Community spaces should simplify fees and charges

Jenny has managed to grab 5 minutes in between dinner and putting the kids to bed to try and book somewhere for Matty's 3rd birthday party. She loves the idea of a bouncy castle in her local community hall and heads to the council website to check it out. Her budget is about $300 for the room hire. The space looks great! However, when she goes to check the pricing, her heart sinks. She didn't realise she would need a maths degree to work out whether it's in her budget.

There's an hourly rate, but it's only for the first hour, then it's a different price after that. And it depends if it's profit or non for profit. Jenny assumes kids parties are definitely not for profit!

But hang on, there's a function rate with hourly and half day rates as well. These are different for weekdays and weekends. The weekend hourly is $60 per hour - so 3 hours would be $180. The half day rate is $300. Does that mean half day is 5 hours or more?

She reads on and there is a bond to factor in too. For private 'sit down' functions this is $500 but for 'not sit down' functions this is $1000. Jenny's not even sure she has an extra $1000, what with payday being a few weeks off. Jenny hears a loud crashing sound and the inevitable tears. Looks like this party is not going to get booked any time soon.

The longer it takes to do something, the more likely it is that people will drop out of a process. This is why eCommerce sites spend millions making checkouts simple. Life is busy, there are many distractions. You've probably had something distract you just reading this article! If there is a simpler version available people will do that - sometimes even if it's more expensive. Time is our most precious commodity. Complex fees and other processes means lost bookings.
If customers don't understand something they may feel nervous or unable to ask for help. People naturally don't like to admit they struggle and feel awkward asking 'stupid questions'. This is amplified when there are other barriers like learning disabilities or if English is a second language.
Because it's time consuming and hard to understand, it's actually making the centre less accessible to those in the community who may need the centre the most e.g. vulnerable groups, support groups, working parents, seniors. The tiered rate system also makes some implicit assumptions about who benefits from lower rates, and could be unconsciously penalising members of the community.

Introducing....the hourly price. Ta Dah!

You may be thinking, ‘Huh but we already have an hourly pricing?’ Maybe, but the way you use that hourly price is probably different. The key here is consistency - the hourly price needs to be the unit of currency that everything else can hang from. It's like the lego of room hire. The basic building block is always the same, and because of that you can open up a world of possibilities and opportunities.

When we talk to councils and other community facilities about how they make their bookings processes fair, accessible and income generating we like to use the DAD method - Delegate, Automate and Detonate. A consistent hourly price is the foundation stone to achieving this.

Delegate

If you can help your customers self serve, then you're empowering them to get their booking done without relying on your staff and team. This is great for them as it's a much better customer experience, and it's going to save repetitive energy from your team. Delegation requires pricing to be simple, so that anyone can understand it and ideally not even have to calculate what price they need.

Automate

We can automate so many things when we have consistent rules to build from. Moving bookings online, means that you can automate processes like collecting payment, receipts, bonds and so much more.

Detonate

How much energy is spent correcting customers when they've misunderstood your pricing? Credit notes, refunds, back & forth emails. This is costing you time and money. Keep it simple and these tasks and problems will go away, creating space to spend time on things that grow your centre's income and impact.

Learn more about the DAD principle and how it can massively reduce admin at your facility here.

Read '7 Reasons why your bookings team are frustrated' here

Why community spaces should simplify fees & charges

Why do community facilities make it so complicated for people to understand how much they cost?

In spite of these good intentions, complex fees and charges can end up doing the opposite of what they want to do. It's an anti-pattern.

If the main aim of fees and charges is to be fair, accessible and income generating, then we know it is still possible to achieve this with a much simpler price structure.

This will not only meet the goals, but also unlock so much more in terms of other booking and payment processes.

So what does good look like?

Wanting more help on your fees and charges?

Looking for other ways to increase income for your community space?

18 free or cheap ideas to increase bookings revenue at your community space

5 ways to win grant applications for funding for community groups NZ

Case Study: How St Luke's in Remuera grew their community impact by improving booking processes

Case Study: How City of Vincent increased bookings by 29% in one year