Simpedia

Winnie B. Colorado

I think we limit ourselves by teaching on a per lesson basis. It seems you are moving past that.
Could you mention that people are paying for the entire year (and perhaps they sign a contract to that effect) and that the monthly payment is simply a monthly average for 1:12 (or 1:10 or however many months your studio runs) of the year’s tuition. Is in any yearly setup, choosing to take time off does not mean the money is not due. (College at mid-class, private school) You could collect the last month of the year in the 1st month (a double payment in the beginning month) which gives you a bit more leverage.

I would say that anyone needing to take off a month can do so by paying to hold their spot, but otherwise, they need to reapply in September,June or January, which are the times I take new students. I do like people to understand that they are committing to an entire year of study when they start the year…(I do give new people one three-month quarter to evaluate before signing in for the rest of the year.) I set this policy in a year when I got several returning people who called about joining the studio a month late after my classes had begun. I rethought the whole thing, and decided I couldn’t run a curriculum with people in and out like that. Which made me realize that it is important for everyone to be there (especially in a class) for the entire year. (This is my policy. Of course I can make individual exceptions if I feel it is merited!)

Good luck!

Laurie Richards, Nebraska

I recently had a parent request that her son take December off. I simply told her I cannot do that. It doesn’t work with group lessons, and it doesn’t work for me. If she would have still pursued it, I would have told her that she would have to drop out, and then rejoin a different class when it worked out for both her schedule and for her son’s level of progress. I would have made it clear that it was taking a chance on not being able to return for a while, and that it’s really hard to get stared again once you’ve had some time off.

I would never want my studio parents to get the idea that they can take unpaid time off whenever they want to. It’s one of those claiming territory issues.

Interesting you mentioned how you changed your policy to include vacation time. I just decided to take an additional two weeks off next year (I have been taking four weeks each year), instead of raising my tuition. Tuition will stay exactly the same.

Annette S. California

I teach in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, and I have five weeks of paid vacation plus one week of unpaid vacation in December. Here’s how it works for me:

I have a monthly fee ($150 for private and $100 for classes). I tell students and parents that they will get either three, four, or five lessons each month.

In December I take the last two weeks off. I offer a holiday bonus to my students/parents for December of a 25% discount for the month–even though they all still get three lessons in December. It makes me feel better about taking the last two weeks of December as vacation weeks. (Hence the one week of unpaid vacation.) And not everyone took the bonus this year–some still paid me the regular fee.

I also offered the 25% discount one month when I ended up being ill the week after one of my vacation weeks. I missed two teaching weeks in a row that month. It hurt my income a bit, but it felt right to do that for my students.

HeatherLee S.

When I was taking my traditional piano lessons, my parents paid on a weekly basis for the lessons I attended. My parents made sure I rarely missed, but when I did the teacher called and offered to squeeze me in somewhere. We didn’t have lessons unless the school buses were running because many of her students (like me) relied on the bus to deliver us to her house. My dad picked me up after my lesson, on his way home from work.

However, I think the idea of how to run a “Home Based Business” has changed since I took my lessons. The lady up the street, runs what she calls a “Day Care”. She charges by the month, and if you want her to look after your child, she makes you sign a contract. The contract says she gets paid for all school holidays as well as any days your child is sick or away! Very similar to any other day care.

In the end I think it is up to each of us as individuals to decide how we want to run our business. If you are at home and you think of your SM business as a hobby then it makes sense to be lax and allow people to pay as they go. But if you think there is any (however) remote chance you will ever have a formal studio, I think you need to treat your SM business like any other modern business.

If you are worried about losing fees, charge by the session instead of by the month. For example, if your first session runs from mid Sept to mid Dec, you can figure out the price anyway you want and still charge a set fee which is due at the start!

Mary R. Michigan

I agree that the month off needs to be paid. If a student is sick and misses a group lesson I assume the parents don’t expect a credit. It’s back to the original enrollment form language—this time is being reserved for you and no credits or makeups can be accommodated. It just doesn’t seem workable to allow people to take unpaid breaks. I have always built vacations in. I follow the school calendar exactly. Some months will have five lessons, some will have three, most will have four, but the monthly tuition stays the same. I claim my brain is too small to handle anything other than set monthly fees and they all laugh and nod and write their checks!

Sheri R. California

Unless you are charging more per lesson to compensate for the “feeless” vacation weeks, I think you may be missing something, namely more income! I was worried to take vacation time because I felt it meant I would be missing part of the income I had come to rely on due to feeling the necessity to credit people missed weeks. I taught continuously in order to not take a cut in salary. Now I take the weeks off worry-free because they are paying for those vacation weeks throughout the year averaged into the monthly fees. I think structuring it this way is a
great idea and I know many teachers had been doing this for years before I eventually and recently ventured forth into what seemed like a proposal that many wouldn’t be happy with (and which the vast majority eased into effortlessly).

Something to think about. . .

Joanne J. (Chris J.)

Hi to all reading this message. Joanne is not available to respond just now but as a business man of many years the answer to this question seems quite simple to me.

1. The first thing to do is establish how much you want/need to earn in a year (12 months). Let’s say, $50,000 a year.
2. Now decide how many weeks you want to teach in a year. Let’s say 48 and you take four weeks leave.
3. This means you must earn $1,041 per week that you teach so as to achieve your annual income.
4. Now take the rate per lesson that you charge and divide that into the $1,041 and that’s the number of students per week you need so as to earn $50,000 in 48 weeks.

If you don’t get the right answer then you have to either, increase your lesson rate, teach more students, work more weeks or accept a lower annual income OR a mixture of all of these so as to achieve your objective of $50,000 a year income.

I hope this helps.

Regards

Chris J. (Jo’s husband).