What is a PAR-Q?

A PAR-Q (Physical Activity Readiness Questionnaire) is a form used in fitness settings to assess whether a customer can safely participate in physical activity. If you offer fitness classes, you may require customers to complete one before their first class to help identify any potential health risks.

There are 3 ways of using a PAR-Q on Bookwhen:

Creating individual attendee booking fields
Linking to your online PAR-Q
Attaching a PAR-Q to the booking form

Creating individual attendee booking fields

You can add health-related questions to your booking form so attendees complete them during booking. Using Attendee fields ensures that each attendee provides their own details.

Managing attendee responses

If you set these questions as Attendee fields, each attendee will need to answer them every time they book. If they have an account, their previous answers will be pre-filled to save time.
You can access their responses in the booking details or by exporting a CSV report.
Keep in mind that adding lots of questions or complex formats can make the form longer for both you and your customers.

Linking to your online PAR-Q

Instead of adding multiple questions to your booking form, you can include a single question about the PAR-Q and provide a link to the full form.

For example, if you set up a Yes / No booking form field with the statement "I confirm that I have completed the health questionnaire":

Attendee details screen with arrow pointing at a health questionnaire hyperlink

To set this up:

Select Settings, then Booking fields from the left-hand menu on your account.
Select the Attendee details tab, then Create a field:
Ensure the Attendee details field type is selected, then select Yes/No option within the Data type drop-down menu:
Select Continue to confirm the selection and open the setup screen.
Add the consenting statement under Field label. For example: "I confirm that I have completed the health questionnaire":

Adding your link
- There are various questionnaire hosting options, such as Google Forms, Zoho, Jotform or SurveyMonkey. Once you've decided on your preferred tool, you can create the questionnaire and add the booking question link.
To add your link and text to the field, you will need to add code to the Additional details field. For example:
Once added, select Create field.

Code example

Example of a PAR-Q code:

<a href="https://www.surveymonkey.com/test1727ge117" target="_blank">Fill out our health questionnaire.</a>

The line of code includes the following:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/test1727ge117	Link to your survey.
target="_blank"	Ensures the survey opens in a new tab (so the customer doesn't lose their booking).
>Fill out our health questionnaire.</a>	Text of the hyperlink (i.e. the word displayed as the hyperlink).

✨ Learn how to add an electronic signature on Google forms.

Consent field

If you'd rather create a consent field instead of a Yes/No option:

Select Settings, then Booking fields from the left-hand menu on your account.
Select the Consent tab, then Create a field:
For consent fields, you can only select Check box - for capturing consent:
Select Continue to confirm the selection and open the setup screen.
Add the consenting statement under Field label. For example: "I confirm that I have completed the health questionnaire":
Add the code to the Additional details field, then select Create field:

How the consent field appears during checkout

💡 The Checkbox – for capturing consent field defaults to a booking field, meaning the system will only ask it once per booking, no matter how many attendees are included.

The Checkbox – for capturing consent field appears on the Booking details page of the checkout as a singular checkbox. For example:

Booking details screen with arrow pointing at a consent question

Attaching a PAR-Q to the booking form

You can add your health questionnaire as a document attachment to a booking form field. This allows customers to download it but not fill it in during the booking.

However, you'll need to follow up with them to return the completed form via email. This method can make it harder to track submissions and locate the file, as it's not stored online.

Adding the field to specific entries

You can add the field to only specific entries in your schedule. To do this:

Open your Scheduling page.
Select the relevant entry, Edit entry, the Booking form tab, then Select & reorder fields:
Use the Select & reorder option to add, remove or reorder the fields in your booking form. Once selected, use the plus "+" and minus "-" signs to add or remove them from the form:
You can also choose whether or not it is a mandatory requirement by selecting Set mandatory fields within each relevant entry.
Once finished, select Save form, then save your entry by selecting Save or Save & Exit in the top right-hand corner.

Adding the field to all entries

If you'd like to add the field to all entries:

Ensure you have already created the field by selecting Create field in the creation screen.
Once you select Create field, we will redirect you back to the main booking fields screen.
From there, select the three-dot menu next to the field, then Edit field:
Scroll down to Restrictions and select Add to all entries: