Clients
Track birthdays and renewals with key dates
Keep a client's birthday, anniversary, or renewal date on their record, mark the ones that come round every year, and know exactly where to look for them.
Remembering that a long-standing client has a birthday next month, or that someone's programme runs out in three weeks, is the kind of detail that makes a practice feel personal rather than administrative. Key dates put those dates on the client's own record, so they're waiting for you the next time you open their page instead of living in your head.
Key dates belong to one client at a time. Open Clients in the sidebar, click the person's row, and look down the right-hand column of their record — past Packages — to a panel headed Key Dates. Everything in this article happens inside that panel, and it's available on every plan, including Starter.
Add a key date
- Open the client's record
From Clients in the sidebar, click the row for the person you want. The list loads 50 clients at a time, so if someone doesn't appear, type their name into Search by name or email... rather than scrolling for them.
- Press Add in the Key Dates panel
Scroll the right-hand column of the record down to the panel headed Key Dates and press Add at its top right. A short form opens beneath the heading New Key Date.
- Name it and choose the day
The first box reads Label (e.g. Birthday) — type whatever you'd want to read back at a glance, such as "Birthday", "Programme renewal", or "One year working together". The date box sits directly under it. Both are required, and the form won't save without them.
- Tick Recurring yearly if it comes round every year
Recurring yearly marks the entry as an annual one — a birthday, an anniversary, the month someone first booked with you. Leave it clear for a one-off, like the end date of a fixed twelve-week programme.
- Give yourself a lead time, if you want one
Beside that checkbox, Remind takes a number and reads days before. Fourteen on a renewal, for instance, records that you'd want a fortnight's run-up before the conversation. It's optional and can be left empty.
- Press Add Date
The button reads Saving... for a moment, then the entry joins the list and the form closes. There's no separate confirmation — if you can see the entry in the panel, it's saved.
What belongs on a key date
The label is free text. Calso doesn't ask you to choose a category, which means the panel is only as useful as the words you put in it. Four kinds earn their place for most practices:
- Birthdays — the obvious one, and the one clients notice.
- Relationship anniversaries: the day someone first booked, or the day they started a programme with you. Useful context before a review session.
- Renewals and end dates — when a block of work finishes, when an agreement is up, when you'd planned to revisit pricing.
- Dates in the client's own life that shape your work: a race day, a wedding, an exam, a surgery date. These are usually one-off, and they're often the ones worth writing down.
Recurring dates and the year you type
The date you enter is the date the panel shows, year and all. Ticking Recurring yearly adds a small Yearly marker to the entry — it doesn't roll the stored year forward. That leaves you a choice worth making on purpose:
- Enter the true year — a real birth year, or the actual day someone first booked — and the entry doubles as a record you can count from.
- Enter this year's date and the panel reads more like a list of what's coming.
Entries are listed earliest date first, so a 1985 birth year will sit at the top of the panel and stay there. If you'd rather the panel read in the order things are due, keep the years current.
What the reminder lead time does
If the renewal you're tracking is really a package running out, there's a better tool for that particular job: an automation built on the Package Expiring trigger, which does send an email on its own. Automations need Practice or higher — Automation triggers and actions covers what each one fires on, and Adjust a client's package credits covers the credit balance itself.
Where key dates show up
The Key Dates panel on that one client's record is the only place they appear. They're not a column on the Clients list, they're not in the file you get from Export CSV, they don't post to the client's Activity timeline, and nothing client-facing shows them. Each entry displays its label, the date, then a Yearly marker if it recurs and a bell with the lead time if you set one. A client with none reads No key dates yet.
That makes the panel something to glance at while you're already in a client's record — before a session, or when you're deciding who to reach out to this week. It pairs naturally with the Activity tab on the same page: key dates say what's coming, and the timeline says what has already passed between you. If you act on a key date by calling or emailing, log it there so the two halves stay together — see Log a call, email, or text on a client's timeline.
Edit or delete a key date
Hover over an entry and two small icon buttons appear at its right — a pencil (Edit) and a bin (Delete). Edit reopens the same form under the heading Edit Date with the values already filled in, and the save button reads Update instead of Add Date. Delete asks first, in a dialog headed Delete Key Date that reads "Delete this key date? This cannot be undone." — press Delete to remove it or Cancel to back out. There's no undo, though a key date is quick enough to retype.
Key dates are usually the last thing you add to a client record, once the basics are in place. Work a client record walks through the rest of the page — the tabs, the panels, and the actions in the header — and Add clients and import your existing list covers getting people onto your list in the first place.
Frequently asked questions
Does Calso email me when a client's key date comes up?
No. The number you type into the Remind field is saved with the entry and shown on it as a small bell with the number of days, so the run-up you wanted is visible whenever you open that client's record. Nothing is sent on the day itself, so check the Key Dates panel when you open a client and put anything you can't afford to miss into your own calendar too.
Do key dates need a paid plan?
No. Key dates are available on every Calso plan, including Starter, with no cap on how many you add to a client. The panel sits in the right-hand column of every client record.
Can clients see the key dates I've saved about them?
No. Key dates are private to your dashboard. They never appear in the client portal, in a booking confirmation or reminder email, or anywhere else a client can reach — the same as the Internal Notes panel on their record.