1. Payments — the one that catches medspas out
What to look for: whether the software knows the difference between a facial and a prescription, and routes the money accordingly.
This is the feature medspas underestimate and then get hurt by. Stripe and Square are payment aggregators, and their terms prohibit prescription medication sales. Enforcement is automatic and retroactive — accounts get frozen with the balance sitting inside, usually months after boarding, usually without warning.
A medspa selling only aesthetics never encounters this. A medspa that adds semaglutide, testosterone or anything requiring a prescription encounters it eventually. So the question is not "does it take cards" — every platform takes cards — but whether it can keep medication revenue off a rail that will terminate you for it.
Aminova blocks medication charges from the standard card rail in software rather than in a policy document, and routes them to a processor underwritten for that work. If nothing you sell needs a prescription, this does not affect you and any platform is fine.
2. Memberships and packages
What to look for: whether a membership carries an allowance the software tracks, or is just a recurring charge.
Most platforms can bill a card every month. That is subscription billing, and it is the easy half. The half that matters is the allowance — a unit of toxin a quarter, a drip a month, two facials — because that is what the client thinks they bought and what your front desk has to answer for at the counter.
The test question when you demo: at the moment of booking, does the screen tell the front desk whether this appointment is already covered? If the answer is no, someone is checking a spreadsheet or guessing, and the revenue leaks in both directions — clients charged for what they had already paid for, and visits given away that should have been billed.
Aminova draws credits down as visits happen and surfaces coverage on the booking screen before payment is taken.
3. Treatment plans and injectable mapping
What to look for: reusable protocols, and a record of where product physically went.
Aesthetic work is repeated work. The same toxin pattern, the same filler placement, the same peptide course — so the platform should let a provider save a plan once and apply it, rather than rebuilding it per visit.
For injectables specifically, ask whether the software records placement and units per site, not just a total. That record is what makes the next appointment fast and what protects you if a result is disputed.
4. Consultation forms and consent
What to look for: consent bound to the specific treatment, not filed loose in a documents folder.
Every platform has forms. The distinction is whether a signed consent is attached to the procedure it covers, versioned when the form text changes, and retrievable in seconds when someone asks for it a year later.
A consent PDF sitting in a general documents list is technically stored and practically useless. Ask to see what happens when you update a consent form — whether previously signed copies keep the wording that was actually agreed to, or silently point at the new version.
5. Online booking
What to look for: honestly, most platforms are competent here, and some are excellent.
This is the most commoditised feature on the list. If online booking is genuinely the main thing you need software for, booking-first platforms are very good at it and there is little reason to pay for a medical record you will not use.
What varies is what happens after the booking — whether it lands in a chart, whether it knows the client has membership credits, whether it blocks a slot the provider is not licensed or trained for. The booking itself is rarely the differentiator.
6. Reporting
What to look for: whether cost of goods is in the numbers.
Revenue by service, by provider and by month is table stakes. The report medspas actually need and rarely have is margin — revenue against the cost of what was consumed to deliver it.
That report is only possible if inventory lives in the same system as the chart. If product is tracked in a spreadsheet, no amount of reporting sophistication will produce it, because the software does not know what the vial cost or how much of it you used.
7. Loyalty and retention
What to look for: recall on clinical timing, not points.
Points schemes are the visible version of loyalty and the least valuable. For a medspa, retention is mostly a timing problem — toxin wears off on a schedule, a peptide course ends, a package expires. The clients who lapse are usually the ones nobody reminded at the right moment.
So the question is whether the software can trigger outreach from clinical events rather than from a marketing calendar. That is a different capability from a points balance, and it is worth more.
8. The question nobody asks that decides it
Every feature above is worth comparing. None of them will determine your choice as much as this one: does your medspa prescribe?
If it does — GLP-1s, hormones, anything a physician signs for — then the platform needs e-prescribing, and for controlled substances it needs EPCS with DEA two-factor signing. Platforms built for aesthetics and allied health generally do not have it, because their users do not prescribe. Jane App, for example, publishes no e-prescribing or EPCS capability anywhere in its materials; it is built for physiotherapy, chiropractic and mental health, where nobody writes a script.
A medspa that prescribes on a platform without it does not get a worse experience — it gets a second system, and a chart split across two places from that day forward. Every feature comparison above becomes secondary to that, because the split is permanent and it compounds.
If you prescribe nothing, ignore this section entirely and buy on the seven features above.
9. Frequently asked questions
Which medspa software has the best payment features?
The right question is which one keeps medication revenue off a card rail that prohibits it. Any platform will process a card; far fewer will stop a prescription charge from reaching an account that gets frozen for it. If you sell no prescription products, this is not a differentiator and you should choose on booking and charting instead.
Which medspa software has the best membership and package features?
The one where the allowance is tracked, not just the charge. Test it by asking whether the booking screen shows the front desk that an appointment is already covered before payment is taken — most platforms bill correctly and cannot answer that.
Do medspas need an EHR, or is booking software enough?
Booking software is enough until you start putting things into people that require a prescription or carry a lot number. At that point you need a medical record, inventory with expiry tracking, and consent tied to the procedure — and running those alongside booking software means reconciling two systems by hand.
What does medspa software cost?
Published pricing ranges widely and the models differ more than the numbers. Per-practitioner platforms start around $79/month and grow with every hire; flat-tier platforms start higher and do not. Aminova is $199/month for one prescriber with unlimited non-prescribing staff included. Compare on your actual headcount rather than the entry price.
Is this comparison independent?
No. Aminova publishes it and is one of the platforms discussed. Where a competitor figure is stated it comes from that vendor’s own published materials so you can verify it. Feature-level claims about other vendors are deliberately avoided — we have not tested their products, and a feature matrix built on guesswork would be worth less to you than an honest description of what to look for.