Input on dealing with cancellations

[Bill1234]

I thought this
If they want to have their car worked on make them put 20 down. If they show up, they get 5 of it back. If they dont, you keep the 20.

 

[jrs1418]

I am a weekend warrior as well, and have plenty of people interested in my time, so while I don't require a down payment, I do require their CC info to schedule an appointment for a future date with the terms that if they cancel with less than 14 days notice or they do not show up at all, they will be charged 10% of the quoted price (min. of $20) for wasting my time.

Just an FYI, if you're writing down customers CC# then you must provide them with a privacy statement explaining your procedures of protecting personal info from identity theft. That is why on all receipts the numbers are truncated except for the last few. I suggest you do some research on this or abandon it. There could be a fine involved.

All a customer needs to do is blame you for an erroneous charge on their accounts saying you improperly handled their info and it led to an ID theft.

A better suggestion would be to have them pay the deposit through paypal or something similar, possibly on your website? You email them an invoice, they pay the company, and you have no issues.