University at Buffalo (UB)
Choosing the Right Microsoft Booking App
UB provides four powerful apps to help you set up meetings, define office hours, offer items for reservation, and more. See which one will work best for you.
Available booking apps
- Outlook Calendar is a scheduling tool within Outlook and Microsoft 365. Many employees will already have this installed on their work computers by IT staff. It can also be installed on personal devices. See Microsoft 365 (UBIT).
- Bookings with Me lets others visit a web page to schedule one-on-one meetings with you, such as office hours. Learn how to set it up at Microsoft Bookings with Me (UBIT).
- Scheduling Poll lets people vote on the best meeting time for them. It is available in Outlook 365. Create an email addressed to your attendees and select date(s) and time(s) when they appear to be available. See Access Scheduling Poll for instructions.
- Bookings lets you create a calendar where students can book advising appointments, reserve equipment, manage group events and more. It is available as an Outlook add-in, and requires consultation with your departmental IT staff. See Microsoft Bookings (UBIT).
Compare booking apps
By use case
| Use Case | Recommendation |
|---|---|
| Staff: Meet one-on-one with a co-worker to discuss a project, time and length may vary | Normal Outlook calendar-based scheduling |
| Faculty: Allow individual students to choose an appointment from fixed office hours. | Bookings with me |
| Manager: Schedule an ad hoc or recurring meeting with one or more staff whose schedule you know | Normal Outlook calendar-based scheduling |
| Set up interdepartmental meetings where the organizer does not know the best times of day or week for all attendees | Scheduling Poll |
| Let people reserve or check out items based on fixed criteria like length of loan or device type | Bookings |
| Allow students to reserve an appointment with one of the available advisors | Bookings |
By feature
| Feature | Bookings | Bookings with me | Scheduling Poll | Outlook calendar-based scheduling |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1:1 meetings | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Several people need to meet with you | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Schedule of individuals is known | ✓ | |||
| Schedule of individuals is not known | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Allow attendees to choose from pre-set meeting times | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Allow attendees to submit preferred times | ✓ |
Need more help with technology at UB?
Contact the UBIT Help Center.