Fiolo or Google Calendar?
Most animal rehabilitation clinics start with Google Calendar — and at first it's a good choice. Below is an honest comparison of what each tool gives you, and how to tell it's time to switch.
| Feature | Google Calendar | Fiolo |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free (GDPR compliance in practice requires paid Workspace) | From 150 zł net/month; first 30 days free, no credit card |
| Appointment scheduling | Events with a time and a description | Appointments linked to the patient record, statuses (confirmed, cancelled, no-show), recurring visits |
| Rooms and equipment | An extra shared calendar per room | Room and equipment booked with the appointment — occupancy visible as you schedule |
| Patient records | None — notes in event descriptions or outside the calendar | Patient record with treatment history, examinations, treatment parameters, discharge cards as PDF |
| Owner reminders | Manual — you send the texts yourself | Automatic SMS reminders — in development (quotas included in the plans) |
| Packages and payments | A separate spreadsheet, kept in sync by hand | Payments settled with the visit, daily and monthly reports; packages — in development |
| Team schedule | More calendars to maintain by hand | Shift schedules, leave, roles and permissions (from the Team plan) |
| GDPR | Possible, but takes paid Workspace, a DPA and real discipline | A written DPA, full audit trail, data isolation, backups every 24 h |
Honestly: when Google Calendar is enough
- you work alone with a handful of regular patients,
- your records live elsewhere and the split doesn't bother you,
- a few reminders a week are painless to send by hand.
Really — in that situation a dedicated system may be overkill. Come back when the clinic grows.
How to tell it's time to switch
- typing out evening reminder texts has become a daily ritual,
- a patient's treatment history lives in more than one place,
- you've had a room or the treadmill double-booked,
- packages keep drifting out of sync with the calendar,
- you're not sure your data storage would hold up in an audit.
Want the full picture? We covered it in depth on the blog: Why Google Calendar isn't enough for an animal rehabilitation clinic