Limit the usefulness of the Zoom link to exclusively the booked date and time

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
March 21, 2024
5 replies
987 views

In our organization, people use Calendly to book the Zoom room and have their meetings. Unfortunately, the links generated by Calendly often also work at dates and times different from the booked ones. So, for example, let’s say I booked the room for an online meeting on March 30, 8:00 – 9:00 am. I would then receive a Calendly email with the details and the Zoom link, and if I use the link on March 27 at 2:45 pm, it’ll let me enter the room.

The problem with this is that one person can book the room for a particular date and time–receiving one link, and someone else can occupy it–with a different link–right before the meeting. When that happens, those who try to use the room for the booked meeting, receive a message saying “the host has another meeting in progress” and are locked out.

How can I fix this? For example, is there a way to make the links work exclusively at the booked dates and time? If I booked the Zoom room for March 30, 8:00 - 9:00, the link should only work during that specific hour. That way, people would never be locked out of the room for booked meetings.

I hope that wasn’t too confusing.

This topic has been closed for replies.

Best answer by Kelsi

Hello @jillian. I read the article. Thank you. We definitely use the “unique meeting link” option. Each time one of us books the room, we get a different Zoom link. The problem is that, the link is actually functional even days before the booked date and time. Would you please try what I’m saying with your account: book the room and then use the corresponding Zoom link at a different time?

I was hoping there was a way to make the link functional exclusively for the specific time for which it was booked.

Hey there Gerado! Thanks for the update - and for your understanding that I am hopping in for Jillian! =)

So, as it pertains to when links are active, this is totally on Zoom - Calendly cannot change that. I have included some info about it from Zoom below!

Firstly - I have tested this behavior in the past, as you asked, and totally understand what you are talking about. The links become active once they are created and remain active for a year (in most cases - more on this below). I know this is frustrating and I apologize for that!

If you are using unique meeting links for each meeting and this is still an issue - here are some notes from straight from Zoom about their meeting links (pay attention to the third bullet point especially):

Notes:

A non-recurring meeting ID will expire 30 days after the meeting is scheduled. If you restart the same meeting ID within those 30 days, it will remain valid for another 30 days. You can restart the same meeting ID as many times as you would like before it expires.
A recurring meeting ID will expire 365 days after the meeting is started on the last occurrence. You can re-use the meeting ID for future occurrences.
Scheduled meetings can be started at any time before the scheduled time. The links will not expire or become invalid unless it is past the 30-day period for a non-recurring meeting, have not been used for over 365 days for a recurring meeting, or have been deleted from your Zoom account. An instant meeting link will expire as soon as the meeting is over.

With that said (from Zoom) - I am not sure there will be a way to make it so that meeting links do not become active until the date/time of the meeting. This is definitely something I suggest reaching out to Zoom support or Zoom community about! While Calendly prompts your Zoom account to create these links when a booking is made, Calendly does not actually create the links nor does it have any control over these Zoom settings - though I truly do wish I could help more!

I hope this info is useful!

jillian

Community Member

Hi @Gerardo!

Hmm. So there’s 2 different settings for Zoom meetings and I’d be curious to figure out which one your organization is using. We’ve got an article about the integration here if helpful.

The first (and what I personally use) is a unique meeting link for every single new meeting. Each of these has a separate meeting ID and the name of the Zoom meeting matches the name of my event too which in my case is “[Invitee Name] - Community Networking”. This should prevent the issue you’re seeing as the meeting organizer is the host and the meeting is set for a specific time that matches the event.

The other is a personal meeting ID used for all meetings, which I think might be the case for you organization. This one is basically like a conference room. It’s always there and can always be used. The setting for this is partially in Calendly and partially on Zoom. There’s a helpful section about it in the article I shared above.

Hope this clears things up a bit!

G

GerardoAuthor

Community Member

Thank you, @jillian. I appreciate your help a lot 😊. I’ll study the article when I have a bit more time.

G

GerardoAuthor

Community Member

Hello @jillian. I read the article. Thank you. We definitely use the “unique meeting link” option. Each time one of us books the room, we get a different Zoom link. The problem is that, the link is actually functional even days before the booked date and time. Would you please try what I’m saying with your account: book the room and then use the corresponding Zoom link at a different time?

I was hoping there was a way to make the link functional exclusively for the specific time for which it was booked.

KelsiAnswer

CalPal Emeritus

Hello @jillian. I read the article. Thank you. We definitely use the “unique meeting link” option. Each time one of us books the room, we get a different Zoom link. The problem is that, the link is actually functional even days before the booked date and time. Would you please try what I’m saying with your account: book the room and then use the corresponding Zoom link at a different time?

I was hoping there was a way to make the link functional exclusively for the specific time for which it was booked.

Hey there Gerado! Thanks for the update - and for your understanding that I am hopping in for Jillian! =)

So, as it pertains to when links are active, this is totally on Zoom - Calendly cannot change that. I have included some info about it from Zoom below!

Firstly - I have tested this behavior in the past, as you asked, and totally understand what you are talking about. The links become active once they are created and remain active for a year (in most cases - more on this below). I know this is frustrating and I apologize for that!

If you are using unique meeting links for each meeting and this is still an issue - here are some notes from straight from Zoom about their meeting links (pay attention to the third bullet point especially):

Notes:

A non-recurring meeting ID will expire 30 days after the meeting is scheduled. If you restart the same meeting ID within those 30 days, it will remain valid for another 30 days. You can restart the same meeting ID as many times as you would like before it expires.
A recurring meeting ID will expire 365 days after the meeting is started on the last occurrence. You can re-use the meeting ID for future occurrences.
Scheduled meetings can be started at any time before the scheduled time. The links will not expire or become invalid unless it is past the 30-day period for a non-recurring meeting, have not been used for over 365 days for a recurring meeting, or have been deleted from your Zoom account. An instant meeting link will expire as soon as the meeting is over.

With that said (from Zoom) - I am not sure there will be a way to make it so that meeting links do not become active until the date/time of the meeting. This is definitely something I suggest reaching out to Zoom support or Zoom community about! While Calendly prompts your Zoom account to create these links when a booking is made, Calendly does not actually create the links nor does it have any control over these Zoom settings - though I truly do wish I could help more!

I hope this info is useful!

Kelsi - Calendly Community