TL;DR:<\/strong><\/p>\n Switching booking software is not a weekend job. Rush it and you will lose appointments, annoy loyal clients and spend weeks chasing missing payment records. Slow down, work through it in stages, and you will barely notice the join.<\/p>\n Here is the order that works:<\/p>\n Pro Tip:<\/strong> Migrate in your quietest week of the year, not your busiest, so a hiccup costs you a handful of appointments instead of a full diary.<\/em><\/p>\n The order matters because lost bookings and duplicated client records both tend to start with data that went in unchecked. If you are moving to Altegio, the Altegio migration playbook<\/a> maps these steps to the settings you will use.<\/p>\n It is easy to assume the GDPR gives your business a right to take its data from one software vendor to another. Portability doesn\u2019t work that way. Article 20 of the GDPR (Regulation 2016\/679) gives the data subject, that is your client, the right to receive the personal data they provided to a controller in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, and to have it transmitted to another controller where technically feasible. It applies where processing is based on consent or a contract and is carried out by automated means.<\/p>\n Your business is the controller of your clients\u2019 data. Your booking software vendor usually processes that data on your behalf, which makes it a processor. So the rules for getting your data back sit in your contract with the vendor. Article 28(3)(g) requires that contract to say the processor, at the controller\u2019s choice, deletes or returns all personal data once its services end, and deletes existing copies unless EU or national law requires them to be kept.<\/p>\n In practice, find the return-and-deletion clause in your vendor\u2019s terms or data processing agreement, ask for your data to be returned before anything is deleted, and agree the format and the date in writing.<\/p>\n Article 20 still matters during a switch. If a client asks for their own data while you are moving, you answer as the controller: Article 12(3) gives you one month from receipt of the request, which can be extended by two further months for complex or numerous requests.<\/p>\n Before you accept an export as complete, work through this:<\/p>\n If Altegio is your new system, most of the move runs through Excel imports. Migration to Altegio is free and comes with onboarding support, so you don\u2019t have to do it alone. Here is what each import takes, according to the Altegio help centre.<\/p>\n Three details that save you a second import:<\/p>\n Most migration headaches come from mismatched fields, not missing data. Before you import anything, build a mapping document that says exactly where each field in your old export lands in the new system.<\/p>\n Prioritise these fields first, because they cause the most damage when they go wrong:<\/p>\n Payment details deserve their own attention. Saved cards are tokenised by the payment provider that stored them, and moving those tokens to another provider is rarely simple. Rather than trying to force old tokens into a new gateway, plan for returning clients to enter card details again the first time a deposit or card guarantee asks for them. In Altegio, online payments run through a connected provider (Stripe, or Adyen in EU countries), and card guarantee works only with Adyen in EU countries.<\/p>\n Test every connected tool with your staged import before you trust it with live clients:<\/p>\n Pro Tip:<\/strong> Run one real transaction through every integration before you widen the import. A \u20ac1 test payment is cheaper than a week of support calls.<\/em><\/p>\n Don\u2019t switch off your old system until you have proof, not just confidence, that the new one works.<\/p>\n Rollback trigger example:<\/strong> if more than a handful of appointments in a single day fail to match between the two systems, pause the cutover and keep working in the old system until the fault is found.<\/p>\n The best migration plan fails if your front desk doesn\u2019t know how to use the new system on day one. Train your team on the new booking flow, including awkward exceptions such as a client who booked in the old system but arrives after cutover.<\/p>\n Roll out client communication in stages rather than one blanket announcement:<\/p>\n Pro Tip:<\/strong> Keep a phone line or WhatsApp number staffed for the first week. Some clients will always prefer to call rather than learn a new booking page.<\/em><\/p>\n Portability covers the mechanics of moving records, but not everything you owe your clients or your suppliers. Start with marketing consent. Under Article 7(1) GDPR, where processing is based on consent, you as the controller must be able to demonstrate that the client consented. That proof doesn\u2019t move by itself: Altegio\u2019s client import has no field for marketing consent, and its booking form only asks for the mandatory personal-data consent. Keep your consent records from the old system, and mark clients who opted out with the Exclude setting in their client card.<\/p>\n If the sender name or brand clients see on your messages changes, tell them before the switch, and ask for consent again where the wording you hold no longer fits who is contacting them. Rules on email and SMS marketing come from the ePrivacy Directive (2002\/58\/EC) and the national laws that implement it, so they differ between EU countries.<\/p>\n Review your contract with the outgoing vendor before you cancel anything. Many booking platforms have a notice period, and cancelling early can trigger fees or cut off access to your own data mid-export. Read the data retention and deletion clauses too: if the vendor will delete your data after a set period, make sure your export is complete and verified before that clock runs out.<\/p>\n If your payment processor is tied to your old booking system, check whether your merchant agreement moves with you or needs a fresh application under the new platform. The same goes for team and supplier contracts that mention the old system by name, such as commission agreements or supplier integrations; they may need a simple amendment rather than a full rewrite.<\/p>\n For a typical single-location business, none of this needs a lawyer. It does need you to read the contracts you signed, rather than assuming portability covers the whole switch.