Charging The Cancelation Fee - Upset Client Pt. 2

Show Notes

After listening to Episode 15: Charging The Cancelation Fee - Upset Client Pt. 1, you have a great foundation to navigating that sticky situation. 

Now it's time to take a deeper look into your cancelation policy. The outline needs to be solid. That way there are no misunderstandings on the client side. 

This episode will help you iron out your cancelation policy's foundation.

Check out the episode I did on Phorest FM!

Kristen Lumiere on Navigating Sticky Situations & Breaking Up With Salon Clients

What is Reviving the Stylist?

You're tuned into Reviving the Stylist, a business podcast for hairstylists looking to build a dream career that creates financial freedom and flexibility. I'm your host, Kristen Lumiere and as a stylist I've had my share of successes. Building a successful six plus figure business working only three days a week while being able to prioritize my family, travel and buy my dream home. I know it doesn't sound easy, but if you put in the work, I guarantee you'll see results. No matter what your goals are. I'm super stoked that you're here so I can help you crush them. Let's start today's episode.

Kristen Lumiere 0:00
If you're tuned into Reviving the Stylist, a business podcast for hair stylists looking to build a dream career that creates financial freedom and flexibility. I'm your host, Kristen lumir. And as a stylist, I've had my share of successes. Building a successful six plus figure business working only three days a week while being able to prioritize my family, travel and buy my dream home. I know it doesn't sound easy, but if you put in the work, I guarantee you'll see results. No matter what your goals are. I'm super stoked that you're here so I can help you crush them. Let's start today's episode.

