The 'maximum appointments per student per parent' option

The Maximum appointments per student per parent option can be set when creating a new conference to restrict the number of appointments a parent can make in respect of a student. It is useful where students are taught by a large number of teachers and the logistics and timings of a conference evening mean that not all parents could see all teachers. This limit never applies to appointments made by an administrator.

• It is not used to stop appointments being made on different dates, that is done by default as long as you set the conference itself up with multiple dates within it.
• It is not used to stop both parents linked to a student from booking appointments. Any parent with a record in your system can make an appointment (since appointments are between a parent and a teacher in respect of a student, not between the student and the teacher). Schools with concerns about both parents being able to book deal with this in different ways: some use Parent Login Codes and only send one code out per household; some are able to use a filter in their SIS to limit the parents that they bring into the system (usually by Priority or Relationship); whilst others accept that, in practice, only one parent will usually book the appointments and deal with any double booking as and when it arises.

For example: a school has 9 classes for a student. When a parent logs in with this option set to  No Limit, they can book all 9 teachers for that student. If you set the limit to 5, the parent will be able to book a maximum of 5 appointments with that student's teachers (if the parent has several students involved in an conference they would be able to book up to 5 bookings for each student.). Once the limit has been reached the system informs them of this.