<\/p>\n Something will go wrong. The question is whether you have a plan for it or you are improvising in front of a queue of clients.<\/p>\n Common failure points worth planning for in advance:<\/p>\n Write these down before launch, not during it. A one-page contingency sheet pinned near the front desk, listing who to call and what to check first, saves far more time than it takes to write.<\/p>\n If you are still comparing vendors, judge them on the things that decide whether your next migration is easier or harder than this one.<\/p>\n A migration is the moment your data is most exposed: sitting in export files, sent by email or stored in temporary spreadsheets. Treat it that way. Article 32 GDPR requires controllers and processors to take security measures appropriate to the risk, and names encryption among them.<\/p>\n Encrypt exported files before they leave your computer, and don\u2019t email raw client data as an unprotected attachment. Store backups in a location with restricted access, not a shared drive everyone in the business can open. Limit who has logins to both the old and new systems during the overlap, and remove access as soon as someone\u2019s role in the migration ends.<\/p>\n Never store full card numbers yourself. Rely on tokenisation through your payment provider, and if tokens can\u2019t move, ask clients to enter details directly on the new system\u2019s secure payment page rather than collecting them in a spreadsheet for manual re-entry. Delete temporary export files once the migration is verified and complete: under the GDPR\u2019s storage limitation principle (Article 5(1)(e)), personal data that identifies people should be kept no longer than necessary. Confirm your old vendor\u2019s deletion timeline too, so you are not relying on their servers as a long-term backup.<\/p>\n Every extra tool is one more thing to reconnect at cutover. Altegio puts online booking, the client base, online payments, payroll, finance and inventory in one system for appointment-based businesses (beauty, wellness, clinics, auto, fitness and more), so there is less to stitch back together. Altegio also follows a Zero-Competition Policy: it isn’t a marketplace, so clients book through links that belong only to your business, they don’t see competitors while booking, and your client base is never resold.<\/p>\n Migration is free and comes with onboarding support. You can try the whole setup during a 7-day free trial<\/a>, and the price depends on the number of team members and the billing period (see pricing<\/a>). For the step-by-step Altegio side of the move, read the migration playbook<\/a>.<\/p>\n At least one full pay or billing period is a practical minimum. It gives you enough appointments and payments to reconcile before you switch off the old system, while shorter overlaps make intermittent sync errors harder to catch.<\/p>\n A spreadsheet or CSV file. Article 20 GDPR describes the standard as structured, commonly used and machine-readable, and a PDF or a screenshot won\u2019t import into a new system. Altegio\u2019s client import accepts .csv, .xls and .xlsx files up to 12 MB.<\/p>\n Usually not, since card details are tokenised by your payment provider and those tokens rarely move between providers. Plan for clients to enter payment details again securely when they next book or pay.<\/p>\n Your contract with the vendor decides how and when it happens. Under Article 28(3)(g) GDPR, that contract must say the processor deletes or returns all personal data at your choice once its services end, unless EU or national law requires storage. Ask for the data to be returned before it is deleted.<\/p>\n Clients, services, products and appointments can be imported from Excel. Team members are added in the Team section before appointments are imported, because the names in the file must match the Team member list.<\/p>\n Yes. Migration to Altegio is free and comes with onboarding support, and the migration playbook<\/a> walks through the steps. You can check everything during the 7-day free trial before you commit.<\/p>\n This article is general information, not legal advice. Data protection and marketing rules differ between EU countries, so check your national rules or ask an adviser about your situation.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A staged plan to switch booking software: exports, field mapping, a parallel run, what the GDPR really says, and what you can import into Altegio.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":49337,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[307,304],"tags":[193,90,286],"class_list":["post-49364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adatvedelem","category-menedzsment","tag-booking-software","tag-clients","tag-online-booking"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n
\nPractical migration checklist: your step-by-step plan<\/h2>\n
\n
Data and the GDPR: what portability actually means for you<\/h2>\n
\n
What you can import into Altegio, and how<\/h2>\n
\n
\n
Field mapping, payments and integrations: get the technical detail right<\/h2>\n
\n
\n
Testing, parallel run and verification before you cut over<\/h2>\n
\n
Getting your team and your clients ready for launch<\/h2>\n
\n
Beyond portability: consent, contracts and client communication<\/h2>\n
![\"Do](\"https:\/\/alteg.io\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/switch-booking-software-01.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nContingency planning: what to do when something goes wrong<\/h2>\n
\n
Choosing a new vendor: what actually matters beyond price<\/h2>\n
\n
Security during migration: protecting client and payment data<\/h2>\n
![\"Encrypted](\"https:\/\/alteg.io\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/switch-booking-software-02.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nMoving to Altegio: what the switch involves<\/h2>\n
\n
FAQ<\/h2>\n
How long should I run two booking systems at once?<\/h3>\n
What format should my exported client data be in?<\/h3>\n
Can I transfer saved card details to a new booking system?<\/h3>\n
Can my old vendor keep my data after I leave?<\/h3>\n
What can I import into Altegio from my old system?<\/h3>\n
Does Altegio help with migration?<\/h3>\n
Read next<\/h2>\n
\n