Over the past year, payments upstart Square has bulked up by adding new services for merchants using its point of sale system. These include invoicing, marketing, and even cash advances.
Today, Square said that it is making appointment scheduling easier for merchants on the go. The company introduced a new iPhone app, called Appointments, that lets merchants like chiropractors and hairdressers access and book customer appointments via a phone or iPad.
Last year, Square debuted the ability to book and manage appointments through the dashboard on the company’s app for point of sale registers. The dashboard is the hub for accessing sales data, orders, and employee information.
With today’s announcement, Square is letting merchants to create a more centralized, mobile hub to manage appointments, access client profiles, and accept appointments on the go. Having a dedicated app saves merchants from having to log-in via mobile web or a desktop computer to manage appointments.
Square’s appointments features costs from $30 to $90 monthly based on the number of employees using the service. The company says that millions of appointments have been booked through the feature since last August.
This also marks the second time Square has broken out a business-focused app apart from its core Register app. Recently, the company released a dedicated mobile app for its dashboard that lets allowing customers to access their sales and analytics from a phone.
It’s also worth noting that the appointments software is one of two products, including payroll, which does not require businesses to use the Register app as the point of sale. This means Square appears to be expanding beyond just payments into other small business-focused software.