Migrating from Optios yourself

Updated on 2026-10-05

You can move your entire Optios file yourself, without outside help. You do this with the wizard under Instellingen → Overstappen uit Optios (Settings → Switch from Optios). Allow about an hour, most of which is waiting — you can keep cutting hair in the meantime.

We do not ask for your Optios password

That is new since 28 August 2026, and it is a deliberate choice.

The wizard used to ask for your Optios login. That route no longer works: the Optios login address gives us a server error on every attempt, whatever we send along. So we can no longer get in there — and frankly that is just as well, because typing your password from one package into another is never pleasant.

What we do instead: in your own browser you are already logged in to Optios. The fetching happens there. You drag one button onto your bookmarks bar and click it in your Optios window; that button collects your data and sends it to HairConnect. Your password and your login stay on your own computer; we never see them.

What you need

• A computer — not a tablet and not a phone. This works with Chrome, Edge or Firefox. (Safari works too, but for the route with the code you first have to switch on the Ontwikkelaar (Developer) menu; with Chrome or Edge you are done faster. The bookmark button does not need that menu — only a visible bookmarks bar.)
• Your ordinary Optios login as the owner. You type that in at Optios itself, as always — not with us.
• Two tabs that stay open for half an hour to an hour: this screen, and your Optios.

What comes along, and what does not

Carried over: customers (including e-mail and mobile), colour formulas across all years, appointments (future ones too!), services with their processing time, staff members (including those who left), products, brands and stock levels, work schedules and absences, your booking settings, your suppliers and deliveries, — new since 4 September 2026 — your register receipts of the last three years, and — new since 16 September 2026 — who performs which service, including the duration that differs per staff member. Since 5 October 2026 your cash movements (deposits to the bank and other withdrawals) and the opening balance of your drawer come along too.

That last one comes from the Kennis (knowledge) page of your staff member at Optios, and it has not always been there: until 16 September 2026 that list stayed empty and online a client could book a men's cut with someone who does not do them. Whatever could not be linked is listed under Opkuisvoorstellen — never guessed.

Not carried over automatically — each of these is a deliberate choice:

• Cash counts. The counts of your drawer in Optios stay there. Your cash movements and the drawer balance your cash book starts from do come along — see below.
• Gift cards. That is money. You transfer open balances by hand and check them against the Optios overview — verified twice, by you, not by a machine.
• The punch clock. Optios offers no workable self-service route for it. If you do want your punched hours (three-year retention duty), contact us — we do that guided.
• Your salon address, VAT number, phone number and e-mail address. Optios does not hand those over. They arrive empty, on purpose: better empty than invented. Fill them in under Instellingen → Het salon (Settings → The salon).

What happens to your register receipts

Optios has no real way out for register receipts, only the day list and the receipt as you see them on screen. The wizard reads those back day by day, three years deep (or back to your first appointment in Optios, if you were with Optios for less time). That gives HairConnect a sales history: the order proposal sees what you sold, the reports have a past, and "what did this customer have last time" has an answer for visits from before the switch too.

A carried-over receipt is recognisable and stays that way:

• It carries the origin "Optios" and its Optios identifier. It gets no receipt number from your HairConnect sequence.
• It counts in your reports (daily takings, cash book, revenue) but does not go to the accountant: that revenue was declared in the Optios era.
• It does not change stock. Your stock level came from Optios as the current level; deducting the sales once more would count double.
• A receipt that was already taken over does not follow a correction made at Optios by itself: if that day comes by again in a round, it appears on the Clean-up proposals as gewijzigd in Optios (changed in Optios) — unless you already reversed or corrected it here.

What the wizard is not sure of, it does not invent:

• A product is on an Optios receipt by name only. If that name matches exactly one product from your Optios product list, the line is linked. Otherwise the line stands without a product and lands on the Clean-up proposals.
• A staff member HairConnect does not know — not even by name — means the whole receipt is not entered. You see that on the Clean-up proposals and in the final report; nothing disappears silently.
• A payment method on a receipt that did not yet exist in HairConnect (Payconiq, bank transfer, cheque…) is created. The final report says how many.
• If a receipt was on several customers at Optios (a mother and daughter paying together), it hangs on the first known customer here and the others appear as Samen met … (Together with …) on the receipt itself — see The cash journal. This no longer produces a clean-up proposal.
• If the lines of a receipt do not add up to the Optios day total, not a cent is changed: the receipt stands as it was, with a clean-up proposal next to it.
• If Optios reversed a payment on a receipt with a negative amount of the same method (Cash € 100,00 · Cash € -100,00 · Bancontact € 36,80, because there was no change), HairConnect counts what is left per payment method. That receipt then only shows Bancontact € 36,80: no cash came in.

What happens to your cash movements and the opening balance of the drawer

Since 5 October 2026 the money that went into or out of the drawer outside a receipt — a deposit to the bank, for instance — comes along too, and so does the drawer balance your cash book starts from. Without those two, the cash book in HairConnect had no withdrawals and no opening or closing balance, and what went to your accountant did not add up.

