Prepayments are the most effective way to avoid costly no-shows and late cancellations. In addition, asking for a prepayment is a great way to generate a cash flow, and you can even use prepayments to sell tickets for events.
With Tickets, you can create and offer unique experiences and promotions on your website. Per Ticket, you can decide whether you want to ask for a prepayment. And there are different ways how you can ask for a prepayment.
Start by creating a Ticket as per usual. Is it your first time creating a Ticket? 📌 Read this article to learn how you create your first Ticket.
Once you added a photo, Ticket title, and description you can scroll down to Price and set up a prepayment. Note that you first have to connect with a payment provider when you want to start working with online payments.
📌 Read this article to learn how to connect a payment provider to Formitable.
There are three ways to ask for a prepayment:
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Ask for a prepayment of a full amount
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Ask for a deposit instead of an entire amount
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Charge a no-show fee by asking a credit card guarantee
1. Ask a prepayment of a full amount
Select 'Full amount' when you want guests to pay the full Ticket price in advance and fill in the amount guests have to pay in advance when making a reservation.
❗The amount you fill in is the amount guests have to pay in advance per person.
This option is useful when you have, for example, a set menu of which you already know the exact price. Or when you have a group package with a set menu. But also, when you organize a special event for which you want guests to buy a ticket in advance.
💡 Don't forget to set up a refund window in which guests can cancel prior to the reservation and still receive a full refund of their prepayment.
2. Ask for a deposit instead of the full amount
Select 'Deposit' if you want guests to make a prepayment of any amount of your choosing regardless of the total price.❗The amount you fill in is the amount guests have to pay in advance per person.
This option can be useful when you don't have a set menu or don't know in advance what guests will actually pay at the end of their night out. Or simply when you don't need them to pay the full menu price in advance but are just securing they will cancel on time.
💡 Don't forget to set up a refund window in which guests can cancel prior to the reservation and still receive a full refund of their prepayment.
3. Charge a no-show fee
❗This option is only available when you use Stripe as a payment provider. 📌 Read this article to learn how to set up Stripe for online payments.
Choose this option when you don't want guests to pay an amount in advance, but instead, you want to charge their credit card in case they don't show up for their reservation (without canceling). Fill in an amount you will charge per person. Read this article to learn more about how to work with credit card guarantees.
Once you've decided what type of prepayment you are going to ask, there are some other items to consider.
Display a full menu price
If you do have a set menu, you can choose to display the full menu price, so guests know what to expect. Switch 'Show a full price' on and fill in the amount for the full menu or package.
No Payment. Not asking for a prepayment? You can still show a full menu price. Switch 'Show a full price' on, under 'No payment and fill in the amount of your menu or arrangement. Guests won't have to make a prepayment but can see upfront what the menu will cost.
Full amount. Are you asking guests to make a prepayment of the full amount? Then you will naturally fill in the full menu price here.
Deposit. Are you asking guests to pay a deposit instead of the full amount? Switch 'Show a full price' on as well if you also want to display the full menu price.
No show fee. Are you asking for a credit card guarantee? You can display the full menu price at the same time by switching 'Show a full price' on.
Display a discount
Sometimes you want to show guests that your original menu is more expensive or worth more than the price you're currently offering. You can switch 'Show discount from price' on to do so. This way, you can show, for example, that your 4-course-menu used to be €75 p.p. , but you now offer it for only €67,50 p.p.
Important! You'll only be able to use this option when you also display a full menu- or arrangement price (otherwise it doesn't make sense to show a discount). 💡 At 'discount from price', you fill in the original price.
Set a refund window
Set up a period prior to the reservation in which guests can cancel and still receive a full refund of their prepayment.
Again you can decide per Ticket what the refund window will be. You can choose one of the given time frames or set a custom period and even add a specific time until guests can cancel.
What's next?
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Do you want to promote one or more of your Tickets? Pin them to the widget as a highlight, so they will instantly pop up when guests visit your website.