Not every business gives customers a time the same way. Some say "Tuesday at nine". Some say "Tuesday morning". Some work like a delivery firm and tell four people "sometime between eleven and two", then work through them in order.
Mucka used to assume the first one. That's why some owners got told they were double-booked on jobs that were perfectly fine.
Where to find it
Settings → Work → Diary. You need the manage workspace permission to change it.
The four ways to work
Exact start times
The default, and what Mucka has always done. You give someone a time and turn up at it. If you try to put two jobs on the same engineer at the same time, Mucka stops you and asks first.
Pick this if you book proper appointments.
Morning or afternoon
You promise half a day rather than an hour — "we'll be with you Tuesday morning". That half-day then belongs to that customer, and nothing else goes in it, including anything the AI receptionist books.
Your own time slots
Same idea, but you set the slots: 8 to 10, 10 to 12, 1 to 3. One customer per slot.
Overlapping windows
This is the one for you if you work like a delivery firm.
You set slots that overlap on purpose — 9:30 to 12, 11 to 2, 12 to 3 — and several customers can sit inside the same stretch of the day. You're not promising to be at all of them at once. You're promising to turn up somewhere in that window, and you work down the list.
On this setting Mucka counts the work, not the window. So six customers all told "sometime this afternoon" is a normal afternoon, not six clashes.
Your online booking page works the same way: a booked job takes up its working time, not its whole window, so the slots either side of it stay open to customers. If you've set a most-jobs-a-day number, a day that reaches it stops being offered.
Put the real length of the job in. If a call takes you an hour, put an hour — not the three-hour window you gave the customer. The job length is what Mucka now measures, so if you keep entering the width of the slot it will still think you're busy.
It also stops the "no travel time" warning on this setting. Working straight through a list is how the job gets done, not a mistake worth flagging every morning.
When Mucka flags a clash
On exact start times, Mucka puts a Schedule Conflict card in Actions when two of someone's jobs overlap, or leave less than half an hour to get between them. Tap Open diary and it takes you to that day, so you can move one of them or give it to someone else.
If you're the only one doing the jobs, Mucka only flags real overlaps. A tight gap between your own jobs is how you've planned your day, and there's nobody to hand one to, so it won't ask.
What never changes
Two jobs on the same engineer at the same minute is always caught, whichever setting you pick. One van can't be on two doorsteps. When you book or move a job yourself, Mucka asks "Book this job anyway?" and lets you go ahead if you really mean it.
Turning the double-booking question off
If you'd rather not be asked — say you're on your own and you know exactly how your day fits together — open Double-booking warning on the same screen and switch off Ask before I double-book.
After that, jobs you book or move by hand go straight in, even on top of another one.
It only covers jobs you put in yourself. When Mucka or your AI receptionist books something, it still won't put two jobs on one person at the same time. The travel time warning is a separate setting and isn't affected.
Your opening hours are a separate setting, under Settings → Business → Details. Those are the hours you're open; this is how you hand times out inside them.
Booking a job into a slot
Once you're on morning/afternoon, your own slots or overlapping windows, booking a job asks which slot rather than which minute. Pick "11 to 2" and that's what goes on the job, and that's what the customer's confirmation text says. Once you've picked a slot, the form asks how long the job takes instead of when it ends: you can't know the finish time when Mucka is choosing where in the slot the job sits, but you do know how long the work takes.
"An exact time" stays on the list, whichever setting you're on. An emergency at half past two isn't a delivery slot, and Mucka won't pretend it is.
On overlapping windows, several jobs can share a slot. Mucka spaces them through it in the order you'll actually work them — three jobs in an 11-to-2 window land at 11, 12 and 1 in your diary, while all three customers are told "between 11 and 2".
Opening a job that's already in a slot shows you that slot, so you can see what the customer was promised and move it to a different one if you need to. Changing the length of the job on that screen changes the work, not the promise — the customer still gets told the slot.
Booking by asking Mucka works the same way. Say "book him in between 12 and 4", or "move it to 12 till 4", and, if 12 till 4 is one of your slots that day, Mucka books the job into that slot: the customer is told 12 till 4, and the job goes in at its usual length rather than filling the whole slot. If the work really does take the whole four hours, just tell Mucka how long it takes.
Changing this setting later
You can change it whenever you like, and jobs already in the diary keep the times you gave them. Nothing gets moved.
What does change is what Mucka shows you. Go back to exact start times and the diary stops labelling old jobs with the slot they were sold as — it shows the real start and the length you booked. The customer's confirmation and reminder texts say the same thing, so nobody gets told "morning" for a job you've now got down as an hour.
If you shorten a job and the diary looks like it hasn't taken, check this setting first. On morning/afternoon or your own slots, a job's card shows the slot you promised, not how long the work takes — that's the whole point of it. The length is still saved; it's what decides whether you're double-booked.
Not done yet
- Your AI receptionist still keeps its own copy of this setting for now, under AI Receptionist → Settings. Change it in both places until they're joined up.
- "A number of jobs a day, no times at all" is designed but not switched on yet.