Help Centre › Setup & administration

Practice settings

Your practice's details, branding, which modules are switched on, billing, and how FastVet emails your clients.

Practice settings shape FastVet for your clinic. Most are set once during setup and rarely changed.

Where settings live#

Who can do this

Administrators only.

Home›Settings

The Settings menu holds everything an administrator maintains: users, reference lists, templates and the practice itself. Mint groups the tiles into four columns: Catalogue, Billing, Communications and Practice; Classic shows the same tiles in one block. It is worth reading through once: Price Groups, Suppliers, Send Letter and Integrations are all here.

The Practice Settings tile holds three screens:

Inside Practice Settings	Covers
Practice Details	Name, code, address, phone number, time zone and country.
Branding & Theme	Icon, header bar colour, and the Mint or Classic theme.
Features & Modules	Which parts of FastVet your practice uses.

Billing & Payments and Email & Notifications are separate tiles on the Settings menu. Both are described below.

Practice details#

Your practice name, code, street address, phone number and time zone. The name, address and phone number can be printed on your documents with the substitution codes. The time zone is used to work out today's date and which appointment times have passed in the client portal.

The Country keeps map lookups inside your country. FastVet finds your practice, and each client's address, on the map so that Map can give directions and the client record can show how far away they live. Without a country, an address such as "18 Willow Road" can be matched to a street of the same name on another continent. FastVet can work the country out from a South African, Namibian, Australian or New Zealand time zone; anywhere else, choose it here.

Tip

To check where FastVet has put your practice, use the Google Maps link under the street address. If it is in the wrong place, set the country and save again.

Branding & theme#

Upload an Icon (40 × 40 pixels, jpg, gif or png); it identifies your practice in the app.
Set the Header Bar Colour to match your practice. It is used with the Classic theme; Mint keeps its own green header.
Choose the Visual Theme: the redesigned Mint look or the original Classic one.

Note

The theme applies to everybody at the practice, and takes effect when staff next sign in.

Features & modules#

Switch off what your practice does not do and those screens disappear for everybody. Nothing is deleted: switch a module back on and its records are still there.

Card	Switch	Controls
Services	Consultations	The consult queue and clinical visits.
	Hospital	In-patient admissions and daily ward records.
	Boarding	Boarding stays and their daily records.
	Grooming	The grooming queue and grooming records.
Optional Features	Quotes	Costed proposals the owner agrees to before work starts. See Quotes.
	Loyalty programme	The points programme, and the Loyalty tile on the Settings menu. See Loyalty programme.
	AI features	Voice notes and the Previous Visit Summary. See Voice notes & AI summaries.
	Per-vet availability	Whether bookings follow each vet's working hours. Off by default; see below.
	Stock receiving	Booking a whole supplier delivery into stock, from a photograph of the invoice or typed in by hand, with a Receive stock tile. Any staff member can capture an invoice; only an Admin books it into stock. Off by default. See Receiving stock from suppliers.
	Business accounts	Farms, companies, trusts and other practices as clients, with their contacts, VAT and registration numbers, and order numbers on their invoices. See Business accounts. Off by default.
Client Portal & Shop	Client portal	Whether clients can register and sign in.
	Online booking	Whether signed-in clients can book. With it off they still see appointments you made for them.
	Repeat medication requests	Whether signed-in clients can ask for a refill online. With it off they still see their pet's medication and are asked to phone. See Refill requests.
	Online shop	The client shop and its dispatch queue. Switching it on shows Delivery, and with that a Delivery fee and Free delivery from; see Collection and delivery.

Note

Online booking and Repeat medication requests only work while Client portal is on, but they are switched on separately. You can set them before you switch the portal on.

Per-vet availability: with it off, the only limit on a booking time is the capacity of the appointment slot. With it on, bookings also follow each vet's working hours: reception sees a warning when booking outside them (and can carry on), and clients booking online are only offered times the vet is in. Enter the hours under Vet Availability.

Note

A vet with no hours entered is available at every slot, so switching this on does not empty your diary. Switching it off again loses nothing.