• Every deposit separately. On the Optios day list every withdrawal is a card of its own (Cash uitname, with the reason, the register and who entered it). The wizard reads those cards from the same day lists as the receipts: three deposits on one day become three lines, each with its own amount. The reason bank is called Storting naar de bank (uit Optios) (deposit to the bank, from Optios) here; any other reason is added literally.
• Who entered it is filled in when that name matches exactly one staff member here. Otherwise the staff member stays empty and the cash book shows the name exactly as Optios gave it.
• Optios gives no time. The cash book shows only the day for such a deposit.
• The opening balance of the drawer comes from the Optios cash book: the balance at the opening of the day you chose at the top under Facturen vanaf (invoices from) — the start of your books in HairConnect. If you chose nothing, it is the first day the wizard fetched. In the cash book it appears as Beginstand van de lade (opening balance of the drawer) with from the Optios cash book next to it — never as Getelde lade (counted drawer), because nobody counted it. Your first own count takes over from there.
• Every day is checked. The cash movements of a day have to add up to the deposits and withdrawals the Optios cash book gives for that day. If they do not, it goes to the Opkuisvoorstellen. If the cash book sees a deposit on a day in a previous quarter that is missing here, even a top-up round fetches the day list of that one day again.
• Nothing is overwritten or booked twice. A round that runs again recognises what is already there. If Optios later says something different about a day that was already in, or about the opening balance, what is here stays and a clean-up proposal appears. A day that is already with your accountant gets nothing added.
• A deposit into the drawer (such as change) has not been seen at Optios yet, so what such a card looks like has not been measured. It is not entered but goes on the clean-up list, with everything that was on it.

What happens to your invoices

Since 2 October 2026 your Optios invoices and credit notes come along too, from the first to the last. Optios has no way out for them, only the list and the pdf of each invoice. The wizard reads the list and fetches the pdf of every document; from that pdf HairConnect reads the number, the date, the buyer, the lines, the VAT per rate and the totals, as they are on the sheet. Nothing is recalculated and nothing gets a new number.

• Only from a certain date, the start of your financial year for instance? Set it at the top of this screen under Facturen: alle overnemen (invoices: take over all). Whatever lies before it stays in Optios: not fetched, not imported, not on the clean-up list. A credit note follows its invoice. HairConnect does not work out your financial year by itself: Optios does not store it anywhere, and its number series do not switch on a fixed day.
• You find them under Meer → Rapporten → Facturen (More → Reports → Invoices), with uit Optios (from Optios) next to the number. Pdf gives the Optios sheet itself. See Making an invoice.
• An invoice on a receipt hangs on that same receipt here, and its turnover is not counted again. An invoice without a receipt counts in the turnover of its date, a credit note subtracts.
• A pdf travels as a file, not as text. That needs the bookmark button or the Chrome extension from after 2 October 2026. With an older version the errors say De pdf kwam als tekst binnen (the pdf arrived as text); drag the button again or update the extension, and the next round fetches those invoices again.
• A sheet HairConnect cannot read is not imported and goes onto the Opkuisvoorstellen (clean-up suggestions) — it is still in Optios. If the amount in the Optios list does not match the one on the sheet, or the amounts on the sheet do not add up, the sheet is imported as it is with a finding next to it.
• An update round looks back a year in the invoice list (roughly weekly), a month (the first round of the day) or to your previous round (in between). A credit note on an invoice more than a year old only comes along in a full round.

What happens to your customers' messages and consents

Since 2 October 2026 the wizard also fetches, per customer, the messages Optios sent them and the consents on their record (email, SMS and newsletter). That is two requests per customer; for a salon with 6,000 customers this phase takes about three quarters of an hour (measured).

• Optios shows the messages of the last six months; nothing older comes along. You find them on the customer record, Berichten tab, with (uit Optios) next to the status.
• Delivered and bounced come along, read and clicked deliberately do not: Optios tracked that without the customer's consent.
• A consent from Optios arrives as taken over from Optios, date unknown: Optios stores no date with it. A withdrawal in Optios withdraws the consent here too.
• What the customer did themselves in HairConnect wins, if it is newer. Optios gives no timestamp, so every round compares with what Optios said the previous time: if nothing changed there, what is here stays. If it did change, and the customer did something here themselves since the previous round, that wins: we know when that happened, we do not know for Optios.
• A "yes" for SMS does not come along: in Optios SMS is on by default for every customer, and that is not that customer's consent. A "no" does.
• An update round only fetches this for customers who had an appointment in that period, and for new customers. A consent that a customer without an appointment changed in Optios comes along in a full round.

See Messages to and from a customer.

Step 1 — Consent

The first screen tells you what is going to happen and asks for one tick. There is not a single input field on it: no e-mail address, no password.

Two things you should know for certain:

• You do not hand over any login details. Nowhere in HairConnect is there a field for your Optios password.
• We only read. Nothing at Optios is deleted or cancelled, and nothing is changed unless you explicitly ask for it — as for your selling prices (see Selling prices back to Optios below). Your Optios keeps working as before.

