Connect an Office Pod to Skedda Scheduling: Setup Guide

A shared calendar or a sign-up sheet taped to the door only works until two teams show up for the same booth at once. Skedda, a room- and space-booking platform, turns a physical pod into a bookable resource with its own rules, so staff reserve a slot from a phone or laptop instead of walking the floor to check if a Quell Office Pod Solo is free. Instead of manually tracking bookings on a whiteboard, set the pod up as a Space in Skedda once and the calendar does the checking for you.

Why this matters

An office pod that isn't scheduled gets treated like a broom cupboard: whoever gets there first keeps it, and everyone else waits outside on their phone. Soundbox Store's range runs from single-person phone booths tested to ISO 23351-1:2020 with 30–35 dB of noise reduction up to six-person meeting booths, and each size gets used differently — a solo pod turns over every 20 minutes for calls, a meeting booth might be held for an hour-long client review.

A booking layer like Skedda doesn't change the pod itself. It changes who gets to use it and when, which is the actual bottleneck once a team has more people than pods. Get the setup right once and the pod runs itself; get it wrong and you'll spend the first month fielding "is this thing free" messages.

Before you start

• Admin access to a Skedda venue. You need permission to add Spaces and edit booking rules — a standard user account can't do this.
• A floor plan or room list. Name each pod's Space to match a physical label staff can actually see ("Solo Pod – 3rd Floor", not "Pod A"), or people will book the wrong one.
• The gotcha: Skedda doesn't add turnaround time between bookings automatically. Without a manual buffer, a 30-minute call booked back-to-back with the next reservation leaves no gap to actually leave the booth — it looks like a double-booking on the calendar even though the slots are technically separate. Fix this in step two below, before you roll the pod out to the whole team.

Set up your pod as a Space

1. In Skedda, open Settings, then Spaces.
2. Click Add Space and name it to match the pod's physical location and size — for example "Meeting Booth – 2 Person, 4th Floor".
3. Set Capacity to the pod's occupancy: 1 for a solo booth, up to 6 for a larger meeting pod, matching the size range Soundbox Store sells.
4. Under Booking Window, cap how far in advance staff can reserve the space. A high-traffic solo pod usually needs a shorter window (24–48 hours) than a meeting booth booked for client calls (up to two weeks).

Expected result: the pod now appears as a selectable Space on the venue's booking calendar, ready for rules.

Configure booking rules and access

1. Open the Space's settings and set a Minimum Duration and Maximum Duration — short minimums stop people blocking a solo pod for a whole afternoon "just in case".
2. Add a Buffer between bookings in the same panel. This is the fix for the gotcha above: a 5–10 minute gap gives the previous occupant time to leave before the next booking starts.
3. Set a daily Quota per user if one team keeps monopolising the pod.
4. If the venue runs Single Sign-On, restrict booking under Access Control to your company's email domain so external accounts can't reserve internal space.

Expected result: staff can only book within the hours, durations, buffers and daily limits you've set — no manual policing required.

Share the booking link with your team

1. Copy the venue's public booking URL from Skedda's sharing settings.
2. Generate a QR code from that URL and place it near the pod's door, or inside on a small card holder.
3. Pin the link in the team's intranet page or group chat so it doesn't get buried.

Expected result: anyone with the link or QR code sees live availability and books directly, without messaging an admin first. For guidance on managing this across a whole floor, see the office pod booking and scheduling guide.

Sync pod bookings to Outlook or Google Calendar

This is the second workflow worth setting up alongside the first: teams that already live in Outlook or Google Calendar won't check Skedda directly unless they have to.

1. In Skedda, open the Space's Sharing settings and copy the iCal feed URL.
2. In Outlook or Google Calendar, add that feed as a subscribed calendar.
3. Bookings made in Skedda now show up on the connected calendar, refreshing on whatever interval that calendar provider uses — usually under an hour, not instantly.

Expected result: anyone checking their own calendar sees pod bookings without opening Skedda at all.

Troubleshooting

• Two people show up for the same slot. The buffer is set to zero. Go back into the Space's settings and add a 5–10 minute gap between bookings.
• The booking link points to the wrong pod. The Space name doesn't match the printed floor label. Rename the Space to match the signage on the door exactly.
• Calendar sync feels delayed. iCal feeds refresh on the receiving calendar's own schedule, not the moment a booking is made — refresh manually if a slot needs to show up right away.
• Someone outside the company books the pod. Access Control isn't restricted to your email domain. Lock this down under the venue's Access Control settings, not just the individual Space.
• Quota isn't being enforced. Quota rules apply per Space, not per venue — check the setting is switched on for that specific pod, not just the general venue defaults.

Customise the workflow

Once one pod is running cleanly in Skedda, the same setup scales across a floor: add a Space per pod, keep naming consistent, and let quotas do the fairness work instead of a manager. If access control matters more than scheduling on its own — restricting who can even open the door, not just who booked it — pair the booking rules above with a smart lock system on the pod itself.

For teams deciding how many pods to list in the first place, working out sizing before rollout saves a re-do later.

Pods worth listing as Skedda Spaces

Quell Office Pod Solo

1-person soundproof phone booth for private calls, Zoom meetings and focus work.

£4,969.50

Office Phone Booth Folio - Stand Up

Stand-up phone booth for short, high-turnover calls between desks.

£3,999

Office Phone Booth Quell - 2 Person

2-person soundproof meeting booth for private conversations and small reviews.

£6,824.50

FAQ

One last thing

The setting most teams skip is the buffer, and it's the same setting that fixes clutter, not just scheduling clashes. A 5-minute gap after each booking gives the last person time to tidy the desk and grab their coffee cup before the next meeting starts — skip it, and the pod looks unbooked but feels permanently occupied.

Related guides

• How to choose the right office pod size
• How to set up a meeting pod in an open office