In the early days of my venture into professional gun instruction, I would make a Facebook event and invite people to come. I would not require prepayment - we used the "honor system."
As an example, we would have 20 people select "going" on the event. Come the day of, 14 would show. Several messages that morning of "having to go in to work," or other excuse. Often, it was the same folks. After "John Smith" says "going" and fails to show six straight times, you no longer believe John Smith is going - even when he marks that he is. Even when he tells you he most certainly will be there.
Believe it or not, that makes things difficult for an instructor. Making sure there are supplies and targets for 20 people, then to have those go unused gets expensive. Not a good way to keep prices down.
So, like other major training academies, I was forced to start requiring prepayment. Being in the marketing field made setting it up a breeze. "Class is $150, but is only $120 if you prepay by xxx date. No refunds." Although the uninitiated would think this would lead to lower attendance, it actually increased attendance.
In recent times, the "excuses" come in different flavors:
"I wish the class wouldn't have sold out, I wanted to wait until Friday the 27th (class on Saturday the 28th) to see what the weather would be like."
Well, that's exactly why we advertise and offer prepay discounts, is to prevent 15 people like you from monopolizing the tickets, only to back out if you have a bad hair day due to slightly higher humidity.
"I wish the class hadn't sold out - I don't know what my work schedule will be that weekend."
Tell your boss you cannot work that weekend, Scooter.
Personally, I have taken 10 days worth of training classes in the past 16 months. Each time I made sure my schedule was open in advance - or I intentionally opened my schedule. It rained on me a couple of times - and that made it more fun. On work days or possible work days, I took time off so that there would not be a conflict.
The underlying problems are just two:
People don't want to commit.
People don't want perceived inconvenience.
As noble as it seems to not require pre-payment, it opens you to frustration, annoyance, and needless expense. Pre-payment requires the attendee have 'skin in the game', therefore increases the value of your class.
ReplyDeleteYou may also consider some level of No Refund, up to keeping 100% of the class fee. Because there will always be that guy who may first offer a lame excuse such as you have listed yet then actually show up but show up late and make known he wants you to bring him up to speed, to coddle him to the cost of other attendees. In that case, my response is the start time was posted, the attendee is expected to show up on time and prepared.
This ain't UNICEF.
I've taught a variety of subjects, although none on the shooting arts. Sadly I know the pain of being stood up. Among many other negative aspects, it does set a sour mood or at least is a distraction for the class in the case that others do show up.
The irony is I suspect your classes involve some element of following through but there are those who do not bother to follow through on their word.
Rick
Funny you mention that. I do require prepayment. There are no refunds. And if a person does not arrive in time for the safety briefing (usually right around 8:45 am - class starts at 8:30 SHARP), then that person will not be permitted to participate. All of these are spelled out in the terms & conditions.
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