Cancellation and reschedule policy

Your policy controls what customers can do to a booking after they've made it. It lives in Settings → Policies, under "Changes and cancellations". You and your staff always bypass these rules and can change any booking from the admin side.

Set your rules

Rescheduling and Cancelling are independent, each with its own lock time.

1. 1
   Open Rescheduling, turn Customers can reschedule their own bookings on or off, and if on, set Up to ... hours before the session.
2. 2
   Open Cancelling, turn Customers can cancel their own bookings on or off, and if on, set its Up to ... hours before the session. Save.

How the lock time works

Each lock is in whole hours before the session starts: at 24 hours, a customer can cancel until 24 hours before, then is pointed to contact you. At 0 hours they can change or cancel right up to the start.

The reschedule lock only covers moving a booking to another date or time. Changing the number of spaces follows its own rules:

• Adding spaces is always allowed until the session starts.
• Removing spaces counts as a partial cancellation and follows your Cancelling switch and lock.

Both are separate from your minimum booking notice for new bookings.

Booked the wrong date

For the first 15 minutes after booking, a customer can change the date themselves even when the session is already inside your reschedule lock. It's for the "I booked the wrong day" mistake, so they don't have to contact you. After 15 minutes your usual lock applies again.

It only affects changing the date: cancelling and refunds always follow your Cancelling rules. If you've turned Customers can reschedule their own bookings off, or a private hire is locked, it stays that way.

Refund to card, or give account credit

When a customer cancels within your rules, Session refunds them automatically to their card, and restores any credits they used (see refunds). Instead of a card refund, you can give reusable account credit - a code they redeem against a future booking. Set it under What they get back.

1. 1
   Choose Account credit instead of Refund to original payment.
2. 2
   Set Credit for ... % of what they paid - 100 is the full amount; a lower number (say 80) keeps a slice.
3. 3
   Optionally set Expires after a number of months (blank never expires), then save.

This is the default for every cancellation, including ones you make, though you can still choose a card refund per booking. The customer is emailed their code. The percentage only applies to the cash they paid; voucher, bundle and membership credit is restored in full when a customer cancels within your rules. When you or your staff cancel after the cutoff, that credit is kept unless you choose to return it (see refunds).

To find a customer's credit, open them in Customers: it's under Bundles & vouchers with a Credit badge, its code, what's left and when it expires. To rebook them with it yourself, add a booking for them and click Use next to the credit under Account credit. Every credit is also listed in Offers > Discounts.

To see which codes a cancelled booking's money went back to, open the booking and look at its History: it lists the credit code issued and the voucher or bundle the value was returned to, for example "£8.00 issued as credit CR-SXDA6, £36.00 returned to voucher GV-P6TLR". Bookings cancelled with a whole session are logged once on the session instead.

What customers see

Customers reschedule and cancel from the "Manage booking" link in their confirmation email or, signed in, from your booking page - see customer self-service. When an action is off or locked, the button is replaced with a prompt to contact you. Your FAQs page explains the policy in plain words, written from these settings.

When you move a booked session

When you move a time in your weekly schedule, you choose what customers booked on it can do if the new time doesn't suit: cancel for a full refund, cancel for full credit, or cancel under these rules. The first two let them cancel from their booking until the session starts, even if you don't normally allow it, and their booking says so. Removing spaces still follows these rules.

If they paid you directly (cash or card reader) and cancel for a full refund, nothing is refunded online: they're told you'll refund them, and your cancellation alert asks you to.

Different rules for a single price

Open a price from a session's Prices and use its Changes & cancellations section: Use booking policy follows your default, and Custom sets whether customers can cancel or reschedule, and whether cancelling gives a card refund or account credit.

Private hire is venue-managed by default: customers can't cancel or move it until you choose Custom on the private price and switch on the actions you want. Group bookings follow your policy, but customers can never change the number of spaces in the block online.

Common questions

1. Does "What they get back" apply when cancellations are switched off? Yes - it still decides what customers get back when you or your staff cancel.

2. A customer says they can't cancel or reschedule. The action is switched off, they're past the lock time (and more than 15 minutes since booking, for a date change), or it's a private hire you haven't opened up on its price.

3. Can I charge a cancellation fee? Not as a flat fee - card refunds within your rules are always in full. Cancel it yourself with a lower Refund amount, or give Account credit below 100%.

4. Can a customer move to a different session type? No, only to other dates of the same session. You can move a booking to any session from the admin side.