you get started. I came across Microsoft's Appointment Booking template and Desk Reservation template created by April Dunnam, which you can use as a base.

If I were to build a booking system in Power Apps, it would need to be highly customized to meet the specific needs of the business. Cost-wise, Power Apps could be more cost-effective if your company or business already utilizes M365, Power Apps, and other Microsoft products, thanks to existing license costs. Another great advantage of Power Apps is the availability of templates, like the Book a Room app template. However, when building custom applications, remember that you will have ongoing maintenance and app updates, which could incur additional costs and effort in the future.

Overall, Power Apps offers great flexibility in building reservation systems. Whether you need a simple booking system or a comprehensive solution for managing appointments, hot desks, or resources, you can create an application to meet your specific needs. However, it's important to remember that Power Apps is a platform for building custom applications, not a pre-built solution. Setting it up requires time and resources, but the benefit lies in having a system perfectly aligned with your specific requirements.

Reservation system with SharePoint and Custom Forms

Another good option for designing the flexible and user-friendly resources booking system is SharePoint, especially if your organization already utilize it. A SharePoint list is a great way to store and manage information about the resources available for reservation and the reservations themselves. Combine them with custom forms, and you have a powerful tool for creating a customized booking system!

You can design custom forms for your SharePoint lists using PowerApps or third-party solutions. If you seek modern, responsive forms with extensive functionality, consider trying Plumsail Forms for SharePoint. It offers a free trial, so you can explore its features and potentially build a basic booking system yourself. For inspiration, here's an example of a reservation system that you can design with Plumsail Forms:

 

What is good about using SharePoint with customized forms for designing a resource management system?

• Seamless Integration: If your team is already comfortable with SharePoint, a booking system built on this platform offers a familiar and user-friendly experience.
• Automation with Power Automate: create a flow with Power Automate to streamline communication. This can include sending booking confirmations, reminders, or managing cancellations automatically.
• Data visualization: Customize your SharePoint list view to effectively track and review resources and reservations. Add color coding, create different views for reporting and management, and group by resource or reservation type—the possibilities are endless!
• Enhanced Functionality with Custom Forms: Create a user-friendly reservation form that captures key details, such as desired date, time, duration, and any special requests. As the user fills out the form, display the corresponding availability calendar, a photo of the resource, and its key information (e.g., description, capacity, amenities).
• Access Control: Easily manage permissions in SharePoint to control who can view, book, and manage reservations and resources.

The integration with SharePoint Online and the use of Plumsail Forms makes the booking process quick, simple, and efficient.

Check out the Room Manager and Plumsail Forms for SharePoint post for real business cases for booking desks, parking, and equipment.

Taking everything into account, SharePoint, with its custom forms, offers a balance between flexibility and ease for building booking systems. However, remember that setting it up, like with Power Apps, might require development expertise and time investment. The payoff, though, is a powerful, tailored booking system seamlessly integrated with your SharePoint environment, significantly improving your booking process.

Summary: Which option is best for the booking system?

Microsoft 365 provides a variety of tools to create a shared resource booking system, and each has its strengths and limitations.

Those with straightforward requirements and no need for complex custom logic can leverage existing Microsoft 365 tools like Resource Mailboxes, Bookings, or Shifts. For more intricate solutions, and if you have the time and resources, the Power Apps platform is the go-to choice.

Actively using SharePoint? Consider creating custom forms for resource reservation with Plumsail Forms.

I hope this post helped you navigate Microsoft 365 tools for designing booking systems. Feel free to comment if you have questions or want to share your experience!