MS Bookings - issue with access

Dear @Lizzie Hobbs, 

Good day, and I appreciate the clear explanation of your concern.   

Based on the behavior you described, this usually happens when the invitation to the new shared Bookings page is not fully approved, or when there is a licensing or configuration difference for the affected user. 

Please see the following workarounds that will help you verify the issue:  

Option 1: Re-invite the user and accept the invitation again 

Step 1: Remove the affected staff member from the new Bookings page. 

Step 2: Add the staff member again and make sure the option to send a notification email is enabled. 

Step 3: Ask the user to check that their browser is fully up to date. If possible, advise using Microsoft Edge. 

Step 4: Ask the user to open an InPrivate or Incognito browser window. 

Step 5: Have the user sign in at office.com using the work account, then go to Apps, open Outlook and select the Bookings invitation email. 

Step 6: Select Accept from the invitation. This should open the Bookings page and display a confirmation for joining the shared booking page. 

Step 7: If the shared Bookings page doesn't appear immediately, ask the user to refresh the page a few times and allow up to 30 minutes for synchronization. 

Option 2: Reach out to your organization’s IT administrator for further verification 

Note: These steps require help from an IT administrator. 

1/ Check the “Require staff approvals” setting 

If “Require staff approvals” is enabled, the staff member must approve access before becoming bookable. In some cases, this approval process doesn't complete correctly. 

• Temporarily turn off the “Require staff approvals” setting in the Microsoft 365 admin center > Settings > Org settings > Bookings. 

• Remove the affected user and add the user again. 
• Ask the user to open the new notification email in Outlook and access the shared Bookings page directly. 

With this setting turned off, the staff member should be able to access the shared Bookings page without manual approval. 

2/ Verify licensing and mailbox requirements 

Since other users can join successfully, it is important to check what might be different for this specific account. This also requires an IT administrator. 

Go to Microsoft 365 admin center. 

Navigate to Users, then Active users, and locate the affected user. 

Open Licenses and apps. 

Unassign and then reassign the license to refresh it.  

Ensure the user has the appropriate licenses, including Microsoft Bookings and Exchange Online. 

Select Apps and confirm that the Bookings and Exchange online are enabled. 

3/ Contact Microsoft Support 

If the issue continues after completing the steps above, I sincerely recommend reaching out to your IT administrator to create a support ticket via Microsoft 365 Admin Center > Support > Help & Support for further investigation.  

A technical support engineer can perform a remote session to investigate the situation, verify the backend configurations, and run any necessary synchronization tools to resolve the problem. If the issue requires further attention, they can escalate it to a specialized team for deeper analysis.    

As a moderator, I don't have the tools to investigate your specific account directly because this is a user-to-user support forum. Moderators and contributors, including external Microsoft employees, cannot directly intervene in Microsoft product features or access back-end systems. Our role is limited to providing technical guidance on reported issues, requests, or ideas. However, I will try my best to guide you as clearly as possible.   

I hope this information is helpful. If you have any questions or need further support, please don’t hesitate to reach out at any time. 

Thank you for your patience and understanding. 

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The staff member must explicitly accept membership to the new shared booking page from within Bookings. Until that happens, the staff status remains “not bookable (pending for approval)” and the page will not appear under Shared booking pages.

Have the affected staff member do the following:

1. Open Bookings (via the Microsoft 365 app launcher or the link in the invitation email).
2. On the Bookings homepage, look for any membership prompts. If there are pending invitations, a pop‑up appears asking to review membership details for shared booking pages that they’ve been invited to.
3. In that pop‑up, select the new shared booking page and then select Accept.
4. After accepting, the shared booking page should move into the Shared booking pages list with state Accepting bookings, and the staff member will become bookable on that page.

If the pop‑up does not appear, remove the staff member from the new shared booking page and add them again so a fresh invitation is sent, then repeat the steps above.

References:

• Accept membership to a shared booking page
• Add team members to Bookings
• Shared Bookings Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)