Appointments And External System Integration

If the FA integration module is turned off and the dispatch group references an external system feature configuration, the Search for an Appointment section of the page is built based on the configuration of the external system feature configuration options.

For a Dispatch Group referencing an external system feature configuration:

The From Date defaults to the earliest scheduled date of the selected field activities. The To Date defaults to the From Date plus the value of the Default Days of Available Appointment feature configuration option whenever a dispatch group is selected.

If your external system allows forced appointments, the Forced checkbox is displayed. The user should check this box when attempting to book an appointment that is not available in the system.

If your external system options include user defined search criteria fields, these fields are displayed below the from date and to date.

Click Show Appointments to invoke the external system to display available appointments. If the communication is successful, the Available Appointments grid displays the results.

Each available appointment includes an OK button to click to choose the desired appointment.

If your external system allows forced appointments, or allows manual appointments is set to Y, then the grid includes "+" and "-" buttons to allow you to add or remove appointments.

If your external system allows forced appointments, allows manual appointments or allows the user to narrow the appointment window, then the start date / time and end date / time may be modified by the user.

If your external system options include user defined result fields, additional columns are included after the end date / time for each user defined field.

When the user clicks OK for the desired appointment a message is sent to the external system to book the appointment.