The moment of your consent we do record — who, when and which text you literally read — because a complete customer file is moving, and then it should be established that you said yes to that.

Click Start de overstap (Start the switch). You end up on step 2.

Step 2 — Fetching your data

This is the only step where you do something yourself, and there are two routes to it. They do exactly the same thing, and you may switch from one to the other halfway: what is in, stays in.

The short route is the bookmark button. You drag it onto your bookmarks bar once, and after that you click it while you are in your Optios window. One click per round, and nothing to copy.

The route with the code is below it. That one asks five actions instead of one, but it always works — even if Optios one day changes something that a bookmarklet trips over.

The bookmark button

1. Switch on your bookmarks bar if it is not visible: Ctrl + Shift + B (Mac: Cmd + Shift + B). A narrow bar appears under your address bar.
2. Drag the button Haal uit Optios (Fetch from Optios) from the HairConnect screen onto that bar. This is the only thing you drag, and you do it once per round.
3. Open a new tab on client.optios.net and log in as you always do. You have to be really inside: you see your own agenda.
4. Click Haal uit Optios in your bookmarks bar. At the bottom right of your Optios window a dark strip appears with HairConnect in it: We beginnen. Laat dit tabblad openstaan. (We are starting. Leave this tab open.) After that, that same strip says where it is, for example Klanten: 1.200 van 5.989 (Customers: 1,200 of 5,989).

The button only works in your own Optios window. If you click it while you are in HairConnect, it says so and nothing happens. It also belongs to this round: if you start a new round later, you drag the fresh button onto the bar again. The old one then does nothing any more — and that is intended, because it contains a code that is valid for half a day at most.

If you see nothing happen after a click — no strip, no reaction at all — then use the route with the code below. That one definitely works.

Pasting the code, if the button does nothing

The code is on the same screen, under Of plak de code met de hand (Or paste the code by hand). It is five actions, and you do not need to understand anything of what you paste.

1. Open Optios in a new tab

Go to client.optios.net and log in the way you always do. You have to really be inside: you can see your own calendar.

2. Open the console window

In that tab, press:

• Windows: Ctrl + Shift + J
• Mac: Cmd + Option + J

A window slides open — usually on the right or at the bottom — with some grey text and, at the bottom, an empty line with a blinking cursor. That is the console. Do not be alarmed by the clutter already there: those are internal messages from Optios and you can ignore them.

Shortcut not working? Then right-click on the page, choose Inspecteren (Inspect), and at the top of that new window click the Console tab.

3. Copy the code in HairConnect

Go back to the HairConnect tab and click Kopieer de code (Copy the code). The button confirms: Gekopieerd — plak ze nu in je Optios-venster (Copied — now paste it into your Optios window).

Copying not working (that happens sometimes in older browsers)? Then click in the grey box below it, select everything with Ctrl + A (Mac: Cmd + A) and copy with Ctrl + C (Mac: Cmd + C).

4. Paste the code into the console and press Enter

In Optios, click on the empty line at the bottom of the console, paste with Ctrl + V (Mac: Cmd + V) and press Enter.

Does your browser ask you to first type the words sta toe or allow pasting? That is a Chrome safeguard against people who get you to paste something malicious — not an error. Type the words literally in the console, press Enter, and then paste again.

5. Let it run

In the console, a line with an orange HairConnect label appears straight away: We beginnen. Laat dit tabblad openstaan. (We are starting. Leave this tab open.) After that, every so often another line is added saying where it is, for example Klanten: 1.200 van 5.989 (Customers: 1,200 of 5,989).

Go back to the HairConnect tab. There you see the same progress as a list, with a counter per type:

So that you are not left waiting needlessly, the wizard asks for several things at once — at most three, so your Optios is not bothered by it. You only notice that in the speed.

At Appointments something other than a counter appears, namely 47 maanden nagekeken · 12.480 afspraken gevonden (47 months checked · 12,480 appointments found). That is because we look back month by month until before your very first appointment, and most of those months are empty: a counter that only counted "months with appointments" would seem to stand still for minutes on end while work is in fact being done.

The same at Register receipts: 412 van 1.096 dagen nagekeken · 9.870 bonnen gevonden · 9.860 binnen (412 of 1,096 days checked · 9,870 receipts found · 9,860 in). Most days are closing days or holidays, and each of those still costs a page.

Usage goes back three years, day by day. Not from the Stock → Consumption list — that is a five-week worksheet — but from the report behind the History button, which takes any period. One request per day, because that makes every period you ask for later exact: last week just as much as August. That has been verified — the days of a month add up exactly to the month's total.

Three years, the same limit as for the receipts. Further back exists, but it also holds figures that cannot be: one product in 2019 carried a quantity of minus two billion, a counter that overflowed at Optios. Such values are never imported; they go on the clean-up list.

That list holds the product, the quantity and the time. Optios does not keep who scanned the tube, so that cannot come along either.

You are free to keep working in both tabs in the meantime, and you may even close the HairConnect tab and come back later: the fetching happens in the Optios tab. That tab does have to stay open, and your computer must not fall asleep.

