My PT is annoyed I haven't given notice...

[filionj]

But, I pay in blocks. I've come to the end of a block and I'm just not renewing until Sept. (Or ever now).

I can't see how I have to give notice? I don't have a contract?

Thinking he's not for me, he pulls me up on cancelling short notice when my children are ill despite the fact I've already paid for the session. I think he expects to be able to fill the slot and get double bubble.

What a shame, we get on fine etc but this all leaves a very bad taste.

From his perspective, though:

• you could have just been clear that a regular slot wouldn't work for you
• if he gives you a slot say once a month or once a quarter, that makes it harder for him to use that slot at other times because most of his clients will want a regular weekly slot at least
• he wants his clients to come regularly and often so that he can see progression in them which is good for them and good for his business
• it's a bit crap if he's coming in especially to see you or has arranged things around your appointment and then you cancel at the last minute; cancelling at the last minute also sends a clear message about where his sessions are in your priorities, which isn't a very nice message to receive regardless of what service you're offering
• I think most PTs would expect you to tell them that you don't want the slot anymore regardless of how you pay.

All this could easily be solved by him running this service AS a paid service, rather than acting like he’s doing a favour for a mate.

Other clients wanting weekly slots making it inconvenient to accommodate the OP? “Sorry, I can’t take you on on a semi-regular basis.” He wants the client’s progression to be free advertising for his business? I’m sure he does; it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen.

As for “It’s not a very nice message to receive”, it’s a paid service! She isn’t cancelling on a friend who wants to go for a drink after a bad breakup. If you’re going to take offence at a client cancelling, you haven’t really got what it takes to run a business.

Why does it matter if she's cancelled a session she has already paid for?

I had this with a PT. She got very uppity when I gave 2 weeks notice, despite zero contract. She’d counted on me continuing but her service had started to decline…put your goals into AI and it’ll give you a fitness plan 🫣

It must be a difficult business to make money in, but that’s not a problem for the clients. Poor business skills from PTs showing irritation with clients who are not in breach of contract.

And even if they don’t want free time - tough tits, frankly! OP has followed the cancellations policy; she’s his client, not his entertainment.

I tutor and people have to pay if they cancel as you have done. However, short notice cancellations are annoying, especially if they happen a lot. Sometimes I'm already on the way to the lesson when people cancel which means hanging around in a car park somewhere until it's time to go to the next lesson. Yes, I'm getting paid to sit in my car in the car park but it's annoying.

But you couldn’t have done anything else with that hour anyway. You were being paid for your time; it was never free time. You’d have been tutoring!

I've never expected to have someone cancel, keep their money and fill the slot with someone else to get more money and I doubt that's what his problem is. It's more likely to be logistics.

The logistics don’t change though. Had the session gone ahead, you’d have still had to factor in time to get there and then to your next one afterwards.

In what way do you think they have bought “you” instead of your time?

They are clients, not your friends. And by the way, you can’t “fire” clients - you never hired them. It’s the other way around.

I think it’s the PT who lacks an understanding of being self-employed.

So @filionj the PT remiinded you that renewal time was approaching and at that point you said you wouldn't be renewing over the summer and he replied that in future you needed to give him more notice than that, is that right? So more notice than when the renewal reminder is given? Bonkers.

FWIW DS is a sports coach and PT. He loves it when a customer cancels at short notice and still pays - he can do his own training, or do some CPD, or chat to other people at the gym, or do his shopping, or come and see me if its a day when I'm not working, or just sit and have a coffee if he's up to date with his paperwork. No need to feel guilty on your part 🙂

They won’t understand. PT’s are very funny about this sort of thing.

It would never occur to me that someone would expect me to be tied in with this sort of arrangement. You pay for the block, you use up those sessions or get to the end of that block and then if you want to carry on you pay again, and if you don't, you don't.

I'd also say what you said in this thread - that you don't like the gym he uses and want to switch back to your old one so you'll do your own thing in future.

Agreed!

I have a PT who is a single Mum of two, she understands.

Ignore the goaders OP. Plenty mra/incels on this thread to decry a woman and stick up for a man. Very transparent. Don't do them the courtesy of replying. You did nowt wrong.

