Create your cancellation policies
You've got to set a policy and stick to it! Here's what to do:
Decide how far in advance someone can cancel. What's reasonable for your studio? 24 hours is pretty standard. It's easy to set the window that will automatically disallow cancellations outside your window -- just go to Manage Settings > Online Reservations.
State your cancellation policy clearly on your website. You can add this to the top of your schedule page (Manage Settings > Public Schedule), within your class descriptions (Manage Classes > select the class), and even add a booking agreement to your Punchpass account.
With Punchpass, you can customize the message on the email confirmation that you send for reservations too. For each course you create, you can turn on the option to send reservation reminders and customize the message in the Customer Communications section of your account settings.
Now you've laid the groundwork to start charging for no shows! Please remember to take attendance for each class or turn on the option for Punchpass to automatically mark attendance so you can handle these as they arise.
Handling No-Shows in Punchpass
Punchpass allows you to track your no-shows so you can consistently and fairly follow your policy around these situations.
Have a client that didn't cancel within the window? You can take a punch from their punch card and mark them as a no-show. Here’s how it works:
While you’re taking attendance, you can see all pending reservations that your customers have made.
Here is a video to send to your instructors as a quick demo:
When someone with a reservation doesn’t show up for class, you can click the 3 dots next to their name and select No Show:
If you are in the midst of marking attendance, you can also mark them as attending, click on the dots, and select the No Show.
When you follow these steps, the customer’s pass will be deducted AND they’ll be marked as a no-show for that class.
Managing No-Show Attendances
Navigate to Reports > No Shows & Late Cancels Report to see all of your No Show attendances for a specific timeframe!
Forgiving Attendances
Want to make a one-time exception to your rule and NOT deduct a customer’s pass?
You can edit the no-show attendance, set it to No Pass Assigned, then mark the attendance as forgiven!
Here's how to forgive an attendance
From the class details page, scroll down to the No Show & Late Cancels section, click on the three-dot icon next to the customer name, and press Edit.
This takes you to the Edit Attendance page. Here you'll change the pass assigned to the attendance to "No pass assigned" and press the Change pass used for this attendance button.
From the Attendance overview page, press the Edit button.
And you'll now see the option to forgive the attendance. Press the Mark as Forgiven button.
Your records will still reflect that it was a no-show unless you change that status too.