If something goes wrong

Everything below can be put right. Nothing is ever lost: what is in, stays in, and the fetching always continues where it left off.

"Je staat niet op je Optios." ("You are not on your Optios.") You pasted the code into the wrong tab — probably into HairConnect itself. Go to the Optios tab and paste it there.

"Je bent hier niet aangemeld bij Optios." ("You are not logged in to Optios here.") The tab is on Optios, but you are logged out. Log in and click the bookmark button again, or paste the code again.

"Je aanmelding bij Optios is verlopen." ("Your Optios session has expired.") That happens by itself after a while, certainly on a long round. Log in again on client.optios.net and click the button there once more (or paste the code again).

"We hebben al een paar minuten niets meer ontvangen." ("We have not received anything for a few minutes.") Usually the Optios tab has been closed or the computer has gone to sleep. Open Optios again and click the button once more.

Nothing happens after a click on the bookmark button. First check that you really are in your Optios window and not in HairConnect. If there is still nothing — no strip at the bottom right — then Optios is holding the button back; use the route with the code, which is not subject to that. Do let us know if that happens: it means something has changed at Optios that we ought to know.

"Deze koppelcode is verlopen." ("This link code has expired.") A button and a code last half a day. Go back to the screen, drag the fresh button onto your bar again (or copy the fresh code), and carry on — nothing is lost.

Your code is no longer available on this screen. That happens if you have logged in to HairConnect again in the meantime. Click Toon een nieuwe code (Show a new code) and use that one. Note: the old button and the old code stop working after that, so do actually drag the new button onto your bar again.

"Er staat een nieuwe, snellere versie van de code klaar." ("A newer, faster version of the code is ready.") You are still running the code from an earlier time. Drag the button from HairConnect onto your bookmarks bar again and click it (or copy the code again and paste it); whatever is already in stays in, and you do not have to redo anything.

There is a message saying we stopped. Then we deliberately broke off because Optios sent back something that was not right — for example the same page of products twice. That is worth half a list, and we do not want to import that. Try again later; if it persists, let us know.

A little list "Een paar dingen lukten niet" ("A few things did not work"). That is no disaster and it does not hold up the rest. Usually it is a single customer file that Optios did not give that second. It is also in your final report, so you can check it afterwards.

Step 3 — Topping up suppliers and deliveries

Usually you do not have to do anything here: your deliveries already came along in step 2. Just check whether the number of delivery pages on the screen is right.

Is it at zero, or is something missing (because you do not have a stock module, for instance)? Then you can still supply the pages by hand:

1. In Optios, open the Instellingen → Leveranciers (Settings → Suppliers) page. In your browser, choose Bestand → Pagina opslaan als… (File → Save page as…) and then "Alleen HTML" ("HTML only"). The file usually ends up in your Downloads folder.
2. Do the same on Instellingen → Merken (Settings → Brands) and on Voorraad → Bestellen (Stock → Ordering).
3. Drag the saved files into the box in the wizard. You do not need to know which file is which — the wizard works that out itself.

Step 4 — Importing

One press on Start de import (Start the import) and everything is placed in your salon. This continues in the background, even if you close the screen — no tab needs to stay open for this any more. You see a progress bar per type.

If something goes wrong, the screen tells you what, and there is a single button: Probeer opnieuw (Try again). That is always safe — everything is recognised by the number it had at Optios, so a second run never creates duplicates.

Step 5 — Reviewing

Afterwards you get a final report: what came in per type, what is waiting in the Opkuisvoorstellen (Clean-up proposals) list and why, and what could not be fetched, if anything. The temporary copy of your Optios data is deleted automatically after the import.

Did it feel like it took long? Then unfold Waar de tijd heen ging (Where the time went). There you see per type how much we fetched, and how many milliseconds of that were spent at Optios and how many with us. Handy for knowing whether it was down to your connection, to us or to Optios.

Below the report sits Volgende stap: opkuis na de overstap (Next step: clean-up after the switch), with a button. It takes you to three steps that put your records in order: first your customers, then your products, and only after that do you ask your customers to confirm their details. How that works is described in Cleaning up after the switch. The block disappears as soon as all three steps are done.

Then walk through this list:

1. Instellingen → Opkuisvoorstellen (Settings → Clean-up proposals) — work the list down to zero. Eight years of records always contain clutter: duplicate customers, swapped names, a "dryer delivery" as a customer file. The import never corrects silently; you decide.
2. Instellingen → Het salon (Settings → The salon) — fill in your address, VAT number, phone number and e-mail address.
3. Diensten & prijzen → Diensten (Diensten & prijzen → Services) — check the processing time in particular. That field is what fills your calendar.
4. Team → Medewerkers (Team → Staff) — set the right order and tick Moet prikken (Must clock in) for those who do. Seeing files like "Oud-medewerker #1234" (Former staff member #1234)? Those are people who no longer have a name even at Optios, but who are still attached to old appointments. Anyone Optios does still know by name gets that name automatically. Give the rest their real name, or leave them be.
5. Team → Afwezigheden (Team → Absences) — review long leave periods.
6. Gift cards with an open balance: transfer by hand and check against the Optios overview.
7. Rapporten → Dagontvangsten (Reports → Daily takings) — pick a day of last month and put it next to the Optios day list. If the total matches, your receipts came over well. The Clean-up proposals say which receipt could not be placed.

