Please note that at this time, the ability to offer appointments in person is only available to California providers credentialed with Kaiser and/or Anthem. You can read more about in-person offerings here and find which insurances you are credentialed with in the Rula provider portal.
This article provides a video and step-by-step guide for adding availability to your calendar in the Rula provider portal.
While availability is primarily for new client appointments, your existing clients can reschedule single sessions directly from their patient portal. These rescheduled sessions will use your existing availability.
If you prefer that your client reschedule with you directly, tell them to contact you via email, phone, or Portal messaging for schedule changes.
Our team will be scheduling first-time appointments and four automatic recurring visits with clients for you, so we’ll only need your availability for intake appointments. After meeting with the client for the fifth time, you can schedule the client for additional follow-up appointments at a time that works best for you. You may also update the date and time for the first four initial follow-ups if needed.
Important Note: Appointments with patients may be booked 25 hours before the start of the appointment. The "hold" cancellation window has been adjusted from 24 hours before the appointment to 14 hours before the appointment. We recommend keeping your availability up to date and continuing to monitor your calendars closely for new, upcoming appointments.
Video Demonstration
Note: We're now Rula! You may still hear Path in our videos from time to time and we appreciate your patience while we continue to update our content to align with our new name. Additionally, this video only applies to telehealth and not in-person appointments.
This video provides a step-by-step guide for adding availability for new client in the Rula provider portal.
Guided Steps
- Log into the Rula provider portal.
- Stay on the Schedule tab.
- Click the Availability button in the top right-hand corner.
- The Availability editor will open a new pop-up box.
- Buttons that are white represent days of the week when you have not yet indicated your availability.
- Light purple buttons represent days where you have already indicated you would like to see new clients.
- Important Note: Existing appointments and calendar blocks will override new client availability.
- To add client availability, click on the day of the week buttons to select the days you are interested in seeing new clients on a recurring weekly basis.
- Once you click on a white button, it will turn light purple.
- Next, select the time frames for each day that you are available to see new clients.
- Here, you can add a continuous length of time, for example from 9 am to 3 pm, or individual time slots, for example, from 9 am to 10 am.
- You can adjust your availability in 30 minute increments.
- If applicable, you will also have the ability to select the location of your availability to indicate telehealth or in-person.
- When you are satisfied with your selections, click Save.
- This sometimes takes a second as the portal is updating all availability in the future.
You will see a pop-up notification that your availability has been updated.
These will now appear on your schedule calendar as light purple boxes for telehealth or light green for in-person.
- Rula will only schedule appointments with clients on days and times when you have indicated you are available to receive new clients.
- Providers may choose to schedule their own follow-up appointments with existing clients in these light purple areas or in any open white space.
Best Practices
When setting your availability for new clients, select time slots that you have open for five consecutive weeks. Rula schedules five recurring appointments (an initial + four follow-ups) for each new client when booking. Appointments are scheduled in this manner to make it easier for therapists to establish a consistent rhythm early in the therapeutic relationship with clients and take some of the burden of scheduling off their plate.
If you do not have availability for five consecutive weeks, create a block over any time slots that you are not available. Appointments will not be scheduled over any time slots that you have blocked off
Note that the availability that you set for new clients will repeat on a weekly basis. If your schedule is subject to changes from week to week, creating blocks may be a better way to customize your calendar.
Pausing/Resuming New Client Intake
You don't have to modify your availability if the changes you are looking to make are short term. If your availability to take on new clients will be affected temporarily, you have the option to pause new clients altogether in the provider portal.
To learn more about pausing or resuming new client intake, check out Pausing and resuming new client intake in the Rula provider portal for more information.