Billing & payments#

Home›Settings›Billing & Payments

Setting	Effect
Currency Symbol	The symbol shown on prices, invoices and statements.
Tax Abbreviation	What your sales tax is called, such as VAT or GST.
VAT Number	Your VAT registration number (the label follows your tax abbreviation, so a GST practice sees “GST Number”). It prints wherever an invoice or statement header uses `#PRACTICEVATNUMBER#`; see Templates. Leave it blank if you are not registered.
Payment Terms	How many days clients have to pay. Statements print it and overdue emails wait for it. A client can have their own terms; see Payment terms. Blank means 30 days.
Prices Read Only	Stops staff changing the unit price when they charge an item.
Hide Tax on Invoices	Shows totals including tax, without breaking the tax out.
Restrict Check Price by role	Doctors and admins see every price; other staff see only the items they can charge. Off means all staff can look up any price.
Statements	Each invoice on its own terms: each charge is due your payment terms after the day it was raised, and no routine statements go out. One statement a month: charges build up and a statement goes out on a day you choose (the 1st to the 28th, or the last day of the month), with everything on it due your payment terms after that. See Statements.
Cash Sales	The client counter sales are charged to. See Cash sales below.
Payment Settings	Your online payment provider: None or PayFast with its credentials. Tick Sandbox mode to test without taking real money. The saved merchant key and passphrase are never shown: leave the boxes empty to keep them, or type to replace them.

Payment methods#

Home›Settings›Payment Methods

These are the ways you can record money coming in. Whatever you call a method here is the word that appears on the payment screens, on your Payments received report and on your accounting export, so name it the way you would say it out loud: the name of your card machine, the bank you are paid into, a supplier promo voucher, an account handed to a debt collector.

You start with four built-in methods: Eft, Card, Cash and Adjustment. Press New method to add your own.

A practice that has added three methods of its own above the built-in four. The chips say how each one behaves.

Setting	Effect
Name	The word written against the payment. Up to 40 characters.
Order	Lowest first, so the method you use all day can sit at the front. Leave it blank and it goes after the numbered ones.
Ask for a reference number	Whether the refund screen asks for a reference. Leave it off for cash.
Offer it at the till as well as on an account	On means it appears on counter sales, the shop and refunds too. Off makes it an account-only method, which is what you want for something like a debt collector.

Press Hide on a method you no longer use. It leaves the payment screens, and the payments already taken under it are untouched.
Press Show to bring it back.
Press Delete on a method you added by mistake. The payments already taken under it still report under that word.

Note

A built-in method can be hidden and reordered but not renamed or deleted. Its name is already written on every payment you have taken under it, and on your chart of accounts, so renaming it would leave your own history answering to a word that no longer exists. If you prefer “VISA” to “Card”, add VISA and hide Card.

Note

At least one method has to stay visible. Hide them all and there would be nothing to press on the payment screen.

Careful

A voucher is not money in your bank. A supplier promo voucher settles the client’s account on the day, but the money comes from the supplier later, and an account handed to a debt collector comes back net of their commission. Both are real payments against the account and both belong on this list. When you reconcile, read them separately on Payments received, where each appears under its own name, and on the accounting export point each one at its own account rather than at a bank account.

Cash sales#

Home›Settings›Billing & Payments›Cash Sales

A cash sale is for somebody at the counter with no account. Every one of them is charged to a single client record, which is what keeps the money in your day summary, your reports and your accounting export alongside everything else.

Search for the client to use and pick it. Choose a record kept for the purpose, named something like “Cash Sale”, rather than a real person: the account is shared by every counter sale you ever make. Interest is switched off for whoever you choose, because the account is meant to sit at zero.

Choosing the client that counter sales are charged to.

Note

Until a client is chosen here, the Cash Sale button does not appear on the home screen. Practices that signed up recently already have one set up. To stop using cash sales, press Turn off cash sales and save.

Careful

If the client you chose is later deleted, this setting says so and the Cash Sale button stops working until you pick another one.

Email & notifications#

Home›Settings›Email & Notifications

Here you choose how your emails are sent, and what FastVet sends automatically.

How Emails Are Sent offers three choices:

Choice	What it means
FastVet mail	Nothing to set up. Emails come from [email protected]. Fill in Replies go to with your practice’s address, so a client who presses Reply reaches you. Leave it empty and replies go nowhere.
Your own mail server	Emails go out through your own mailbox, for example Gmail or Outlook. Fill in the address and the SMTP details your email provider gives you. The saved password is never shown: leave the box empty to keep it, or type a new one to replace it. If you change the server or the user name, type the password again: a saved password is only kept for the account it was saved with.
Your own address, sent by FastVet	Emails come from your practice’s own address, for example [email protected], without a mail server to look after. Whoever manages your domain adds the three DNS records the screen lists, then FastVet confirms them. Until then your emails still go out, from [email protected], and replies go to your address.

Setting	Effect
Email invoices & receipts automatically	Sends the invoice when a consultation, sale, hospital or boarding stay, or groom is finished.
Email reminders	Sends reminders to clients as they fall due.
Email overdue account statements	Sends statements to clients with an overdue balance.
Email the client their account statement when a payment is received	Sets the default. The receptionist can untick it on any payment.
Text reminders	Sends reminders as a text message too.
Text clients the day before an appointment	An appointment reminder by text.
Text clients with an overdue account balance	A text stating the balance. The statement itself is still emailed.
CC the client's alternative email address	Copies the client's second address, where they have one, on every email.
Send Before Payment	Marks invoices that have not been sent to the client in amber on the payment queue, for invoices of at least the amount you give (leave it empty for every amount). Off unless you switch it on. See below.

