Overview

1. Industrial strength, HIPAA compliant appointment scheduling
2. Client appointment reminders via text
3. Client appointment reminders via email
4. Client self scheduling, including group sessions
5. Client payments with PayPal, Square, or Stripe
6. Embeded scheduling widget for your website
7. Easily initiated video conferences with clients
8. Save credit card details for future sessions
9. Android, Apple, and web applications
10. Optionally require clients to fill out a form before a session
11. Optionally require clients to pay before a session

1. On Acuity there are users and calendars, and first you add a calendar and then you link one or more users to that calendar. ChartCaddy assumes that each Acuity calendar corresponds to a ChartCaddy user, and while not every ChartCaddy user has to be associated with an Acuity calendar, every Acuity calendar needs to be associated with exactly one ChartCaddy user. ChartCaddy initially maps calendars to users by name, but the name of the Calendar can be changed once the map is successful. This means that you MUST NOT "recycle" calendars on Acuity, or in other words, if a calendar is no longer desired on Acuity you should delete it and NOT rename it to be for another user. Acuity does not provide a way for ChartCaddy to update the calendar details, so if the name of the user changes in ChartCaddy then the name of the Acuity calendar must be updated manually.
2. When setting up your Acuity account the most import thing to get right is what Acuity calls "Appointment Types". Basically ChartCaddy looks at the Acuity appointment type names for certain key words and then tries its best to map them to services in ChartCaddy. Currently valid key words are: Assessment, Case Management, Counseling, Crisis, Family With, Family Without, Intake, Interactive, Plan, Rehab, Screening, Skills, and Testing. You don't need to add an appointment type for each keyword, but each appointment type must contain a keyword for it to be mapped. "Contact" can be used instead of "Intake". "Couple" can be used instead of "Family". "Session" or "Therapy" can be used instead of "Counseling". If the appointment type has the "Family" or "Couple" keyword then it must also have either "With" or "Without" in the name as well. The "Telemedicine" keyword can also be used to limit the mapping, but you either need telemedicine versions of all appointment types or no telemedicine appointment types.
3. Appointment types are either for an individual or for a class, and if you designate an appointment type as a class then it maps to a group service in ChartCaddy. Acuity class appointment types only make sense for Counseling and Rehab.
4. Another important thing to know about Acuity appointment types is how the duration works. A specific duration is tied to an appointment type and it can not be changed. In other words if you specify a duration of 30 minutes for an Acuity appointment type then those type of appointments will always appear as 30 minutes on Acuity and you can not change it. You may want to set up similar appointment types that have different durations. You can change the duration in ChartCaddy, which is not reflected on Acuity, and this is one of the rare cases where a change you make in one system is not instantly made in the other system. You can think of the Acuity duration as the expected duration and the ChartCaddy duration as how long a session actually lasted. In Acuity you can add time padding for an appointment type and, for example a 60 minute services, we recommend that you set it up as a 55 minute appointment with 5 minutes of padding at the end. This is because ChartCaddy does not allow services to overlap by even a minute, so if you set up appointments for the full 60 minutes then back to back appointments would cause both items to be flagged as rejected in ChartCaddy.
5. If a client does not exist or the appointment type name has the "Intake" keyword, then a Contact (incoming referral) is created instead of a chart item in ChartCaddy. Therefore new clients should only be scheduled for Intake appointments until the Contact is finalized in ChartCaddy and they exist as a client. You might want to make all appointment types private in Acuity except an Intake appointment type, although that would prevent clients self scheduling most appointment types.
   
