Deposits and prepayments

Booking deposits are live for venues with the deposits feature enabled: set a policy per booking setup, then record, refund, forfeit or void deposits straight from the diary. Taking the money itself stays with you for now — over the phone or in person — and the guest is not asked to pay on the public booking page yet.

The cards open and close

Every card on a booking setup is closed when you arrive, and clicking its name opens it. A closed card shows what it is currently set to underneath its name — "Max 40 covers per slot", "24 hours' notice" — and a card you have not changed shows nothing there at all, which is how you tell the two apart at a glance.

Closing a card never loses what you typed. A card with unsaved work is marked Unsaved, pressing Save at the top opens anything it is about to save, and a card that cannot save opens itself and tells you why.

Setting a deposit policy

Open Booking settings → Booking setups, pick a setup, and turn on Require deposits in the Deposits card. It is near the bottom of the setup, below the rules and above Auto-assignment:

• From how many covers — parties this size or larger are asked for a deposit (a common choice is 8).
• Deposit type — per cover (e.g. £10 a head) or a flat amount per booking.
• Only with a pre-order — tie the deposit to bookings that pre-order, if that's how your venue runs large parties.

Save with the page's Save button at the top. The policy is what your team quotes when a large party books; the booking flow itself doesn't charge the guest today.

Recording a deposit

When you take a deposit over the phone or in person, record it on the booking: open the booking in the diary, and on the Deposit row — it reads None recorded yet — choose Record deposit. Enter the amount, how it was taken, and an optional note. The booking then carries a Deposit badge — for example "Deposit £80.00 · Paid" — wherever your team sees it.

One live deposit per booking: if a deposit was recorded in error, void it and record the right one.

Wrong name or number on a booking with a deposit

Don't cancel and re-book it. The deposit stays with the cancelled booking, and you'd have to refund and retake it to put things right.

Press Edit guest details on the booking instead and correct the name, email or phone in place. The deposit is untouched, and the correction is saved to that guest's customer profile as well, so their next booking starts from the right details. See Booking details panel.

Moving a booking with a deposit, or changing its number of guests

Don't cancel and re-book this either. Press Change date, time or guests on the booking: it's the same booking, so the deposit stays with it. Changing the number of guests doesn't change the deposit — it stays as it is, and nothing is charged or refunded automatically, so sort out any difference with the guest. See Booking details panel.

Changing a booking's length doesn't touch its deposit either. If the number of guests changes, you're told before you save how many guests the deposit was taken for, and afterwards the Deposit row reads, for example, £40.00 Paid · was for 4 guests. If more people are coming and the new number now reaches the size your setup asks a deposit for, but there's no deposit, you're told that too — nothing is charged, so use Record deposit if you want one. The same notes show on the host stand and the till. While a guest's online deposit payment is still going through, the number of guests can't be changed — its amount was worked out for the old number — but the date, time and length still can.

Cancelling a booking only ever cancels one of your own venue's bookings. If a booking can't be found — it was removed, or the link was for another venue — you see "Booking not found." and no cancellation email goes to anyone.

Refunds, no-shows and mistakes

From the booking's deposit controls:

• Record refund — the guest cancelled in policy and you're returning the money. Give it back first, then press this. Pressing Record refund moves no money: it writes down that you did it, and the deposit is marked Refund recorded so your books agree. The record notes that you gave the refund yourself, rather than it having been sent back automatically.

  For a deposit you took, over the phone or in person, give it back on the card machine, the same way you would refund any other payment. For a deposit the guest paid online, the card machine never saw that payment, and the portal cannot send it back yet — the booking says so in place of the card machine instruction. Speak to your account manager about those.

• Reinstate instead of re-booking. If a guest who cancelled rings back, press Reinstate on the booking rather than making a new one — the deposit stays attached to it, along with the notes, the card and their answers. A new booking starts with none of that, and the old deposit is then stranded on a booking nobody will honour. The one exception is a big booking that was holding several tables: if any of them is now unavailable, it can't come back, and its deposit stays on the cancelled booking.

• Forfeit — a no-show or an out-of-policy cancellation; the deposit is kept and marked Forfeited.

• Void — the deposit row was a mistake (wrong amount, wrong booking). Use void rather than refund so your refund records stay clean.

Every change is kept as an audit trail against the deposit, with who did it and when.

A cancelled booking's row also shows a Reminded chip if that guest's booking reminder had gone out before they cancelled. It changes nothing about the deposit — it is there because a guest who was reminded and then cancelled is the one you get asked about when the deposit is queried. See The parties list.

What's not live yet

• Online payment at booking — the guest paying the deposit on the public booking page. The policy and ledger are ready for it; the payment step isn't live yet.
• Automatic deduction at the till — the deposit coming off the final bill by itself. Until that ships, deduct it the way you do today and use the deposit's status to keep the books straight.
• Refunding from the portal — sending a deposit back from this screen. Record refund is a record, not a refund. This matters most for deposits the guest paid online: there is no button anywhere that returns one yet.

Common questions

Where do I see a booking's deposit? On the booking, in the diary — the badge shows the amount and status (Paid, Refund recorded, Forfeited, Voided).

Is the deposit per person or per booking? Your choice, per booking setup: per cover or a flat amount.

Will a deposit refund automatically if the guest cancels? No, and neither does pressing Record refund. Give the money back yourself — on the card machine for a deposit you took — then press Record refund on the booking so your records match what you did. Nothing in the portal can send money back yet, for any deposit.

Does the guest pay on the booking page? Not yet. Deposits are taken by you (phone / in person) and recorded against the booking. Online prepay at booking is coming.

Is "Card pending" a deposit? No. If your venue stores a card as part of booking, Card pending on a booking means the card confirmation hasn't arrived yet — no money has been taken. It's separate from deposits, and if the guest abandoned the card step the table is released automatically.

Is "Card on file" a deposit? No, and this is worth being clear about because you'll now see both on the same booking. A deposit is money you have taken. Card on file means a card is stored and no money has moved. Refunding a deposit and removing a card are different actions with different buttons, and doing one never does the other.

What's next

• Booking setups — the rules and steps behind each booking.
• The diary — where bookings and their deposits live day-to-day.
• Bookings overview — the pieces that make Bookings work.

Charging a no-show fee to a stored card

A deposit and a card on file are different things (see the question below). If a guest saved a card rather than paying a deposit, and they don't turn up, you charge them from the booking itself, not from here.

Mark the booking as a No-show, open it, and press Charge no-show fee under the Card on file chip. You type the amount, and you'll see the exact cancellation terms that guest agreed to next to the box.

Pressing it twice won't charge the guest twice.

A no-show fee is not a deposit

If you charge a stored card for a no-show, that charge does not appear as a deposit and it isn't part of any deposit total. It shows on the booking itself as a Charged block — the amount, the date and the payment reference — and as a small Charged chip on the booking's row, which opens to show the same three things.

They're two different things: a deposit is money taken up front and set against the bill, a no-show fee is money charged after the table went empty.