Trial runs are allowed — in fact, they are the idea

You can run the whole migration several times: a trial today, another next week, and the definitive one on switchover day. Nothing is ever duplicated. Each new round brings in only the difference:

• New at Optios (an extra customer, an extra appointment) → gets added.
• Changed at Optios → gets updated.
• Unchanged → is left alone. Also — and especially — if you improved something yourself in HairConnect in the meantime: your improvement simply stays.
• Changed on both sides → this is judged per field, not per record. If you corrected the first name here and an address was added at Optios in the meantime, that is not a clash: the address comes in and your first name stays. Only a field you adjusted here and that also changed at Optios in the meantime is a clash: there the import does not choose. Your version stays, and the case appears in Opkuisvoorstellen (Clean-up proposals) with both values side by side, so you decide. The import never silently takes over the e-mail address, and a field that is empty at Optios or shorter than what is here ("Kerkstraat" against "Kerkstraat 4") does not come in: that stays a clash, because you do not throw away a house number because the other side lost it.

After every round, the final report says exactly what happened: so many new, so many updated, so many unchanged, so many clashes.

Two kinds of round: fetch everything again, or only top up

From your second round on, you get a choice:

• Start de overstap (Start the switchover) — the ordinary button in the middle of the screen. It fetches everything again: all your appointments, all your customer records, three years of usage and receipts. Count on half an hour to an hour again. This is what you do for your first switchover, on switchover day, and whenever you are in doubt.
• Alleen bijwerken sinds … (Only top up since …) — the button at the top right, with the date of your last successful round. It only fetches what can have changed since, and takes minutes instead of an hour.

That second button exists for the period in which your old Optios and HairConnect run side by side. That is the idea — a month in parallel is the safest way to switch — but you do not want to wait an hour every week for a handful of changed appointments.

In a top-up round these always come along in full: your customers, your staff, your services, your prices and your products. Optios tells us nowhere what changed about them, so we fetch them every time — together that takes less than a minute.

So your product range comes along too, every round. A product you create at Optios is here after the next round — and that is needed: usage, deliveries and receipts point to it, and as long as the product was missing here, those ended up on the clean-up list. What you changed here stays: a record you renamed, a brand or supplier record you merged, a product you archived. If your change clashes with what Optios says, the case appears under Opkuisvoorstellen (clean-up suggestions) and you decide. Merged brands and records do not come back. HairConnect decides the supplier of a delivery, and the brand, the article number and the supplier of a product itself, following the supplier's price list and not Optios: however Optios splits up a delivery or a brand, or whatever code Optios puts on a product, it changes nothing here and produces no clean-up suggestion. If an article number or a supplier is still empty here, the round does fill it in from Optios.

And what got stuck heals itself. Usage on a product that did not exist yet is booked as soon as the product arrives, and the suggestion about it closes by itself. A receipt line that did not find its product is linked after all — the amounts on the receipt do not change. A delivery with a line to such a product is checked again every round until all its lines have their product. Usage on a product that Optios has since deleted finds its record through the name, a former name or an alias, but only when exactly one record matches. A receipt that was not imported because two staff members share a first name is fetched again, even from a previous quarter. It then comes in under whoever had appointments around that day. If both did, or neither, the receipt stays a proposal. A former staff member stays marked as having left and appears by name on her receipts, her appointments and in the reports. The round's final report says how much was fixed this way.

What does get limited depends on how often you top up. Anyone running several rounds a day would otherwise fetch the same days over and over. That is why there are three settings, and HairConnect picks the one that is due. There is nothing to tick and nothing to remember: the screen says which one is running.

Your diary comes along in full on every round, up to a year ahead. Nothing is saved there, not even in between: an appointment you book today for March belongs in HairConnect this afternoon, not next week. What gets shorter is only how far we look into the past — that is where the bulk is, and where a day's delay hurts no one.

Why three days and not one, for the first round of the day: a hair salon is usually closed two days in a row. That first round therefore has to be able to reach back to the last working day before that.

Selling prices back to Optios

If your till still runs in Optios, it charges the price that is set there. When a product gets a new selling price in HairConnect — by hand, or from your supplier's price list — HairConnect can set that price in Optios as well, so your customer pays the same at both tills.

This is off by default. It only happens in a round for which it was explicitly switched on; ask us, there is no button for it. The next round does not inherit it.

What happens then:

• Only the selling price. Name, barcode, brand and supplier stay in Optios as they are.
• Only where the price was changed here and Optios still charges the old one. If the price changed in Optios itself in the meantime, it is not turned back: the round takes over the Optios price, as always. If it changed on both sides, the case appears under Opkuisvoorstellen (clean-up suggestions) and you decide.
• Never a price of € 0.00, and never a product with an open clean-up suggestion about its price.
• Never lower than in Optios. If Optios charges more than HairConnect, the higher price stays. If you really want to lower it, do so in Optios itself.
• After saving, the price is read again in Optios. Only when it is really there does it count as set back. It then appears in the log under Instellingen → Logboek (Settings → Audit log) as Verkoopprijs teruggezet in Optios (selling price set back in Optios), with the old and the new price in Optios.