6. Once you have your appointment type set up you need to go back to each calendar and select which appointment types should be available for that calendar.
7. Acuity clients are mapped using their first name, last name, and phone number ONLY. This is a good but not great way to do it, but unfortunately it is the only option with Acuity. By default Acuity does not require a client phone number so it is highly recommended that you set that option to require clients to enter a phone number.
8. One potential deal breaker for some organizations is that every user on Acuity can see the name and contact information of every client on Acuity. This is an Acuity limitation and there is no way to change it, but at least users can only see client appointments for calendars they are linked to.
9. Only Draft chart items can be edited in ChartCaddy, so only Draft chart items are synchronized with Acuity. In other words, once you complete a chart item in ChartCaddy it will not be updated with any changes from Acuity. All future chart items in must be Draft, which ChartCaddy enforces.
10. The equivalent of canceling an appointment on Acuity is to change the service of a chart item to "For Information Only" or "Encounter Canceled". However unlike Acuity, in ChartCaddy the service can be changed back. Therefore when using Acuity, if you cancel an appointment, you can uncancel it in ChartCaddy but that change is not reflected back in Acuity. Flagging a chart item as deleted in ChartCaddy also cancels the appointment on Acuity.
11. In addition to setting available hours, Acuity also provides "Block Off" times for events like vacation and doctor appointments. Unfortunately Acuity only allows limited ability to synchronize them, so even though ChartCaddy synchronizes Acuity block off times to events there are restrictions with editing these linked events in ChartCaddy. All Acuity recurring events must be edited on Acuity. Adding events in ChartCaddy will add a block off time on Acuity, and setting an event IsActive or IsBlocking to No will delete the linked block off time on Acuity. To make some changes to linked events you need to set IsActive or IsBlocking to No, make your changes, and then set IsActive and IsBlocking back to Yes. Changes to block off times made on Acuity occur overnight in ChartCaddy.
12. Currently the Acuity features locations, add-ons, certificates, and orders are not supported and are ignored by the synchronization process. However if you would like them to be supported please contact us about it. We also plan on supporting synchronizing form data with Acuity in the future, but to best accomplish that we need to work with a customer generating real Acuity data. If you are interested in being that customers please let us know.
13. Acuity can be set up with PayPal, Square, or Stripe to process client payments. It looks like Square is best supported (and a card reader is available), but more information on that is available here.
14. Acuity is not set up for HIPAA compliance by default. You must follow the steps in this article to make Acuity HIPAA compliant. Some of this process involves setting an option and signing a BAA, but it also involves either disabling notifications or updating them to not include client information. Finally, certain features such as synchronizing your calendar with your phone are disabled.
15. After adding or updating appointment types or calendars on Acuity you need to click the "Process Acuity" button in ChartCaddy for those changes to be picked up immediately. Only appointment and client information is synchronized immediately while other information is synchronized over night or when the Process Acuity button is clicked.

1. First go to https://www.acuityscheduling.com/ and sign up for an account. You must sign up for the "Powerhouse" level account. Acuity has a setup wizard that walks you through setting up what is needed, and in general work your way through that wizard. Acuity has a helpful guide for getting started.
2. Initially set up at least one calendar. An Acuity calendar must correspond to a single ChartCaddy user, and at least initially the name of the Acuity calendar must match the name of the user in ChartCaddy. Once the calendar is successfully associated, if desired the name of the Acuity calendar can be changed. If at some point you no longer need an Acuity calendar it is important to delete it rather than rename it to be used for another ChartCaddy user.
   
3. Initially set up at least one appointment type. This is a crucial step, and you might want to just set up one or two appointment types and play with Acuity before setting up the rest of them. The three most important things to remember are A) the name of the appointment must contain a keyword that ChartCaddy recognizes, B) add a few minutes of padding for the duration (for example a 55 minute duration with 5 minutes of padding at the end), and C) classes in Acuity map to group sessions in ChartCaddy. The duration for individual appointments on Acuity can not be changed and are locked to whatever you set for the appointment type.
4. It is your choice to use Square, Stripe, Paypal, or no payment processing. If you want to use payment processing but aren't sure it seems as though Square is best supported by Acuity. More information on that is available here.
5. Go over the various options under Customize Appearance -> Scheduling Page Options and pick the settings that seem to be the best fit for you. It is highly recommended that you require phone numbers to be entered for each client and hide the "any available" calendar option.
6. It is absolutely mission critical that you go through the steps to make Acuity HIPAA compliant. These steps include signing a BAA. You must follow the steps in this article to make Acuity HIPAA compliant. The syncing process synchronizes client information so it is important to complete this step before you link ChartCaddy to your Acuity account.
7. At this point you should have completed all the Acuity setup wizard and HIPAA compliance steps. To link ChartCaddy to your Acuity account, log into ChartCaddy, go to Settings -> Organization, and click the "Process Acuity" button. If an error occurs then try to resolve the issue and then click the button to try again. If you have any issues, problems, or questions about the process please contact customer support.

1. New Client Intake
   
2. Assessment
   
3. Screening
   
4. Service Plan
   
5. Family Counseling With Client
   
6. Family Counseling Without Client
   
7. Group Counseling
   
8. Individual Counseling
   
9. Interactive Counseling