We’re excited to announce a small but very important improvement to the way children are handled in Punchpass. This will be going live for all clients on our Banyan & Redwood plans the week of May 20th.
We have a number of clients whose customers are booking children into classes, and while we have had some workarounds….they honestly aren’t the best. Especially if a parent has multiple children, it can lead to the following problems for everyone involved:
The Parent gets confused: The parents name is on the reservation, so it is difficult to know/remember which child is booked into which class (especially if the class is not well named so you know the age range.) That makes it difficult for the parent to keep everything straight. Easy when someone has 2 reservations….but if you have 2 kids and 40 reservations things get tricky!
The Instructors are in the dark: The class instructor doesn’t know which child is coming to class. That’s at best inconvenient, and at worst gets in the way of class preparation.
The Business Owner doesn’t have good data: Because the child is being booked under the parent’s name, the business owner doesn’t have great reporting. A customer might be listed as having attended 20 classes….but how many of those were her children? If a class requires a pre-requisite class….how do they know who has fulfilled that requirement?
Family Accounts Make This Much Easier
When everyone is frustrated, it means there should be a better solution! We finally have one, and in true Punchpass fashion we’ve kept it lightweight, easy to use, yet flexible. Parents can now add Children to their account, and if they have children we will present them with a slightly different booking experience where they can choose who they are booking into a class.
Reporting and the class roster is improved as we show the child’s name and the parent. To keep things simple passes are still owed by the parent, and can be used by the children on their account. All communication still goes to the parent – you won’t send a marketing email to any kids by mistake! Children can have standing reservations and be booked into either group classes, private sessions, or appointments.
We think this is going to be another seemingly small improvement that makes Punchpass just that much easier to work with if your business involves classes for children. For more detailed information on how this works, you can review our support article on Family Accounts here. As always your feedback on any enhancements we can make is welcome!