Booking Queues

Intent

Checkride appointments are in short supply. Rather than let them turn into a chaotic scramble, Koda Aero uses a Booking Queue to make sure everyone gets a fair, orderly turn. Booking Queues are used only for checkride scheduling.

Think of a Booking Queue as a virtual waiting line. You join it when there's nothing on the calendar that works for you -- whether that's because nothing is open at all, or because none of the open times fit your schedule. The rest of this page, under "How Booking Queues Work," explains exactly what that's like.

Our Policy

We aim to run Booking Queues strictly first-come, first-served, and take that seriously. That said, we do reserve the right to step in and manage a queue directly when we need to -- for example, to fix a bug, remove entries created through fraud or hacking, trim a queue that's grown unreasonably long, or, on rare occasion, for a genuinely good cause. We don't do this lightly, and any such manual reordering is covered by the same position-change notification described below -- it's visible to affected Clients the same way any other position change would be.

How Booking Queues Work

Only Checkride appointments use a Booking Queue; Training appointments are simply first come, first served. On this page, whenever we say "appointment," we mean a Checkride appointment. If you're working your queue window and book a Training appointment by mistake, you'll be asked to confirm first.

You can join a Provider's Booking Queue any time you don't already have one of these appointments booked with them. That obviously includes whenever nothing is open -- but you can also join even while appointments are currently open, if none of the times actually work for you. Joining in that case just means passing on what's open right now in exchange for a fair shot at whatever opens up next.

For privacy, you can never see who else is in a queue -- but you can always see your own position, right on the calendar page. You can also turn on e-mail notifications for whenever that position changes.

Once a queue actually has people waiting in it, any new appointment a Provider creates gets held back for the queue instead of posted publicly. We call this stretch -- while the queue works through that batch of held-back appointments -- a booking cycle. During a cycle, people are offered a turn in the order they joined, one at a time. The cycle ends once the queue runs out of people, every held-back appointment gets booked, or everyone still waiting has passed on their turn. Anything still held back when the queue runs out gets released back to the public. Otherwise, things simply pause until the Provider creates something new.

When it's your turn, you get a Booking Window -- a block of time in which you, and only you, can book one of the held-back appointments. You'll get an e-mail ahead of time letting you know when your window starts and how long it'll last, and a second e-mail the moment it actually opens, with a direct link to book. Both the advance notice and the window's length adjust automatically based on how many people are waiting -- shorter when the queue is long, longer when it's short -- but never so short it'd be unreasonable. You won't, for example, be told at 2 a.m. that your five-minute window is opening right now.

A Booking Window is a chance to book, not a guarantee that a bookable appointment will still be there for its entire length -- the specific appointment(s) backing your turn can still expire or be removed by the Provider while your window is open. If that happens, you won't lose your place: you're kept at the front of the queue and notified again the moment something new opens up.

While your window is open, you can:

Book an appointment
Recycle -- move yourself to the back of the line instead of booking
Leave the queue entirely without booking

If you don't do anything during your window, you're automatically removed from the queue. (If you've reached the recycle limit described below, an unused window instead suspends your account.) This keeps the line moving instead of getting clogged with people who've moved on. We know that's not much comfort if our e-mail simply never reaches you -- we do everything we can to make sure it's delivered, but we can only promise to send it, not that it arrives. If you're using a Booking Queue, it's worth checking your spam folder now and then, and maybe adding notifications@koda.aero to your contacts.

The queue moves the moment someone acts -- it never sits around waiting for a window to fully expire. That's good news (queues drain faster), but it also means sitting far back in line today doesn't guarantee a long wait before your own window opens. You'll always get reasonable advance notice, just maybe sooner than you'd expect. If you'd like a closer eye on how fast a particular queue is moving, that's exactly what the position-change notifications above are for.

Open Appointments vs. Held-Back Ones

Appointments that are still open to the public stay that way even during a booking cycle -- after all, if you're in the queue instead of grabbing one of those, you've effectively already said it doesn't work for you.

That said, if you're in your Booking Window and change your mind, you're welcome to book one of the openly-available appointments instead of a held-back one. Either way, booking anything during your window completes your turn the same way.

Recycle Limits

To prevent abuse, we may cap how many times you can recycle (move to the back of the line instead of booking). That limit can change over time, but we'll always tell you the current one before you recycle.

Leaving the queue entirely, or just letting your window expire unused, counts toward that same limit if you later rejoin -- otherwise dropping out and coming straight back in would be an easy way around it. That extra count only applies once your window has actually opened: leaving before then doesn't add one, since there was nothing yet for you to act on -- though any recycles you've already used still come with you if you rejoin.

Once you reach that limit, your next window is your last -- you'll need to either book something or accept a temporary suspension of your account. Leaving the queue isn't an option during that window, and letting it expire unused counts as accepting the suspension. (Leaving before that window opens is still fine; your count simply stays where it is if you rejoin.) A suspension can always be lifted; just contact Koda Aero and we're happy to sort it out.

Once you actually complete an appointment, your recycle count resets to zero -- a past queue never follows you into the next one.

If a Provider removes you from their queue themselves, we'll e-mail you to let you know, and it never counts toward your recycle limit.