It happens during the round, after the customers and before the appointments. The progress list then shows a line Verkoopprijzen terug naar Optios (selling prices back to Optios) with a counter, and the final report says how many prices were set back and how many were not. Whatever did not work is in the error list with the reason; in that case nothing changed at Optios and the old price is still there.

Appointments from HairConnect in Optios too

As long as you work in both, your clients book in two places: on the HairConnect booking page, and through everything still connected to Optios. If an appointment created here is not in Optios, Optios sees a free slot there and may give it to another client.

That is why HairConnect can put those appointments into Optios as well. This is off by default. You switch it on under Instellingen → Overstappen uit Optios (Settings → Switch from Optios), at Afspraken van HairConnect ook in Optios (Appointments from HairConnect in Optios too). You first read what will happen, and nothing happens until you confirm. You can switch it off there at any time, with one click.

What happens then:

• Every appointment created here — booked online, entered in the calendar, or through the rebooking link in a closure email — is also put into Optios: the same client, the same staff member, the same services or the same menu, at the same time. A colour treatment with processing time appears in Optios the way Optios does it itself: the colour, then a gap while it develops, then the next service.
• Before anything is created, HairConnect checks in Optios whether that time is still free for that staff member. If it has been taken in the meantime, nothing is created and nothing is overwritten. You see that clash right away on the migration screen, with Hairlien at the top of every screen and under Opkuisvoorstellen (clean-up suggestions) — with the client, the time and their mobile number, so you can call or email. If you move the appointment here, HairConnect tries again.
• A closure or leave counts as busy too. If the salon is closed at that moment, or the staff member is away — here in HairConnect or in Optios — nothing is created and nothing is moved. Optios itself does not stop such an appointment; that is why HairConnect checks your closure days, approved leave and the Optios roster. You see it as a clash, with the reason: the salon is closed then, the salon is closed in Optios or Ada is away then.
• If you delete an appointment that is already in Optios — while booking through to Optios is on, or because HairConnect put it there itself — HairConnect first cancels it in Optios. Nothing of the appointment remains here; only its number in Optios waits until the cancellation is proven there, and then disappears too. If that does not work (a deposit, a punch card), you get a clean-up suggestion to delete it in Optios yourself.
• If you move or cancel such an appointment here, the same happens in Optios. If there is a deposit or a punch card on it in Optios, HairConnect does not cancel it there: that choice is yours, in Optios itself.
• An appointment that comes from Optios is never changed there — with one exception: if you cancel an appointment with the closure email, it is cancelled in Optios too, so Optios does not fill that day again.
• It only counts after a check. After every change HairConnect reads the day in Optios again. If the appointment is there as intended, it has gone through; if it is there differently, the difference appears among the clean-up suggestions. An appointment never goes twice.
• If a staff member, service or menu cannot be linked to Optios, that appointment does not leave and appears among the clean-up suggestions, with what is missing. A new client who booked online is first looked up in Optios by email address and mobile number; only if nobody matches is the client created in Optios, with what they filled in themselves.

It happens from a computer that is signed in to Optios. We cannot reach Optios ourselves. The appointments leave from a browser in which you are signed in there and the HairConnect extension is running (see Let your computer keep it up to date below). Ideally that is the computer at the front desk. With version 1.3.0 or newer of the extension, that computer gets a signal as soon as something is booked, moved or cancelled here, and the appointment leaves straight away: it is in Optios within a few seconds. How many seconds depends mostly on Optios. HairConnect first checks the day, the rota and the customer, then sets the appointment and reads the day again to verify: five steps one after the other, of which the reading steps take between 0.2 and 0.8 seconds at Optios, measured. With an older version of the extension it happens within two minutes. How to put the new version on the front-desk computer: The extension on the front-desk computer. At the same time the extension fetches your calendar for the next four weeks from Optios every minute, so the free slots on your booking page also take account of what was just booked in Optios. A wizard round also sends appointments across, before it fetches the appointments.

Optios also sends the customer its own confirmation. Optios treats an appointment that arrives this way as one booked at the front desk. If in Optios, under Instellingen → Communicaties (Settings → Communications), Bevestiging afspraak sturen naar de klant via e-mail voor telefonische afspraken (send the confirmation by e-mail for phone appointments) is on, the customer gets Optios's confirmation as well as HairConnect's; for a move, the same goes for Klant op de hoogte stellen van tijdswijziging (verplaatsing) (notify the customer of a time change). Optios cannot switch this off per appointment: there is no field for it in what Optios's own calendar sends. If you want only one e-mail, switch those settings off in Optios — knowing they then also no longer apply to appointments you plan in Optios itself.

