Private sessions

Private sessions aren't separate sessions in Session. You add a Private price to a normal session, and the moment a customer buys it the whole session is reserved for them.

This is different from other platforms, where you'd keep a parallel calendar for private bookings. In Session, every session is bookable in any of the ways you choose to price it.

What you can do with it

• Offer private hire on any communal session without creating a duplicate
• Choose which sessions offer it - add a private price only where you want sole-use bookings, and leave it off sessions like sound baths or events
• Sell it side by side with your other prices, like standard, concession, and a "bring a friend" group price
• Give customers an automatic "Private hire" filter on the booking page, so they can find sessions they could book privately
• Override the private hire price on a single session or date, for example a discounted off-peak slot on a quiet weekday

How private hire works

A Private price type reserves the whole session - every space in it. So a single private hire purchase fills the session, and the communal prices disappear from that session for new bookings.

Because a private booking holds the entire session, it's venue-managed: only you and your staff can change or cancel it - customers are asked to contact you instead. That protects you from a whole-session booking being cancelled out from under you online.

Add a private hire price

Prices live on the session itself, so you add private hire to whichever sessions should offer it. See price options for the full walkthrough; the private-specific steps are:

1. 1
   Open a session on the Sessions page and find the Prices panel.
2. 2
   Select Add a price, then Create new (or Copy from a session if you already have a private price elsewhere).
3. 3
   Name it - for example "Private hire" - and set the Price for the whole session.
4. 4
   Set Price type to Private. It will reserve the whole session; a note confirms how many spaces that is.
5. 5
   Save. The session now offers private hire alongside its other prices.

Override the price for one date

For a one-off change - say a discounted private hire on a particular Friday - open that session date from your admin calendar and edit its price there.

1. 1
   Click the session date in your admin calendar.
2. 2
   Open the Prices section and click Edit on the private price.
3. 3
   Set a new price and save.

A single-date price beats the session's price, which beats the org-wide default - so you only ever set what's different. See instance overrides.

The "Private hire" calendar filter

When any of your sessions offers a private price, customers automatically get a Private hire filter on your booking page. Selecting it hides every session that can't currently be booked privately, so it doubles as an availability filter for private bookings - the simplest way to give customers a "show me all the private slots I could book" view, with no separate calendar to maintain. You don't set this up; it appears whenever private hire is on offer.

Common questions

1. Which price gets the member discount? The session's default price - the one with Use as the default price turned on. Member discounts and included sessions are priced from it, so set your standard rate as the default rather than the private one.

2. Can a customer cancel a private booking themselves? No. Private bookings hold the whole session, so only you and your staff can change or cancel them - customers are pointed to contact you. A group booking is different: customers can cancel or reschedule it online under your policy, they just can't change the number of spaces.

3. A session's other prices vanished - why? Someone booked it privately. A private hire purchase reserves the whole session, so the communal prices drop off that date for new bookings until it's cancelled.