Importing Your Data

If you already run your business with another booking tool, a spreadsheet or a calendar app, you don’t have to start from zero. The import wizard takes the files you can export from it and brings in your clients, your appointments (upcoming and past), your services and one calendar per professional.

The wizard is available on every plan. Open it from Clients > Import, from the first step of the “Getting started” panel or, at any time, from Settings > Data & Privacy > Data import.

What you can upload

Up to 5 files at a time, 5 MB each:

File	Typical source
CSV	The export of most booking tools, or a saved spreadsheet
Excel (`.xlsx`)	A spreadsheet or a report downloaded as Excel
Calendar (`.ics`)	Google Calendar, Outlook or Apple Calendar

You do not need to rename columns or tell Timeblu what each file is. Upload what you have - a client list, an appointments report, a price list, or all three - and the wizard works out the rest.

Getting your data out

Another booking tool: look for the export option in your client list and in your appointments or sales report, and download them as CSV or Excel. If you cannot find it, ask their support for an export of your data.
Google Calendar, on a computer: Settings > Import & export > Export. Unzip the download and upload the .ics files.
Outlook: File > Save Calendar. Apple Calendar: File > Export.
A spreadsheet: save it as .xlsx or .csv, with a header row and one row per client or per appointment.
A paper diary: type your upcoming appointments into a sheet with date, time, client, phone and service. That is enough.

Running an import

Upload your files

Drop your files into the upload area. They are read in your browser.

Check what Timeblu understood

Timeblu reads the column names and a small sample of each file to work out what it contains and which column is which. Nothing is saved yet. The review shows:

what each file contains (client list, appointments, service list, calendar events). Open Adjust columns to correct a column or the date format;
how many clients are new and how many you already have, how many services and calendars will be created, and how many upcoming and past appointments will come in;
your services and team: each one is matched to a service or calendar you already have with the same name, or created. You can change the match;
the first appointments, exactly as they will appear in your calendar;
the rows left out, with the reason.

Two choices on this step:

Past appointments - the last 12 months by default; choose 3, 6, 12 months or all of them. Upcoming appointments and all your clients are always imported.
Send reminders for these appointments - on by default. See What your clients receive.

When the import brings new clients you must confirm that you have a lawful basis to process those contacts.

Import

Click Import now and keep the tab open until it finishes. The final screen shows what was created and lets you download the rows that were left out.

How appointments come in

Upcoming appointments are imported as confirmed, on the calendar of their professional.
Past appointments are imported as completed, or as cancelled / no-show if your file says so, so your client records and your numbers have history from day one.
Dates and times are read as the local time of your business.
If a file does not name the service, the appointment uses a generic “Appointment” service.
An appointment that is already in your calendar (same client, start and service) is not imported again, so importing the same file twice is safe.

Calendar files

A calendar event has no “client” or “service” field, only a title. If your titles follow a pattern (“Haircut - María García”), Timeblu splits them into service and client. Events that do not follow it (“Dentist”, “Closed”) are imported as blocked time if they are upcoming, so nobody books over them, and left out if they are past.

How clients are matched

A client needs a name and an email or a phone. Timeblu recognises a client you already have, or one that appears in several files, in this order:

the same email;
the same phone and name (two people who share a phone number stay separate);
the same name, only when a row has neither email nor phone.

A full name in one column is split into first and last name. Clients you already have are never modified by an import.

Clients without an email cannot receive email reminders. SMS and WhatsApp reminders are part of the Max plan.

What your clients receive

The import itself sends nothing: no confirmations, no surveys, no messages about past appointments. Upcoming imported appointments get your usual reminder, like any other appointment. If you would rather tell your clients about the change first, switch off Send reminders for these appointments before importing.

Services and calendars

Imported services are visible on your booking page straight away. Check their prices and durations in Services. Each new calendar starts with the working hours of your main calendar - adjust them in Calendars.

Undoing an import

For 30 days you can undo an import from the wizard. Undoing deletes the appointments and blocked times the import created. The clients, services and calendars it created are deleted too, unless you have edited them or used them since. Nothing that existed before the import is touched.

Limits

Up to 50,000 clients and 20,000 appointments per import.

Why was a row left out?

Reason	What to do
No name	Add the client’s name, or check the name column in Adjust columns
Client with no email and no phone	Add one of the two
Appointment with no client	Fill in the client, or check the client column
Date or time we could not read	Check the date format in Adjust columns; every appointment needs a time
Upcoming appointment already cancelled	Nothing: cancelled appointments are not brought into the future
Past event with no client	Nothing: only upcoming events become blocked time
Repeated row	Nothing: it was imported once

Fix the downloaded file and import it again: what is already in Timeblu is not duplicated.

Not working for you?

If your tool exports something the wizard does not understand, if all you have is a PDF or a paper diary, or if the import does not come out the way you expected, write to support@timeblu.com and we will help you. Remember that an import can be undone for 30 days.