If no such computer is on, the appointments wait. Nothing is lost — as soon as a computer with Optios and the extension makes contact again, they leave — but Optios does not see them in the meantime. The migration screen shows how many appointments are waiting, when the last one was proven to be in Optios and when an Optios window last made contact; if appointments are waiting and it has been quiet for ten minutes, Hairlien says so too. Our advice: keep Chrome open on the computer at the reception desk, signed in to Optios, with the extension — at night too, because people book online at night as well.

Confirmations only from HairConnect

An appointment HairConnect puts into Optios counts there as a phone appointment. If the confirmation for phone appointments is on in Optios, your client gets two: one from HairConnect and one from Optios.

That is why HairConnect can also send the confirmation for an appointment booked at the desk in Optios, and an email when an appointment goes to another time in Optios. You switch it on under Instellingen → Overstappen uit Optios, at Bevestigingen enkel van HairConnect, by choosing a moment. Empty means off, and that is the default.

• Only what happens in Optios after that moment. Optios does not say when an appointment was created there; HairConnect therefore looks at the moment it first reads the appointment, and at its number in Optios, which goes up. An appointment that was in Optios for a long time and only now comes into view gets nothing.
• Only in the future, never for history, and never twice for the same appointment.
• Only for clients who want email. A client without an email address or without consent gets nothing; whoever chose WhatsApp gets it there.
• Not for online bookings in Optios. Whoever books on Optios's booking page gets their confirmation from Optios itself.
• A move in Optios gives a move email, also for an appointment that already existed: the move itself is what happened after the moment.
• The message goes out within a few minutes, as soon as HairConnect reads the appointment from Optios — through the extension or a round of the wizard.
• In the client portal, a client cannot move an appointment that came from Optios themselves while sending to Optios is on; cancelling does work, and HairConnect then deletes it in Optios as well. See My colour and My appointments.

As soon as the moment is chosen, the screen shows how many confirmations and move emails HairConnect has sent since, and which settings you switch off in Optios, under Instellingen → Communicaties, with their name as it appears there:

• Bevestiging afspraak sturen naar de klant via e-mail voor telefonische afspraken
• Klant op de hoogte stellen van tijdswijziging (verplaatsing)

Leave the email reminder (48 hours before) on in Optios. HairConnect does not send the reminders yet; as long as that is the case, the reminder comes from Optios. If the appointment confirmation or the move is off under Instellingen → E-mail in HairConnect, the screen says so too — then leave the settings in Optios on, because nothing goes out from here.

What you delete in Optios disappears here too

If you cancel or delete an appointment in Optios, it is cancelled here on the next round — not deleted. It stays in your diary as cancelled, with the reason Bij Optios geschrapt or Bij Optios verdwenen, so you can still see later where that customer went.

This only applies to the days this round actually fetched. A round that looks at a handful of months leaves everything else alone — otherwise one short round would brand your whole history as vanished. And an appointment you moved to another week in Optios is simply moved: it was seen, so it has not vanished.

Appointments created here that are not yet in Optios stay put. They belong on Nog in Optios te zetten (still to be entered in Optios), or they go across by themselves if you switched on sending appointments (see above).

There is deliberate overlap: we look a little further back than strictly necessary every time. A no-show that only gets ticked in the evening, a note added the next day, a correction on yesterday's receipt — those have to come along too. But not every half hour: once a day is ample for that, and whatever even that misses — a correction to an appointment from last month, a customer booking for December — comes along within the week with the weekly round.

Let your computer keep it up to date

If you run Optios and HairConnect side by side for a longer period, there is a way that asks nothing of you at all: the HairConnect extension for Chrome. You install it once, couple it to your salon once, and after that HairConnect updates itself in the background — as long as your computer is on and you are signed in to Optios in Chrome. No button to drag, no tab to keep open, no code.

How to couple it:

1. Install the extension in Chrome. It is in the Chrome Web Store as HairConnect — Optios sync (in Dutch: HairConnect — Optios bijhouden).
2. Go here to Instellingen → Overstappen uit Optios (Settings → Migrate from Optios) and unfold Laat je computer het bijhouden (Let your computer keep it up to date): that section is folded closed by default, click its title. Tick the box with your consent, then click Koppel deze computer (Couple this computer). You get a code that is valid for ten minutes and works once. Without the tick no code appears, and the reason is shown in red.
3. Click the HairConnect icon next to your address bar, enter the code and a name for this computer ("the front desk", "the laptop at the back").

Step by step, with what you see on screen, and also how to load a new version before it is in the store: The extension on the front-desk computer.

And you never have to drag anything again. With the extension, the fetch screen simply carries a Haal nu op (Fetch now) button. One click and it runs — including a full round on your migration day. You do not even need an Optios tab open; being signed in in this browser is enough.

The same screen then shows which computers are coupled, which version of the extension they run and when they last reported in. If none runs version 1.3.0 or newer, a warning appears under Afspraken van HairConnect ook in Optios: an appointment then only goes to Optios within two minutes. Uncoupling is there too, one click; that computer then updates nothing any more.

