If you’re teaching full time, or at least with more than a dozen students in total, the last thing you want to do is to spend time chasing up payments or parents who haven’t paid for classes. Taking cash after each lesson can soon become a logistical nightmare.
So to save all the stress, the pulled out hair and to let you concentrate on what you do best – teaching – then this tip will save you a lot of time & hassle!
Get the parents to pay by direct debit or bank transfer
If you’re teaching in some developing countries then this might not be possible, but otherwise it’s a must. It will drastically cut down on the amount of skipped lessons and parents will treat you much more professionally.
Of course some parents will say they can’t or won’t pay this way. But those are more than likely the parents that can’t or won’t have control over their personal finances, hence they’d probably be late with payments anyway and give you the heartache of having to ask for their money each time or the even worse heartache of having to send their children away after several weeks of non payment. You really don’t want to put yourself in that position. It’s horrible!
So save yourself the stress, pop down the bank to get some payment forms and get the parents to fill one in when they sign up for your lessons. You’re going to need a separate bank account for your classes anyway ( because if you use Genki English you’re more than likely going to be so successful and making so much money that you’ll be happy to pay taxes) and it will save you a lot of time and accountant’s fees when it comes to doing your books as well.
And there are also other more serious reasons which we’ll cover in the School Owners Program.
As with any business, getting the mundane things like accounting and payment as automatic and as out of the way as possible mean we can concentrate on what we really enjoy doing all day.
Unless, of course, you have a secret ambition to become an accountant or debt collector!
Be genki,
Richard
P.S. For online teaching then paypal is the best option!
Getting your payment process in order is really important to looking professional!
I worked for a school that was totally chaotic and lost their contract to teach an after-school program because of it. They had bank transfers, but waited 2-3 months to start checking who had paid. They couldn’t figure it out. Some parents received 3-4 invoices although they had paid, others made it 1,5 semesters without paying when they suddenly pulled their kids from the class when confronted, teachers had to use class time to deal with this. Chaos!
Tip with bank transfers: remind the parents to put the kid’s name on the transfer – often the child has the last name from whoever is paying.
Another solution: Have students or parents pay in advance, whether cash or bank transfer. I do a month’s worth of lesson’s at a time. Less stress, less cancellations/rescheduling, less hassle.
Another nice tip. The banking service I was thinking of using takes 500 yen per transfer. Anyone know a cheaper way of doing things?