Tentative bookings, also called soft allocations, let you plan resources for budgets and deals that are not yet confirmed.
They help you anticipate potential workloads without affecting a person's total scheduled hours until the booking is confirmed.
Productive is rolling out an updated booking form. If your booking form looks different from the screenshots in this article, your organization hasn't been switched over yet: the rollout is gradual. Learn more here.
Creating And Confirming Tentative Bookings
To create a tentative booking:
Open the Resource Planner.
Create a new booking.
In the booking pop-up, select Tentative.
Once saved, tentative bookings are displayed with grey stripes. They do not count toward a person’s total scheduled hours.
Capacity Indicators
Confirmed + tentative bookings on the same day
The capacity indicator shows total capacity, confirmed booking hours, and tentative booking hours separately.
The main number displays only confirmed hours (green or red). A grey overlay signals that tentative bookings exist.
Only tentative bookings
The capacity indicator turns grey.
👉 Learn more in Capacity Indicators.
Confirming a Tentative Booking
When the work is confirmed, click the tentative booking and select Confirm. The booking hours are then added to that day's total scheduled hours.
📌 This change is logged in the booking history.
Tentative Bookings in Reports
1) Bookings Data Source
The Status field indicates whether a booking is Confirmed or Tentative.
You can filter reports to show only confirmed or tentative bookings.
2) Capacity and Availability Data Source
Tentative fields are available, showing time, cost, and revenue linked to tentative bookings.
3) Financial Items Data Source
Tentative bookings appear under the Type field and can be filtered like other types.
They include revenue, cost, and similar details depending on the filters applied.
Tentative bookings do generate recognized revenue, but confirmed bookings are always recognized first.
👉 Learn more about revenue recognition for tentative bookings.
Access to Tentative Bookings in the Resource Planner
All Employee users can see tentative bookings in the Planner, except for:
Staff
Staff with CRM access
Staff with Time access
Staff with Time and CRM permissions
👉 For a full breakdown of permission levels, see Employees, Contractors, Clients and Contacts: An Overview.
