This article explains the relationship between the time fields in a job and how that job is displayed in the Calendar. These are two separate things in Auxo Workshop, and understanding the difference helps you schedule accurately and manage your workshop capacity with confidence.
Creating a booking and initial Calendar placement
There are two ways to create a new booking, and they behave differently in terms of Calendar placement:
Via the New Booking button: The Booking Date/Time you enter is used to set the initial position of the job in the Calendar. After the booking is created, this field becomes decoupled from the Calendar, editing it later will not move the job. To reposition it after creation, drag the tile in the Calendar directly.
Via right-click in the Calendar Daily View: Right-click any time slot and select New Booking from the menu. This instantly places the job at the correct start time based on where you clicked, making it the more reliable method for accurate scheduling from the start.
Assigning a technician
Selecting a technician on a service when creating the booking ensures the job appears in that technician's column in the Daily View. If no technician is assigned, the job will sit in the Unassigned column on the left of the Daily View rather than in any individual technician's column. You can reassign a job at any time by dragging the tile into a technician's column in the Daily View.
The time fields in the job header
Once a booking is created, the job header contains three scheduling fields:
Booking Date/Time: Records when the customer is expected to drop off their vehicle. After initial creation this field is decoupled from the Calendar, changing it will not move the job.
Pick Up Date/Time: Records when the customer is expected to collect their vehicle. This field does not affect Calendar placement.
Est. HRS: This is the field that directly controls the duration of the booking block in the Calendar, for a job dragged onto a technician as a whole. The longer the estimated hours, the longer the job appears.
đ Note: There is currently no job start and end time in the job header that stays in sync with the job's actual position in the Calendar. After initial creation, Calendar placement and the job header times are managed independently.
đĄ Tip: To check whether the slot you have placed a job in the Calendar sits within the customer's drop-off and pick-up window, hover over the key icon on the job tile in the Daily View. The key turns red if the job is scheduled outside that window.
How Est. HRS is calculated
The Est. HRS value is automatically totalled from the estimated hours on each service added to the job. You can also override it by typing directly into the Est. HRS field in the job header. The following changes to a job will affect Est. HRS and in turn the duration of the booking block in the Calendar:
Increasing the estimated hours on an individual service will increase the overall Est. HRS and extend the booking in the Calendar.
Adding a new service will increase Est. HRS, provided that service has a value in its Estimated Hours field.
Manually overriding Est. HRS in the job header will change the Calendar duration directly, but will not adjust the hours on individual services. This override doesn't last: the next time a service is added, edited or removed, Est. HRS is recalculated from the services and your manual figure is replaced.
Bookings made through the Scheduler behave differently
Everything above describes a job dragged onto a technician as a single, whole-job booking. Jobs booked using the Scheduler work differently: the Scheduler creates a separate booking for each service, technician and day, and none of these bookings follow later changes to Est. HRS or the services. If a scheduled job's hours change afterwards, reopen the Scheduler and adjust the bookings there, changing Est. HRS in the header won't touch them.
Adjusting bookings in the Calendar
In the Daily View you can control how a booking appears directly:
Drag the job tile to move it to a different start time or a different technician's column.
Drag the top or bottom edge of the tile to make the booking appear shorter or longer.
â ď¸ Important: Resizing or moving a job tile in the Calendar does not update the Est. HRS value inside the job. However, it does affect the capacity displayed for that day and technician. If you want the job's estimated hours to reflect the change, update the Est. HRS field in the job header directly. Note that a whole-job booking will still follow any later change to Est. HRS, so a manual resize can be overwritten if the estimate changes again afterwards.
đ Note: For a full breakdown of how Est. HRS, diary bookings and a technician's % Booked and available hours all relate to each other, including a worked example, see How Estimated Hours, Bookings and Technician Availability Work Together.