Note

The text options only appear once you have connected an SMS account, and each is off until you switch it on. Texts are paid for from your SMS account.

Note

Turning the automatic options off does not stop you sending things by hand.

Send Before Payment, at the bottom of Email & Notifications.

Send Before Payment is a reminder, never a block. With it on, the payment queue marks unsent invoices of at least your amount in amber, and a line at the top says the practice wants them sent first. Whether it is on or off, Pay asks before taking payment for an invoice that has not been sent, and the desk can always go ahead; each time it does, the invoice is marked Paid without sending, with who did it.

Note

Send test email sends a real email, so you can check the settings work instead of waiting for the next invoice to go out. It uses whatever is on the screen, so you can test before saving. With your own mail server it goes to your own From Email: leave the password empty to test with the saved one, and if it fails the message under the button says which box to look at. With the other two choices it goes to the address in Send the test to, and the result says which address it came from. A test is not a save.

Tip

If clients say they have not received something, check the email history report first. It shows whether the email was sent.

Reference lists#

These lists keep your data consistent. All are on the Settings menu.

Settings tile	Used for
Breeds Classic: “Breed”	The breed options on a patient record.
Colours	The colour options on a patient record.
Vitals	Which measurements appear on clinical screens. See Setting up vitals.
Consultation Reasons	The reasons offered when booking or queueing.
Client Tags	Labels you put on clients. See Client tags.
Payment Methods	The ways you record money coming in: your card machine, your bank, vouchers, a debt collector. See Payment methods.
Boarding Locations Classic: “Boarding Location”	Your runs, kennels and pens.
Boarding Descriptions Classic: “Boarding Description”	The kinds of boarding stay you offer.
Appointment Slots	The shape of your appointment book.
Suppliers	Who you buy stock from. A supplier cannot be deleted while stock is assigned to it; move those items first, under Suppliers & levels.
Price Groups	Named rates you can charge a client at instead of your everyday prices: staff rates, pensioner discounts, rescue rates, set separately for each kind of item. See Price groups.
Discharge Sheets	Standard client advice you attach to a visit. See Discharge sheets.

Tip

Keep these lists short. Near-duplicate breeds or reasons make reports less clear and data entry slower.

Setting up vitals#

Home›Settings›Vitals

A vital is one measurement your practice records: temperature, heart rate, a pain score, mucous-membrane colour. The vitals in this list are the ones staff see on consultations, hospital days and boarding days.

Each vital has a Name and an Input type, which decides what staff see:

Input type	What staff see	Use it for
Named scale	A slider with labelled points you define: Normal · Elevated · Critical.	Anything judged rather than measured: pain score, hydration, demeanour, mucous membranes.
Numeric range	A slider over a number range, with an optional unit.	Measurements: temperature, pulse, respiration, weight.
Free text	A box they type into.	Anything that fits neither. Free text cannot be compared between visits, so use it sparingly.

Press Add on the vitals list, or open an existing vital.
Enter the Name staff will see.
Choose the Input type.
For a named scale, list the Points along the scale in order, lowest first. For a numeric range, set the Minimum, Maximum and Unit / suffix (°C, bpm, kg).
Optionally choose a Colour and an Icon to make the vital easy to spot.
Tick Allow a comment alongside each reading if staff need to add notes.
Check the Preview, which shows the control as staff will see it, then save.

Tip

Set the minimum and maximum to the realistic clinical range. A temperature slider of 35–43 °C is much easier to use than 0–100 °C.

Note

Editing or deleting a vital does not change readings already recorded; past visits keep showing them as they were taken.

Integrations#

Home›Settings›Integrations

Connections to outside systems: IDEXX for laboratory work, and an SMS provider for text messages.

Screen	What it is for
IDEXX Settings	Your IDEXX VetConnect PLUS credentials. Set up once. See IDEXX integration.
IDEXX Test Mapping	Links an IDEXX test to an item on your price list, so ordering the test charges the item.
IDEXX Reference Data	What IDEXX holds for your account: species, breeds, genders, tests and in-house analysers. Read-only.
SMS	Your text-messaging provider, its account details, your balance, and a test message. See SMS.

Note

Open IDEXX Reference Data when a test you expected is not offered, when you need a test's exact IDEXX name to map it, or to check that an in-house analyser is connected. Each test is marked Reference or in-house.

SMS#

Who can do this

Administrators only.

