What this does
An availability window turns “I am usually free on Tuesdays” into concrete, comparable answers: this start time, on these courts, yes or no. Those answers are the input the scheduler uses later, so the quality of the round depends on this step more than on any other.
Before you start
- The round exists — see create and manage rounds.
- Your venues and courts are set up, so a slot can point at a real playing area.
- Participants who should answer are on the roster. Anyone added after you open the round can still be included, but they start behind everyone else.
Steps
Open the round for availability
On the round, use Open for availability. Its status becomes Open for availability and participants can start answering.
Define the playable slots
Open Manage availability and add each slot with Add availability slot: the date, the start and end of the window, and the Courts that are genuinely free in it. Exclude maintenance, club events and the turnaround time you need between bookings — a slot that is not really bookable will produce a fixture nobody can play.
Let participants answer
Each participant opens the round and uses Submit availability, or Update availability if they answer again before the window closes. For a pair or a team, agree in advance whether one member answers for the whole side; do not mix the two models inside one round.
Watch the response count
The round header shows how many participants have responded against how many are expected, along with the number of slots and courts you defined. Chase the missing answers while there is still time to act on them, not after you have closed the window.
Response count, playable slots and court capacity in one place, before anything is scheduled.
Close the window
When the deadline passes, use Close availability. Responses become final and the round moves to Availability closed. Closing is what makes the round schedulable, so do it even if one or two answers are missing — a round that stays open forever never produces fixtures.
Reuse availability copies a previous round's answers into this one for participants whose pattern does not change week to week. It is a Pro feature, and it is a starting point rather than a substitute for asking.
What happens next
With availability closed you can ask for fixture suggestions — see generate schedule suggestions. For the organizational side of deadlines, missing answers and exceptions, see the guide to scheduling around player availability.