Happy Friday. It's Friday fry, as in medium with, you know, salt. And yay, like, yeah, it is Friday, and your girl is back. And I am so stoked to be here with you stove. Because you know, you gotta SoCal girl got a Cali girl. So I gotta say, stoked. That is my word. And I love it. And I am so stoked, again, to be here with you. Because, first of all, we're going to finish up that part two for that sticky claim situation. And today, I really want to talk about cancellation policies. But before I do, I actually want to talk about something that's totally not stylus related, or beauty industry related. I don't know if you knew this about me. But I'm actually a really big book reader. Like I read a lot of books. And recently, I've been doing a lot of these standalone romance stories that are anywhere from you know, 230 to like 400 pages. And I have to give you like my recommendations for ones that I read recently that are like, drop dead good, like so good. So if you like the romance stories, that really just like kind of break your heart completely, and then put it all back together with like all of these fancy, like little pieces and a bow and it's better than like it was then I will tell you right now that the book you absolutely like 100% need to read is it ends with us, it will break your heart completely. But at the same time, you'll still walk away loving every single one of the characters. It's by Colleen Hoover, and I've actually read a whole bunch of her books, but that book, just oh my gosh, it was so good. Like I've got chills right now even thinking and talking about it. It's so so good. And I will tell you that I read all types. I read contemporary romance, I read dark romances, I read fantasy, all types of stuff. I have no like limit on the type of romance and I do like the romance that's just a little bit steamier I'm not really like a big young adult romance girl. I like it when my characters are like kind of, you know, early to, you know, early 20s, I would say to like mid 30s. That's kind of where I identify as because I always feel like I'm still 24 guys like 24 is where I'm at. But I will say that that book is incredible. And then if you like kind of more of like a Hades Persephone type book that has like that type theme but it's not like Hades and Persephone, then Savage in the swan is a really really good fiction like shifter type book. So it has like wearables and FE and that kind of stuff. And this is like totally off like podcast subject but I'm a big like book reader like a really big book reader and I just have a feeling that if you're a book reader too then you're my people and I want to like hang with you. So if you're all about like these types of books, then please DM me on Instagram because I'm actually thinking about starting a book club. So I absolutely want to be able to connect with you 100% And it Okay one more book that I'm going to recommend to that was a really really good your heart will break in the beginning it will be put together it will break again it will be put together even better at the end. So this is another book two which is say you swear so incredibly good. It's by Megan brandy and I absolutely recommend it I am normally like you know grab a book and turn it page by page but I read so many books I actually got a Kindle. And if you are currently using like the Kindle app on your phone to read your books, I will tell you that my eyes like really started hurting when I was using because I read so many books it just is impossible to purchase so many when I was reading it on my phone, I started hurting really bad but when I switched to the Kendall and I don't know if this is true, my eyes well, I know that this part's true, my eyes stopped hurting. And I think it's because the Kindle doesn't have like blue light like your phone does. And it actually looks like you're reading a page out of a book, instead of a screen on your phone, there's no reflection. And I don't get paid by Kindle or Amazon, obviously, to say this, this is just something that really works for me. So if you're a book reader, and you would like to read up on some incredible romance books, then those are the three I got for you right now. And I think I'm going to do some recommendations on books every once in a while. And just because I don't know, I want to connect with more book readers. So like I said, DM me on Instagram, I want to start a book club, even if it's just like an online book club, whatever. I have two other girls right now that we like, go back and forth with this is a book you should read. This book is so good. This is one you should read. I read this and it was great. So again, DM me. Now let's get back to the podcast subject, which is your cancellation policies. So I just want to outline really quick the foundation of what your cancellation policy, you should have bare minimum, you need to have a specific period of time that your clients have to give you in order to cancel without any repercussions. Now, what does that mean? That means that if you cancel outside of 48 hours, then nothing happens, you can cancel that appointment. And you don't have to worry about your card being charged or depositing non refundable. Whatever it is. Now if you cancel at 47 hours and 58 minutes, then you are within that cancellation policy. And no matter what there's going to be some kind of repercussion, what's that repercussion gonna be? That is totally depends on you. I used to make it really complicated, and I had like a 48 hour and a 24 hour. So if someone cancelled within 48 hours is 50% service as someone cancelled within 24 hours, it was 100% of the service cost. Whatever it was at that time, it was too complicated for me. So I actually just decided to make it even less complicated, and way more straightforward. And also at the same time, a lot more like painful if that client didn't give me enough time to fill that spot. So that is going to be your foundational number one, you need to figure out how much time does someone need to give me in order to cancel their appointment. So that way, I can make sure I fill their appointment time with a service that is equal to or greater the amount that they were actually going to get serviced. The second foundational necessity for a cancellation policy is for you to have it put together in an online format that is automated and sent to your client before they even sit in your chair, not something that you pull up while they're seated and have them sign at that time, it needs to be something that is signed before they even scheduled the appointment. Now, that is something that a lot of Salon software's have available, I use riguardo for a really long time. It has a forms app that you can use or has a forms add on or integration I guess I should say that you can use I would 100% recommend if you are a girl user, I believe it is more a month you have to add on but it's well worth it just to have that covered, you need to have it in place as automated, you don't have to worry if someone doesn't sign it, because it's going to be automatically assigned for them to even schedule the appointment with you. So that is 150% necessary. The next thing that I really recommend is that if you decide to take deposits, you have a transfer policy. So you have your cancellation policy. If you cancel within 48 hours, then your deposit is you know, not transferable. Whatever that is with your deposit, you have to state where that deposit goes, the deposit goes towards the appointment. And if you cancel within this period of time, it's not transferable but if you cancel outside of this period of time it is transferable. Or what I did is I made all deposits non refundable and only transferable if I was able to fill that appointment time with a service I was equal to or greater than the dollar amount that they had scheduled on my books to be serviced. Now another thing too, that is just really important is that you get your entire cancellation policy looked over by an attorney that is local to You, that's so so important. Now, you can actually go on a place like Legal Zoom or Rocket Lawyer actually don't think Legal Zoom is probably one that I would recommend rocket lawyers, the one I would absolutely recommend, because they typically have lawyers on staff that can look and see where you are located. Put in all of the legal jargon and all of the verbiage necessary, you have to make sure that everything that you do is 100% clad, as far as the legal side goes, is clad in armor. So you don't have to worry if a client does get pissy and decides to dispute the charge on their credit card, because I guarantee, if you keep a deposit, someone's going to do that, if you don't have that situation, then I am incredibly happy for you. But at the same time, I would much rather you be prepared, just in case, it actually does happen. So that is my recommendation. And when it comes to your cancellation policy, you have to make sure that you have those foundations in place, and you have it clear cut and written out. Now at the top of your cancellation policy, you can have a summary as to what people are actually signing. So that way, they don't have to read through all the legal jargon or whatever it is, you can have like a summary bullet point, maybe a paragraph that states in signing this cancellation policy, you are agreeing to these bullet points. And you know, read further to see exactly what or whatever it may be have a little bit of a summary in the very beginning, just so that client can take you know, a minute or two read through it, make sure they're cool with it. And then they go down to the bottom and sign and that's going to be for the people who just want to get it over and done with don't want to necessarily spend time and read through a page or even two page of legal jargon that maybe they have, like our time of understanding or that they have to like really search their brain to try and like put the pieces together because I know that's me anytime though read through like a legal contract or an agreement. It takes my brain a minute to like put all the legal jargon together. And that's not because I'm stupid. That's because I'm human. So I will just say that maybe a summary would be helpful to have for those clients. 100% recommend doing that. Now that is it. For this episode. I do have to say Happy Friday the 13th because when this episode airs, it is Friday the 13th Holy cow, I you know, I'm an October Baby. I was actually born before the day before Halloween, and yep, that's October 30. You girls Scorpios. So, I will tell you that for some reason, every Friday the 13th I feel like it's Halloween. And I feel like my birthday should be happening soon. I don't know why I think it's just because it's like spooky. And I'm so used to like all of my birthday stuff being like spooky time. I'll tell you right now. And this is a confession. I do not like Halloween. And I think I don't like it because I was born the day before. And everyone always asked me if I was going to do like a costume party for my birthday. And I just got sick and tired of everyone always asking me that. But I'm hoping because my kids are kind of at that cool age where we can start doing like, themed dress up like Halloween like to get like we can be like the Flintstones or we can you know do like Game of Thrones or something like that we can do like cool themed, like family dress up Halloween stuff, maybe I'll think is a little bit more fun, but just want to throw that out there. Thank you so much for listening to today's podcast episode. Don't forget, leave me a rating and review and tell your friends to subscribe because I love I will. First of all, I just love that, you know if you would go and write me a review and tell me how awesome you think I am. Just kidding. Just tell me what you got out of this episode and how you loved it. And also if you have something that you really would like me to talk about on the podcast, you have something that is just burning with like you have a situation or you need like some emotional like love or whatever it is, then you just tell them tell me in the ratings and

review and I will go in and make sure that I get to every single one of those. So thank you. Thank you so much for joining me today and I will see you next Friday. Thank you so much for joining me today on Reviving the Stylist. If something really resonated with you during this episode, take a screenshot share it to your Instagram story and let me know what you love most don't forget to also send it to a friend so that way they can reap the incredible things from this episode too and leave me a rating and review. I'd also absolutely just love to connect with you outside of the show too. So you can find me on Instagram At Kristin dot Lumiere that's L u m i e r e or my website, Kristen lumiere.com. And before I go, I just want to leave you with one reminder. It isn't about living to work. It's about working to live. And that is my goal for you, friend, because you deserve it. I'll see you on the next one.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai