A parent texts you just after lunchtime. Lesson's at 4pm. Their child can't make it; they're going to a friend's house straight from school. Do you charge? Do you offer to reschedule? Or do you let it go again and feel quietly resentful for the rest of the day?
If that scenario feels familiar, this episode is for you.
In this episode:
Why cancellation policies are the number one thing music teachers struggle with
The real cost of not having a clear policy, in time, income, and emotional energy
What my cancellation policy looks like and how I put it into practice
How to communicate it to parents without sounding harsh or unapproachable
What to do when a parent pushes back
The mindset shift that made enforcing it feel a lot less daunting
Links mentioned:
If this episode resonated, the free Studio Policy Template is a good place to start. It gives you the exact wording you can adapt for your own studio, so you're not starting from scratch.
If you find this episode useful, I’d be so grateful if you could leave a review on Apple Podcasts: it goes a long way in helping other music teachers find my podcast!
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Part 1: Why cancellation policies matter
Picture this
Picture this. You get a text from a piano parent just after lunchtime saying their child won't be able to make it to their lesson this afternoon. They're going to their friend's house straight from school. Do you charge for the lesson? Do you offer to reschedule? Or do you just let it go again, because the whole thing feels uncomfortable, and accept that's just the way things go for music teachers?
I'm Victoria. I started teaching piano part-time 18 years ago alongside a career in pharmaceutical market research, and I made pretty much every mistake you can make when it comes to running a teaching business. But today I run a thriving studio from my home on the south coast of England, with students I love and a waiting list I'm proud of. I started this podcast because I want that for you too.
If you've ever said yes to a reschedule you really didn't want to do, felt your heart sink when your phone buzzed with another last minute cancellation, or found yourself putting off increasing your fees for another year because the timing never feels quite right, this is the podcast for you. I've been there and come out the other side with a teaching business that lights me up every single day, and I'm here to help you do the same.
Protecting your time
Today's episode is all about cancellation policies and why you need them in your business. Studio policies might seem like a bit of boring paperwork, but they really are so important for your studio. Not just to run your studio in a professional way, but to protect your time, to protect your income, and also to protect your own self-worth. That might seem a bit deep for something like a cancellation policy, but this episode will help you understand why it's so important for your studio.
If you don't protect your time, you'll be giving it away without really thinking about it. When you automatically reschedule lessons, the time you reserved for that student is gone, and you can't get it back. And when you reschedule, you reschedule into time that was set aside for something else. Even if there was nothing in your calendar and it looks like free time, that time was there for something. It could have been time spent on admin tasks, or on your own piano practice. And when I say your own piano practice, I mean piano practice for yourself, not preparing student repertoire for another lesson. It could even be free time, downtime, which is really important.
If you're currently in the mindset where all free time is available time for teaching work, I get where you're coming from. This is where I used to be as well, until I discovered the importance of downtime.
Protecting your income and your relationships
Coming back to another cost of not having proper cancellation policies, a really obvious one: money. You're going to lose income. If you set aside time that you can't then use for anything else, you're effectively giving away a lesson for free when you reschedule it. Or you're directly refunding the money if you choose to refund lessons.
Another cost of not having proper studio policies is that it creates a dynamic between us and our piano parents or students that doesn't support what we need as music teachers. It doesn't support the teacher, student and family relationship. What ends up happening is that, unbeknownst to the piano parent or the student, they end up taking more of your time than they've paid for. They don't realise; they're just asking for a reschedule, or just telling you they can't come. But it can leave us feeling like we're being taken advantage of.
So if you have a particular student who cancels frequently, a good student-teacher relationship can turn into a not so good one quite quickly. If this habit develops and there are no boundaries in place, it can become an unhelpful relationship that interferes with the process of teaching the student effectively.
Part 2: My policy and how I communicate it
Having a policy but not believing in it
When I first started teaching, I had a lot of advice from my childhood piano teacher, who is a good friend today. She's in her 80s and she lives just up the road from me, and it's wonderful. She gave me a lot of advice on how to get started, including her template for her studio policy agreement. I read it and thought, "Okay, yep, I'll do this. She's told me to do this, and she's a great teacher who's made a great success of it her whole life." So I used it.
But the problem is that I didn't reinforce my studio policies. What she had in there was similar to what I have today, except mine is a bit tightened up. Her studio policies were that lessons missed would not be refunded, but could be rescheduled at the teacher's discretion. So she would offer reschedules if she had space, basically. And lessons missed by the teacher would be rescheduled or the fee refunded.
That's in my policy as well, because I suffer with a lot of migraines. If I need to cancel, and most likely it's because of a migraine, I will cancel the lesson and refund the student directly as soon as I can, when I can see again and use a computer. That works out fine for me, so that I can keep the same monthly amount. But we can talk more about that in another episode.
The point I'm making here is that even though I had quite a robust studio policy in the beginning, and I would share it with new students and they would read it, I didn't get them to sign it more than once. I didn't have an annual re-signing of the agreement, so it was easy to forget details. And the second anybody asked to reschedule, I just said okay. I got that immediate feeling, that clenched stomach: "Oh, but I don't reschedule my lessons. Oh, but I can't... yeah, okay, fine, sure, whatever."
I didn't have my policy straight in my head, because I didn't believe in it and I didn't support it. I didn't believe that I deserved to run my studio in that way. And if you feel like that, I know how you feel, and it's fine. But it's something we all need a bit of support with, and that's why I'm doing this podcast.
My cancellation policy now
My studio policy is that I do not offer refunds at all, and I don't reschedule any lessons, no matter what the reason is, with one exception, and that is bereavement. If the reason the student can't come to the lesson is that a family member has died, or they are attending the funeral of a family member, then I will automatically refund the lesson. I don't reschedule lessons because my studio is full. I just don't have the time.
When I say for any reason except bereavement, that includes sickness. If the child or the adult is sick and they can't come to the lesson, I don't refund the lesson, because if you refund every lesson for every student who is unwell, you will quickly be out of pocket in a big way.
This is an area that I know a lot of teachers feel quite guilty about, because clearly the student didn't want to get sick, and the teacher feels like the student is maybe being punished for getting sick by not receiving the lesson they paid for. However, it's impractical to try to accommodate all the illnesses that any of your students could get at any one time, and to take that on your shoulders in the form of lost time and lost income. It's just not feasible.
In the beginning, you might think, "Well, if I've got five students, of course it doesn't matter. I can find the time, it's just one lesson here or there." And I'll admit that's exactly what I did in the beginning. Before I had my studio policies, I refunded every single cancellation if I wasn't able to reschedule it. And I rescheduled wherever they could fit. So you can imagine what my teaching schedule was like. It was all over the place. I didn't have a structure that worked for me; it was chaos. And as I got more and more students, I just couldn't keep up with it, so it became more and more difficult.
If you're in that situation, please don't worry. There is a way out of it, and that is what this podcast is all about. I provide support to help you go from that situation to one where you are comfortable, where everybody knows the boundaries, where everybody is happy and on board, and you are able to concentrate on what you do best, which is your teaching.
So my policy is no refunds except for bereavement, and no reschedules. Now, if a student cancels during the week and I know that slot is therefore available, I will offer it to someone else who has to cancel, if they can make use of that slot. So I'm not opening up any new lesson slots. I'm taking from the schedule I've already set out for my teaching, and I'm just slotting people around. Obviously, most of the time this doesn't work out, because it has to fit precisely with the gap left by the person who has cancelled. But when it does work, it's great, and I can offer it.
I explain where that slot came from, and that's quite important to do, so you don't make them feel like you've made a slot available specially for them. I make it clear that it's because someone else cancelled, and that's why I can give them that lesson slot.
How I communicate my studio policies
There are a couple of different ways I communicate my studio policies. Every year I get all of my students to sign up for the next academic year. I run my studio from September through to August. I don't teach in school holidays, so I'm not teaching in August or any of the school holidays, but it runs from September to August as a 12-month agreement. All of these policies are laid out in that agreement, so they have them in writing.
I also send an email out to my whole set of students and parents pointing out the key points in my studio policies, which they're all very familiar with unless they're new to me. So it's duplicated by email, and I also give them a paper copy during the lesson. This is normally just before half term in the summer term, so that they can sign up for the next academic year's lessons and get the agreement back to me before we stop for the summer holidays. So that's how I work the timing. They get the physical copy in the lesson, and they have an email with the main points and the agreement attached so that they can read through it, and if needed, we discuss it in person in the lesson.
I also do this for all of my trial lessons. One of the things I include in every trial lesson is a copy of my studio policies that I give them to take away, so that they can read through and understand exactly how my studio works before signing up for lessons. That way there are no surprises and everyone knows how it works. This helps a lot when it comes to supporting your policies, which is harder than it sounds.
Part 3: Supporting your own policies
When families push back
Something that's inevitable is that piano parents or students will push back at some point on some area of your studio policy. That's fine; that's human nature. The skill you need to develop is learning how to support your own policies and not undermine them. That involves a bit of a mindset shift, which might sound a bit tricky, and I won't lie, it is a bit uncomfortable the first half dozen or dozen times. But it does get easier, and it's in your best interests, and in the best interests of your entire business and your relationships with your piano families, that you support your own studio policies.
So if a piano parent or student comes to me, either by text or in person, and says, "Oh, I can't make this lesson. Can you reschedule to another time?", you need to be very clear without over-explaining, and just say, "I'm sorry, I can't reschedule lessons. I'm sorry that you'll miss it."
It's really hard not to over-explain and not to add a justification, because your whole body is screaming out to justify this policy you have, but you don't need to. The reason you don't need to is that the second you start adding reasons, it opens up the dialogue for a debate, for a discussion, for ways to negotiate. And it's not something to negotiate. These are your policies, this is the way your studio runs, and you don't reschedule lessons. "So I'm afraid you're going to miss the lesson." And that's it.
Like I said, it does get easier with time, but in the beginning it's one of those awkward things that none of us want to deal with. It's in everyone's best interests to do it, though.
The mindset shift
The mindset shift I mentioned earlier is a key part of this, and it won't happen overnight. Believing in your studio policies is what takes you from a person who teaches piano but doesn't run a piano teaching business, to a professional who knows how to run their business, has good working relationships with their students and piano families, and doesn't suffer from the crippling guilt, indecision and self-doubt that come with not supporting your own policies.
The first time I held the line
Shortly after introducing my cancellation policy, I received a casual text from a piano parent saying their child couldn't come to the lesson that day, and could we reschedule? As a rule follower, I find it very difficult to understand when everyone is on board with your studio policies: they've read them, you've discussed them in person, they've signed to agree, and then they go and ask for a reschedule. It feels quite uncomfortable for me, because I think, "Well, I wouldn't do that. If I knew reschedules weren't offered, I wouldn't go and ask for one."
However, putting that aside, because they had texted me, I texted back. I kept it nice, short and brief without being too formal, because this is an area where some people fall down. They're uncomfortable reinforcing the boundary, and the language can come across as a bit condescending; that's probably the best word I can think of. You don't need to use extra formal language. It just needs to be clear without over-explaining.
So I replied and said, "Oh, I'm sorry so-and-so can't come for their lesson today. I don't reschedule lessons, so it will be a missed lesson. Look forward to seeing him next week." Full stop, and that's it.
You go through the process of writing this, and then your mind starts going haywire, and you think, "Oh, this feels really uncomfortable. How are they going to respond to this? Are they going to be really upset? Is this going to make things awkward the next time I see them in person?" All the drama that can go on in your head.
But what happens 99% of the time is that you send the message and get one back saying, "Okay, thanks for letting me know," or, "Okay, that's fine. See you next week." And it's fine. It really is fine, and it's nothing to feel guilty about, or to feel like you're imposing a big burden on them. And do you know why? Because they have signed the agreement to have lessons with you, knowing that this is the way your policy works. If they want to have lessons with you, that's the way your studio works, and that's it. You didn't force them to come and have lessons with you. They chose you, and that's what you need to remember.
Where I am now
As time went on after I had introduced my cancellation policies, these requests came less and less often. I'm now in a place where all of my students and families have been with me for so long that everyone understands how it works, and no one questions it. I don't get any awkward texts or requests in person. And it's wonderful, because I'm not wasting my energy and my time worrying about how to respond to these messages, or how to remind people, while feeling a little bit awkward, that no, I don't reschedule lessons, and no, I can't refund your lesson because you're unwell.
So things are a lot, lot better now, which is why I want as many music teachers as possible to understand that this is okay. It's okay to run your studio like this, and many, many companies do. You might think, "Well, that's a company. That's a bigger thing than me. It's just me teaching students." But let's use the gym example: you would never expect to get a gym class refunded because you missed it because you were ill. It's been paid for, the time is there, you've missed it and you've missed out, so you lose the money. You don't get any money back, and it shouldn't be any different for us as music teachers.
To finish
If you take one thing away from this episode, it's that studio policies aren't about being bossy. They're about protecting your time, your income and your energy, so that you can show up and be the best teacher you can be without burning out, and without losing all that extra time and money that means you need to take on more students to make ends meet. This is about creating a schedule and a structure for your business that is sustainable.
If you don't have a studio policy already, I have a free studio policy template. It's got the exact wording that you can adapt for your own studio, so you don't have to start from scratch. All the formatting's been done. I think it's really lovely; I've done a good job. It's the exact one I use with all of my students, and I just update it every year with the new figures and details. You can access it via the link in the show notes.
Thanks for listening to this episode. It's been wonderful to share this with you. If you enjoyed this episode, I would be very grateful if you wouldn't mind giving me a rating and sharing it with any music teachers you feel could benefit from this show. Thanks very much. Bye bye.