Home›Settings›Integrations›SMS

FastVet sends text messages through your own account with a provider: SMS Portal, a South African provider that sells prepaid credits, or Twilio, an international provider that charges each message to a money balance. You open and fund the account, and enter its details here.

Choose the Provider at the top of the screen. Only one is used at a time; the other's details are kept if you switch back.

Using SMS Portal:

Sign up at smsportal.com and buy some credits.
In the SMS Portal control panel, go to Settings → API Keys and create a key.
Copy the Client ID and API Secret into this screen. SMS Portal shows the secret only once, so copy it straight away.
Set a Sender ID: the name clients see the message from, up to 11 letters and digits.
Set your dialling code; see below.
Send yourself a test message, then tick Enable SMS for this practice.

Note

Some mobile networks replace the Sender ID with their own number, so a client may see a number rather than your practice name.

Using Twilio:

Sign up at twilio.com, add funds, and buy an SMS-capable phone number.
Copy the Account SID (it starts with AC) from the top of the Twilio Console dashboard into this screen.
In Twilio, go to Account → API keys & tokens → Create API key, choose type Main, and copy the key's SID (it starts with SK) and Secret here. Twilio shows the secret only once.
Choose your From number from the list of numbers on your Twilio account, or press Type one manually instead. Clients' replies go to this number.
Set your dialling code, send yourself a test message, then tick Enable SMS for this practice.

Note

A Twilio trial account can only text numbers you have verified with Twilio, and only with Twilio's sample messages: choose one on the screen for your test. An upgraded account can send anything.

Your Balance is read from your provider: in credits for SMS Portal, or in money for Twilio. A standard text uses one credit or one message charge; a longer one is split into parts, each charged separately. Press Refresh balance to update it. Twilio trial accounts do not show a balance.

Test mode checks and prices messages without delivering them, so nothing is spent. Leave it on while you set up, and turn it off when you are ready to send for real.

Your dialling code, and who can be reached#

Client mobile numbers are stored the way you dial them locally, 082 123 4567. To send a text, FastVet converts them to the international form (27 82 123 4567) using your dialling code: 27 for South Africa, 264 for Namibia, 61 for Australia. No texts are sent until it is set.

It is filled in for you when your practice is created, from the country you gave when you signed up, so for a South African practice it already reads 27. Check it is right for you: it is also what the WhatsApp buttons use to dial a client straight from their record.

Once it is set, the screen shows how many clients can be reached, for example “1,842 of 2,332 clients can be reached by SMS”. The rest have no mobile number on file, or one that cannot be read, and still receive email only.

Tip

Check that figure before you switch on text reminders. If it is lower than you expect, correct the mobile numbers on your busiest clients' records.

Note

Once your dialling code is set you can type test numbers the local way (082…). Until then, use the full international number.

What has been sent, and what it cost#

Home›Text Messages

This screen lists every text your practice has sent, what it cost, and why any failed. Its tile appears on the home screen, next to Follow Up, only when something needs attention: you are low on credits, texts are waiting, or some have failed.

Note

When your credits run out, texts wait rather than being lost. Top up and they go out by themselves within a few minutes.

Careful

Don't send these deletes the waiting texts, and your clients will never receive them. Use it only if they have waited so long they are out of date.

Tip

A failed text says what went wrong: usually a mobile number that cannot be reached. Correct the number on the client record.

Once you have read the failures, press Mark as seen. The home-screen tile stops warning about them, for everyone in the practice. The failed texts stay in the list, marked Seen, and a text that fails later brings the tile back.

What the texts say, and what they cost#

Home›Settings›Manage Templates›Text Messages

The wording of every text your practice sends is on one screen, under Manage Templates. The Manage Templates button on the SMS settings screen opens the same list. Keep the supplied wording or write your own.

Message	Sent when
Reminder	A reminder falls due. The vet's own reminder message is the text; the template adds your practice name and phone number after it.
Overdue account	A client has an overdue balance.
Appointment reminder	The day before an appointment.
Hospital update	Staff text an owner about an admitted patient. It is a starting point that staff finish.
Ready to collect	Staff tell an owner their animal can go home. Staff can edit it before sending.

Every text message on one screen, each with its own credit counter.

Codes such as #PETNAME# are replaced with the real details when the message is sent. Tap a code under the box to insert it. The shaded box below shows how the message will read.

A standard text is 160 characters and uses one credit.
A longer message is split into parts, each using a credit.
The counter under the box shows the length and credits.

Note

Curly quotes and dashes pasted from Word are not standard SMS characters. One of them cuts the limit from 160 characters to 70, so a message costs more. The screen names the character; retype it in the box.

Once you have changed a message, a Default button appears among its codes. Press it to go back to the supplied wording.