You're incredible. Well ridiculous really. How can someone on a parenting website not understand that you can't predict a child will be ill the next day. She's not demanding he be flexible as he didn't reschedule her appointments and she didn't ask him to. He got paid and she lost out.

Would you announce in advance when you change vets? Hairdressers? Dentists? Plumbers? Cafes?

He is the entitled one and a poor businessman, alienating her future custom and potential recommendations.

Is there a reason why you didn’t give him notice? Clearly you don’t HAVE to but isn’t it a nice thing to do if you know in advance you’re not going to continue. It would help him out to know. Especially if you’ve been working together for a while and get on with them. Unless there was an issue and I thought it would be awkward, I would give them the heads up.

If you’d seen my later message, I realised that she was not expecting not to pay for the sessions cancelled at short notice and I retracted my comments on that point.

I do still think if you’ve been renewing block by block it would be courteous, at least, to let him know. And yes I probably would tell the vet, if only to get the medical history transferred! Hairdresser etc - depends on the relationship but in these circs yes I probably would, again out of courtesy, even if it was because I was unhappy about something.

I'm a music teacher, and despite sending out T's and C's with every invoice, people still do not give the required notice. It's like I don't matter because I'm not a big company. Really annoying. A few weeks notice that a regular spot will not be continuing would have been helpful to the PT. But more fool them for not stipulating the notice period on the bills.

The cancelling is irrelevant. If you were cancelling late and not paying him then that would be bad. But you are still using one of your prepaid slots so he’s not losing out financially. He’s not cut out to be self employed

Lots of people hard of understanding today, or just arguing for the sake of it. He’s self employed, that’s not your problem. It’s not your responsibility to manage his income, cashflow
or customer base.

He has a choice of taking block bookings, and no contracts, or regular monthly payments with a notice period. He’s chosen his way of doing business. You’ve paid for previous blocks, and have now decided you don’t want to pay for the next block.

He’s got a cheek to say anything other than “have a great summer, and hopefully see you in September!”

It's not nice sitting in a freezing car park in winter because someone has cancelled a lesson at short notice, when I'm already in the car driving there for example. No, I wouldn't have been doing something else because that should have been tutoring time, but it's still not pleasant when people cancel like that at short notice and you have to hang around somewhere waiting, admittedly being paid to wait, as you point out, but it's still not pleasant and it shows that the client has little consideration for the tutor. If people start doing that too often I end the lessons and get someone else in instead.

As for your second point. Here I was pointing out that probably the reason he was annoyed /irritated was to do with the logistics rather than what the OP implied which was that he was taking her money for the cancelled lesson AND wanting to fit someone else into her cancelled slot so he could get double the money and that her cancelling short notice meant he couldn't fit someone else in to the slot.

I pay for my PT sessions in blocks of 10. In week 7 my trainer asks if I want to do another block. I would think that, that is quite normal especially as illness and injury will often disrupt these things. My position is slightly different though because my PT emails all his clients at the weekend and asks them for their availability for the next week. This part always strikes me as a crazy way to run a business and so labour intensive. However, it works for me during school hols as I just tell him that I am not available rather than cancelling sessions.

Reply to what? What does his message actually say?

Re not renewing: it sounds like you were under no contractual or financial obligation to give him notice, but it would have been courteous for you to do so. As a professional he should have just let your lack of courtesy go and thanked you for your business instead of saying something.

Cancelling short notice: I know multiple personal service providers who will drop clients or restrict when they can schedule for repeated cancellations, even if they pay for the sessions anyways. Partly this is because one of the things that clients and prospective clients consider when choosing someone like a PT is how easy or difficult it is to schedule with them (especially at convenient times), so while you cancelling last minute doesn't directly cost them that session revenue it does mean that other clients who could have really benefitted from/appreciated that slot weren't able to use it.The other big thing with PTs is that clients getting results and making progress is important to them (from a business perspective and because they usually do have a passion for it) and inconsistency can get in the way of that.

Fair but my session is 9am on a Monday morning, the gym is as dead as a dodo at that time