Book a room with the Outlook Add-In

Open the Robin Add-In in your Outlook calendar and book a room.

Open the Add-In

After an admin installs the Robin Add-In for your organization, it shows in your Outlook desktop or web app toolbar.

1. Open your Outlook calendar and select New Event.

2. The Outlook event composer opens. Expand it to full screen.

3. In the event composer toolbar, select the overflow menu > Robin Room Scheduling & Desk Booking app from your list of Add-Ins.

4. If you are not signed in, sign in with your work email address and accept the privacy terms. If you use Single Sign-On, enable pop-ups in your browser.

5. Select Get Started.

Book a room

The Add-In suggests the best spaces for your preferred office and the number of people in the meeting. It chooses spaces based on permissions, preferred office location, availability and fit.

1. Open your Outlook calendar and select New event or New appointment, depending on your Outlook version.
2. Select the date you need a room in the calendar and fill in the event details.
3. Robin suggests rooms based on your meeting criteria, your recent and frequent bookings, and your location. To see a room's full list of amenities and a larger picture of the space's layout, select "more".

4. Select Add to Event to complete your room booking.

   

   You can also do these things:

   • If your Robin office supports meeting services, select Add a service request and fill in the request forms. Learn more in Submit a meeting service request.
   • Book a recurring event: your Outlook calendar configuration, not Robin, controls whether you can book a recurring event. Your organization's Outlook configuration controls how the event is created. If Outlook detects a meeting conflict in the series, you may get a room rejection email immediately after you book a room.
   • If your Robin office requires booking approval for special rooms, you see "Request room". Select Request Room to submit your booking request through the web dashboard.
   • Add a second room to your event with the “Add another space” option.

   

5. After you add a room and complete the meeting details, select Send in the event composer.

Edit a room booking

As the organizer or creator of the event, you can Change or Remove a room from the event in the Add-In. For more changes, select Edit to open the meeting in the web dashboard.

Meeting attendees can add a meeting room (only). To add a room, an attendee forwards the event invite to the meeting room. Learn more in Add a room to an event as an attendee.

• If there are no conflicts, the room calendar accepts the forwarded invite and the room is added to the event. The organizer and attendees get an email with the updated meeting room information.
• This helps when attendees work in a different location from the organizer. Attendees can book a space in their own office that fits their needs for the same meeting.

When you edit a meeting, the Robin add-in shows the status of your selected meeting space. This helps you find scheduling conflicts quickly and keeps everyone informed about the room's availability.

• Busy: The space is already booked during the requested time.
• Accepted: The space has confirmed the meeting reservation.
• Tentatively Accepted: The space has tentatively accepted the meeting, which shows a potential conflict or pending approval.
• Not Responded: The space has not responded to the meeting invitation.
• Declined: The space has rejected the meeting invitation.
• Excluded: The space is excluded from the meeting because it is unavailable, usually because of meeting conflicts or calendar syncing issues.

FAQ & tips

• Outlook Add-ins support delegate booking for customers running Outlook API version 1.8 + and above. To see if your Outlook version qualifies, see Microsoft's guide.

• Robin syncs events from your Outlook calendar to the Robin web dashboard, room displays and mobile app. It relies on your native calendar rules to recognize conflicts.

• Meetings booked through the Add-In behave the same as meetings booked in Outlook Calendar. To book through the Add-In, users need the correct permissions to book events on the resource calendars.

• When you book events in your Outlook calendar, you book through your own Outlook user account.

• When you book through the Robin web dashboard or mobile app, the booking user makes the reservations on your behalf, unless your office has configured the personal booking settings.

Next, see Book desks with the Outlook Add-in.