Cancelled swimming lesson dilemma

[PandaOrLion]

DS (2yrs) has weekly swimming lessons. We pay for the term. Lessons are in a hydrotherapy pool at a school, other swimming lesson companies use it too on other days. Lessons are about £9.50pw.

When we arrived yesterday, the teacher apologised and said we couldn’t have a lesson as there was poo in the pool from the lessons the day before and she needed the school site staff to run the cleaning procedure.

She said we would either get a refund or a free session next term - our choice.

Im assuming she will have lost a days income due to this - our lesson was at 8:15 and they are back to back for most of the day. I’d like to say don’t bother, just keep our money, it’s not her fault. It’s not a huge amount but she will have lost out on hundreds because of someone else not reporting it yesterday.
DH says we should take a refund. What would you do?

She may have insurance that covers this eventuality so perhaps enquire if she has lost income first?

I assume she is self employed?

If your child is sick and you can’t go you can bet you’ll still have to pay even though it’s not your fault! Take the refund. The swim school may well have a contract with the pool that they don’t pay for the hire/get compensation if the pool is unusable. This is a hazard of the business and will be considered when pricing up the lessons.

Remarkably similar to what happened to us earlier this week 👀

It's good of you to be kind hearted, but unless you know the details of her contract with the pool, or her insurance situation, I'd keep the Ts and Cs you've agreed to.

She’d charge you if your child was sick?
Then take the refund

Don't patronise her. Take up the refund/free lesson.

Take the refund/free lesson things like this are part of her business and she will hve encountered it before. There is often poo, vomit, heating not working etc etc. To tell her to keep the money is patronising.

I don't understand how offering for her to keep the money is patronising. It seems a kind thing to do - you were expecting to spend that money, it's mentally accounted for so you wouldn't be losing out.

But I agree with others that it's worth checking whether the teacher would lose out. If she's covered by her own insurance or the school will refund the hire cost to the teacher, then I would take the refund that you are being offered.

It's not treating her like a business.

It's treating her as a human being who could financially lose out over something that's not her fault.

I run a swim school and I would be blown away with your kindness and thoughtfulness. It's a lovely thing to offer.

Someone mentioned insurance. I pay insurance, last year pool was closed for a few days and I tried to claim. No one picked up the phone, or responded to my email: so no, it's not that easy to think 'insurance will just pay it.'

I would assume that as a business she has set her prices to cover eventualities such as the occasional cancellation.

I agree with the poster above, it does seem patronising not to take the offered discount - it suggests you don't think she is running an efficient business.

I run a business and it isn’t the sort of thing I’d contact insurance about. I am assuming she’d use that for large outgoings. Whether or not she still has to pay the pool hire, she still will have lost out financially by refunding people. The amount she brings in will obviously be more than the costs!

Op. After the pool had to shut down last year, I seriously thought about closing my business. It had taken me about 40 hours to organise the bookings, and I refunded everyone, so that took a further 40 hours. So I did about 80 hours work for no money.

Well, I did get some.

Two of my customers emailed me to do what you want to do.

Honestly, I could have cried with happiness those small acts of kindness made. In a week where I was working for nothing refunding everyone, it meant so so much.