What the extension deliberately does not do:

• It never starts a full migration by itself. That takes half an hour and touches your whole salon, so it stays a button you press. The product range it does take along, like every round.
• It only reads, unless you explicitly ask for something to be set back, such as your selling prices or your appointments (see Appointments from HairConnect in Optios too above). Nothing at Optios is deleted or cancelled.

If you are no longer signed in to Optios in Chrome, it cannot fetch anything. That shows in the little panel behind the icon, and HairConnect notes it — so the silence does not go unnoticed.

Staying up to date today

If you do not use Chrome, or would rather not install the extension, there is the middle way. Tick Vandaag bijblijven (Stay up to date today) when you start: you drag the button once, click once in your Optios window, and after that HairConnect updates itself roughly every half hour for as long as that tab stays open. Importing happens by itself too — you no longer have to come back and press Importeren.

In the corner of your Optios window there is a small panel saying what is happening and when the next round is due. It carries a Stoppen (Stop) button as well.

It stops by itself in three cases, and that is deliberate:

• you click Stoppen;
• you close the Optios tab or sign out;
• this morning's pairing expires — it is good for half a day and is never extended along the way.

A day session therefore stays inside the day you gave permission for. Tomorrow you start again with one click.

One thing a top-up round cannot see: a colour formula or a remark you changed for a customer who did not come in during that period. Optios tells us nowhere when something was last changed — that has been measured, no filter for it exists. If you miss something, or you are in doubt: just do one full round. That is always allowed and costs you nothing but time.

You always see which round is running. It is spelled out at the top of the screen — including whether this round stays with the past few days or reaches further back — the progress list carries a Soort ronde (Kind of round) line with the date, and the final report shows Bijwerkronde: dagen teruggekeken (Top-up round: days looked back). If that line is not there, everything was fetched again.

Switchover day

Preferably do the actual switch on a closing day:

1. Run one more fetch round in the wizard (Nog een keer ophalen (Fetch once more)) so the last days come in too. Choose Start de overstap there — the full round, so not Alleen bijwerken. Today you want to be certain that everything is in. You then get a fresh button to drag (and a fresh code, if you prefer to paste). This does not create duplicates either.
2. Redirect your booking link to your own address. A good share of your appointments arrives via the old Optios link in mails and QR codes — it must point to you from day one. See Sharing the booking link.
3. Keep Optios running for one more month, read-only.
4. Only then cancel your subscription, and check your notice period — it is usually a yearly contract.

Frequently asked questions

What is in that button, and what am I actually pasting there? The same thing: one readable piece of code with, at the top, a written-out description of what it does. It does three things in a loop: ask HairConnect what still needs to be fetched, fetch that one thing at Optios, and send the result to HairConnect. It writes nothing at Optios and it reads nothing outside Optios. Want to see what is in the button? Right-click the bookmark and choose Edit; it holds exactly the same code as the box on the screen.

Is that safe? I am busy teaching my staff never to paste or drag anything someone sends them. That reflex is a good one and we do not want to unlearn it. So, two things: always take the button and the code from your own HairConnect screen and never from an e-mail, a chat message or a phone call — we never send them to you. And use them only in your Optios window, nowhere else.

Why is there a button and a code? Because we cannot get into your Optios from the outside: the only place where your data is reachable is your own browser, where you are already logged in. The button is the shortest route that exists there. But a bookmark button runs inside Optios's page, and is therefore subject to the security rules Optios attaches to that page; if Optios changes something there, the button can fall silent from one day to the next. The code you paste into the console window is not subject to that. That is why both exist: the button because it is one click, the code because it always works.

Do I have to drag that button every time? Once per fetch round, yes. The button holds a code that belongs to that one round and is valid for half a day at most — exactly like the code you paste. Within that round you may click it as often as you like: after a dropped connection, after logging in to Optios again, or simply to carry on. A button from last month does nothing any more.

May I close the screen? The HairConnect screen, yes. The Optios tab has to stay open for as long as it is fetching, and your computer must not fall asleep. If that does happen: open Optios and click the button once more. Nothing is lost.

Can I run the wizard twice? Yes — see Trial runs are allowed above. Everything is recognised by its Optios number; a second round brings in only the difference and never duplicates anything. Whatever you improved in HairConnect in the meantime stays put.

I want to run Optios and HairConnect side by side for a month. Do I have to wait an hour every week? No. Choose Alleen bijwerken sinds … (Only top up since …) — see Two kinds of round above. That takes minutes. On switchover day you do the full round once more.

I topped up by mistake instead of fetching everything again. No harm done, and you can see it: it is stated at the top of the screen and in your final report. Just run another round and choose Start de overstap this time. Nothing is lost and nothing ends up duplicated.

Can a staff member do this? No. The wizard is open to the owner only: the complete customer file comes across.

I see "Dit Optios-account is al aan een ander salon gekoppeld" ("This Optios account is already linked to another salon"). Then your establishment number has already been claimed by another HairConnect salon — usually a mistake or an earlier trial. Contact us; we will sort it out together.

Where are my product photos and staff photos? They are not fetched automatically in the self-service flow. Just ask us — it is a small finishing touch.