[Chelsea.M]

Hi there!
Does anyone have a suggestion for scheduling conference rooms? So far, rooms are scheduled on the firm-wide calendar... but I still have attorneys and staff using them without a prior reservation. We are short on conference rooms right now, so it is causing a problem when clients come in and we have no where to put them because the room is being used... without a reservation.
I've started printing signs the night before, hoping they get the idea... but I'm open to tips/ideas.

Thanks!

[Chrissy Scivicque]

That's a tricky one. I like the idea of posting a sign. I say, put the schedule for the room on each door. That way, when someone enters they are faced with the fact that they either did or did not actually reserve it.
Good luck!

[Jodith]

I agree with putting a schedule for the day on the door. I'd also include at the top of the schedule the information for scheduling the room and that the room must be scheduled for use. We had the same problem at my last job, and I had to just get really firm with people about scheduling rooms. After I bumped people out of rooms for scheduled appointments a few time, they started getting the idea.

[deana79]

We have the same problem in my office. We only have two conference rooms, a large and a small. They tend to book up quickly, especially the larger room.

We use calendars in Outlook for each room. If anyone wants to reserve a conference room, they are supposed to email our receptionist with the request and she puts them on the schedule. Some of us that use it more frequently than others, also have permissions set in Outlook to add our own reservations.

Some employees, especially management, see an empty room and feel it's free game. It always seems to be the same people, so I get great joy in bumping them out. One thing that I did do to prevent it from happening more often, was put locks on the conference room doors. I told everyone that if the schedule continues to be disregarded, the doors will be locked at all times, and only opened for those who have reserved the room(s).

I thought about the idea of keeping the schedule on the door, however, our CEO is a bit of a neat freak, and didn't like the way it looked on the door.

[Chelsea.M]

Thanks!
Today I did the signs, including a "master" list that I leave out on the ledge. Everyone feels very important now that their names are on the doors, and I think in the future they will keep each other accountable- as in, "dude, why are you in my conference room?" Thanks for your suggestions

[Chelsea.M]

Hi Deana,
I'm a bit of a neat person myself- and by the end of the day the papers on the doors had curled and looked pretty shabby. Yeah, ok, it bothered me... (grin). I found some pale blue cardstock that I printed tomorrow's schedule on, and not only do they look nice, the cardstock won't curl. Still looks temporary, but until we upgrade to those flat panel screens like they have at the hotels, it will work Thank you for the suggestions! c.

[deana79]

Chelsea - I'll try the cardstock. Maybe the boss won't be so opposed to that!

[ut_pronestor]

Hi,

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proNestor Booking is a web application, that also works in sharepoint.

It also comes with an Microsoft Outlook add-in for the meeting organizers, so we connect the calendar appointments and the needed resources.

It does not require any changes or installation into Exchange - it requires installation of an add-in and thats it.

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Take a look - maybe this can be of any help - any input is more than welcome.

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