Thai Clinic AppBuffer time between appointments is the padding a business reserves before or after a treatment, for changing, showering, a short consultation, fresh linen and cleaning, so that the next guest does not start late.
Where the extra minutes actually go
Very little of it is idle. Before the treatment there is greeting the guest, a foot wash, the short conversation about pressure, injuries and pregnancy, and time to change. Afterwards come dressing, a glass of water or tea, settling up, and then the work nobody books: stripping the mat, fresh linen or a towel, wiping the oil, airing a closed room. For a traditional Thai massage on a mat this is quick; for an oil massage, a herbal compress or a treatment in a cabin it is not. Pretending the minutes do not exist does not remove them, it only moves them onto the next guest, who now starts late.
What a buffer costs you per day
Padding is not free, so the arithmetic is worth doing once. A therapist rostered from nine to six has 540 minutes. With 60-minute treatments and no buffer, nine appointments fit exactly. Add ten minutes after each one and the block becomes 70 minutes: seven appointments fit, using 490 minutes, with 50 left over. That is two appointments of capacity for ten honest minutes. Cut the buffer to five minutes and the block is 65 minutes, which fits eight. Numbers like these are the real decision: measure what the changeover actually takes for a week, then pad for that, not for the worst day you remember.
Put it on the treatment, not on the day
A few rules of thumb survive contact with a busy shop. Set the padding on each treatment, because a thirty-minute foot massage and a ninety-minute oil massage leave very different rooms behind. Put cleaning time after rather than before, so it travels with the treatment that caused it. Make sure the padding blocks whatever the treatment occupies, the room and the mat as well as the therapist, or a second guest will be booked into a room that is still being wiped. And pad only once: a buffer on the treatment plus a manual gap in the calendar quietly halves your day.
Every treatment in your catalogue carries two numbers in minutes, time before and time after, both zero until you set them. A booking then holds the whole window, time before plus the treatment plus time after, so the therapist and any room or mat the treatment requires stay occupied for all of it, and the padding is drawn around the appointment on the calendar. Slots offered to guests respect it too: a time appears only when the complete block fits inside the roster. For a visit with several treatments, the first one's time before and the last one's time after frame the whole appointment. Rooms and mats come with Pro.
Frequently asked
How much buffer time should I allow between massages?
Enough for what actually happens between two guests in your shop: changing, the mat or the room, and settling up. Time it honestly for a week and use that figure, treatment by treatment. A foot massage on a mat needs far less than an oil massage in a cabin, so one number for everything will be wrong twice over.
Does buffer time block the treatment room as well?
It should. The ten minutes spent stripping a mat or wiping down a cabin are exactly the minutes the room is unusable, so padding that only blocks the therapist will let a second guest be booked into a room that is not ready. A buffer is worth having only if everything the treatment occupies stays occupied.
Is buffer time the same as leaving a gap in the calendar?
Not quite. A manual gap is a decision somebody has to repeat for every appointment, and anything that offers times automatically does not know it is meant to be there. Buffer time belongs to the treatment, so it follows that treatment wherever it is booked, and by whoever books it.