Messages patients receive
- Everyone
On this page
Clinicify sends patients a small set of messages about their appointments, results and payments. They’re sent in your clinic’s name, and each one points the patient to your portal for anything private. SMS and email are included in every plan.
Messages you can control
These are optional. Each one goes by email, by text, or both, depending on two settings:
- Your clinic’s defaults, which the owner sets under Clinic settings > Patient notifications, for the four messages that appear there.
- The patient’s own preferences: Email notifications and SMS notifications on their record, which the patient can also change in the portal.
A message only goes by a channel if both allow it.
| Message | When it’s sent | Setting in Patient notifications |
|---|---|---|
| Your appointment is confirmed | When an appointment is booked. If a booking fee is needed, once it’s paid | Appointment booked |
| Your appointment is tomorrow | About a day before a confirmed appointment. It names the practitioner and appointment type, and carries the join link for a video appointment | 24-hour reminder |
| Your appointment has been cancelled | When the clinic or the patient cancels. It says who cancelled and what happens to any booking fee | Appointment cancelled |
| Your results are ready | Once per set of results, when they become visible to the patient: when approved, entered by hand or published straight away, or within about half an hour of a results delay ending | Lab results published |
| Your question has been answered | When a clinician’s reply to a patient’s question is sent | Patient preference only |
| Your aftercare advice | After a treatment, when aftercare is sent. Email only | Patient preference only |
| Your refund has been issued | When a payment is refunded | Patient preference only |
Messages that are always sent
These are needed for the patient’s care or for a payment, so they’re sent even if the patient has turned notifications off. Most go by email, and by text too if the patient has a UK mobile number on their record. Those marked email only are never texted.
| Message | When it’s sent |
|---|---|
| Invitation to the patient portal | When your team invites the patient. The Set up your portal button opens your portal’s sign-in page, where the patient signs in with a code sent to their email |
| Forms to complete | When forms are sent before an appointment. Email only |
| Your video link is ready | When the join link for a video appointment is ready, including after your team selects Retry on a link that failed |
| Booking fee or payment received | When a patient pays a booking fee or pays in full online |
| No-show fee charged | When a no-show fee is charged to the card the patient saved when booking. Email only |
| Payment requested | When your team sends the patient a payment link |
| Record deletion reminders | 30 days and 10 days before the record of a patient with no clinical history and no booked appointments is removed |
The sign-in code a patient requests to access the portal is always sent by email only.
What messages never include
Results, form titles, answers to questions and other clinical detail are never put in a message. The patient is asked to sign in to the portal instead. The one exception is aftercare: the aftercare email includes the important points and when to contact you straight away, because a patient worried late at night needs that in their inbox. See How patient emails are sent and branded.
Good to know
- SMS notifications is off for patients your team adds or imports until the patient or your team turns it on, so their optional messages go by email only at first. A patient who gives a mobile number when booking online starts with it on. See Patient phone numbers and text messages.
- Confirmation, video link and cancellation emails come with a calendar file. See Calendar invites for patients.
- When your team books an appointment that’s already in the past, or uses an appointment type set to Hide from patient treatment history, no confirmation is sent.
- Archived patients don’t get appointment messages (confirmations, reminders, cancellations, video links, forms or aftercare). Payment messages, such as receipts and refunds, still go to them.
- Dates and times in confirmations, reminders, cancellations and video link messages use the Timezone set in your clinic details.
- Patients see a short history of recent messages under the bell icon in the portal.
Was this article helpful?
Thanks for letting us know.
Thanks. We read every response.
Questions about this article? Contact support
Related articles
- Choose which messages patients receive Turn email and text messages on or off for bookings, reminders, cancellations and lab results, and set your reply-to address and SMS sender name.
- Appointment reminders Clinicify reminds patients by email, and by text if they've opted in, about a day before each confirmed appointment. Here's how reminders work.
- Patient phone numbers and text messages Which phone numbers Clinicify accepts, how numbers are formatted, when patients get texts, and how to set the sender name they see.
- How patient emails are sent and branded Patient emails arrive in your clinic's name, with your logo and colour, and keep clinical detail behind portal sign-in. Here's how they're put together.