Booking on behalf of a member
Book a facility for a member from the admin area, change the price if you need to, and choose whether to send a payment request, record the payment or leave it outstanding.
Not every hire starts with the member booking online. A regular hirer phones the club, a committee member agrees a one-off deal, or a hall is booked for a friend of the club at a special rate. An admin can book the facility for the member from the admin area, set the price, and decide how and when it is paid.
You need the Manage Facility Hire permission. See Permissions for how to grant it.
Start a booking
There are two places to start:
- Admin > Facility Hire > Bookings: choose New booking at the top of the list.
- Admin > Facility Hire > Calendar: choose New booking. The page opens with the date you were looking at already filled in, and with the facility too when the calendar was showing just one.
Fill in the booking
- Under Who and where, search for the Member and choose the Facility. The booking is always for a member of your club. You cannot book for someone who is not a member.
- Under When, choose the Date, the Start time and the Duration. The start time is typed in, so you are not limited to a list of slots. The durations offered are the facility's pricing options.
- Under Details, answer any extra questions the facility asks, in the same way a member would when booking online. Required questions stay required. Terms and conditions are not shown, because you are booking on the member's behalf.
- Check the summary on the right, choose how the booking is paid (see below) and select Create booking.
Availability is checked before you save
As soon as the facility, date, time and duration are set, the summary shows either Available, with the start and end time, or the reason the booking cannot be made. A clash with another booking, a blockout, or a time outside the facility's opening hours is shown here, and Create booking stays switched off until you change something so that the problem goes away.
Bookings made by an admin are not held to the facility's minimum notice or maximum advance rules, so you can book at short notice or far ahead. Everything else, including clashes, blockouts and opening hours, still applies. See Availability rules and Blockouts.
Set the price
The summary shows the price the member would pay if they booked online, based on the facility's pricing and the member's package. Select Override price to replace it with any amount you like, including zero. The list price stays beside it, struck through, so you can see what you are changing from.
The booking, the emails the member receives and any payment request all use the amount you enter. If you change the date or duration afterwards on the same page, your amount is kept and only the struck-through list price updates.
A price of zero means there is nothing to pay. The page shows No payment needed instead of the payment choices.
The booking page records who set the price and the list price it replaced, for example "Price set by Alex Admin, list price £40.00".
The price, like the time, cannot be changed once the booking is made. If you got it wrong, cancel the booking and make a new one.
Choose how it is paid
| Choice | What happens |
|---|---|
| Send a payment request | ClubPal raises a payment request for the amount, due on the date you choose. The member pays by the link in their email or from their booking page. |
| Already paid | The booking is recorded as paid in full. Use this for money you have taken outside ClubPal, such as cash or a bank transfer. |
| Outstanding | The booking is confirmed with the amount still to pay, and nothing is sent to the member to pay it. Sort it out later. |
With Send a payment request, the Due date starts as the date the facility's balance is normally due (its Balance Due (days before) setting) counted back from the booking date, or today when that is not set or has already passed. You can change it, but not to a date in the past.
Tick Email the payment request to the member to ask the member to pay now. It is ticked by default. Untick it to raise the request without telling the member, for example when you will collect payment in person and only want it on record.
The booking is confirmed straight away
Whichever choice you make, the booking is confirmed at once and the slot is reserved. An unpaid payment request does not release the slot, and it does not expire. Nothing is held at a checkout, which is different from a booking the member makes online.
The member's card is never charged automatically
For these bookings ClubPal never takes the money by itself, even if the member has a card saved. The member pays only by choosing to, using the link in the email or the Pay now button on their booking page.
What the member receives
The member always gets a booking confirmation email. Its payment section depends on what you chose:
| Your choice | What the email says |
|---|---|
| Payment request, email ticked | It asks them to pay the amount by the due date, with a Pay now button. |
| Payment request, email unticked | It says the amount is still to pay. There is no pay link and no due date. |
| Already paid | It says Paid. |
| Outstanding | It says the amount is still to pay and that the club will be in touch about payment. |
| Price of zero | It says no payment is needed. |
Emails are only sent when the club has email notifications on and the member has not opted out. See Managing bookings.
After the booking is made
Open the booking from Admin > Facility Hire > Bookings. Where the booking was made as Outstanding, or its request was cancelled, the booking page offers two actions.
- Raise a payment request: choose a due date and whether to email the request to the member, then select Raise request. It is offered when the booking has an amount to pay and no open request. With the email ticked the member is sent the request with a pay link, and with it unticked the request is raised silently.
- Mark as paid: records money you took outside ClubPal. You are asked to confirm before it is saved. If a request is open it is closed as well, so the pay link stops working.
While a request is open
The booking page shows the amount and either when it is due (sent, due a date) or that it is overdue (overdue since a date). Not emailed appears when you chose not to email it. Manage in Outstanding Payments takes you to Admin > Payments > Outstanding Payments, where you can send the member a reminder or cancel the request. See Payment requests.
The member sees the same booking on their own page with a Pay now button.
The booking stays marked Payment outstanding while a request is open. It does not change to overdue by itself and no reminders go out automatically. Use Send Reminder in Outstanding Payments when you want to chase.
Cancelling the booking
When a booking is cancelled, by you or by the member, its open payment request is cancelled at the same time, so the pay link stops working. You do not need to cancel the request separately.
What happens to money already paid depends on how it was paid:
- Paid online through the payment request: if the booking is marked refund eligible, ClubPal refunds it for you, as it does for any other booking. See Managing bookings.
- Recorded as paid outside ClubPal (Already paid, or Mark as paid): ClubPal has no payment to return, so the booking page shows that a refund is due and you must return the money to the member yourself.
What is not included
- Repeat bookings. Each booking is made one date at a time.
- People who are not members. Add them as a member first.
- Changing the price or time of a booking after it is made. Cancel it and book again.
- Deposits and discount codes. Admin bookings are paid in full, using the choices above.