Running a club · 7 min read · October 2026

No-show fees for court bookings

The fee that works best at a racket club is the court fee itself, paid when the court is booked. Cancel before your deadline and it comes back; cancel late or do not turn up and the club keeps it. Below: the four ways clubs charge for no-shows, how much is fair under UK and EU consumer law, and the rules that stop the fee turning into an argument.

No-show, late cancellation, no-show fee

No-show: The player booked a court, did not cancel and did not turn up. The court stood empty and nobody else could book it.
Late cancellation: The player cancelled, but after your free-cancellation deadline. You still have a chance to resell the slot, but a small one.
No-show fee: What the player pays in either case. At a court club it is usually the court fee itself (all of it or part), not an extra penalty on top.

Both cost you the same court hour. Across bookings in Playmore, 57% of cancellations happen in the last 24 hours before the slot — too late for most clubs to resell. That is why the rule for late cancellations matters as much as the one for no-shows.

What happens when clubs take payment upfront

57%

of cancellations come in the last 24 hours

46%

fewer cancellations where prepayment is required (n=2,700)

200 → 0

no-shows a month at Vera Sport, Łódź

Vera Sport, an eight-court tennis club, used to take bookings by phone and text without payment. Around 200 bookings a month were never played or paid for — roughly 4,000 PLN in lost court fees. After it made online payment compulsory for every booking, with a full refund up to 24 hours before, no-shows fell to zero. Read the Vera Sport case study.

Figures: Playmore booking data and the Vera Sport case study, as published on this site.

Four ways to charge for a no-show

1.Prepayment at booking

The player pays the full court fee online when booking. Cancel in time and the money comes back; cancel late or do not turn up and the club keeps it.

Do you get paid?: Always — there is nothing to chase.
Weak spot: Players who are used to paying at the desk may grumble for the first few weeks.

2.Deposit

The player pays part of the price upfront and the rest on the day. The deposit is kept on a no-show.

Do you get paid?: Only the deposit, so a no-show still costs you the rest of the court fee.
Weak spot: Two payments per booking, and a small deposit is easy to write off.

3.Card on file, charged later

The player saves a card when booking and the club charges it after a no-show.

Do you get paid?: Often, but not always — cards expire, get declined or the charge is disputed.
Weak spot: Someone has to decide each case and press the button, and the player must have agreed to the charge in advance.

4.Fee owed, paid next visit

The no-show is recorded as a debt and collected at the next booking or visit.

Do you get paid?: Only from players who come back.
Weak spot: Reception becomes a debt collector, and the worst offenders simply do not return.

Many clubs combine them: prepayment for online bookings, and a recorded debt for the few bookings that still come in without payment. A strike rule — prepayment becomes compulsory for a player after a set number of no-shows — is a softer start if you are not ready to require it from everyone.

How much is fair?

Consumer law in the UK and the EU does not set a number. It asks whether the fee is proportionate to what you actually lose. In practice, for a court booking:

The court fee for that slot is the natural ceiling. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 (Schedule 2, paragraph 6) and the EU Unfair Terms Directive (Annex, point 1(e)) both list a “disproportionately high sum in compensation” as a term that may be unfair. A fee on top of the full price is hard to defend.
Resold slots count. In its 2016 letter on cancellation terms, the CMA says charges are more likely to be fair when they reflect the business’s net loss — “minus the amount it has saved from not providing the services or finding another consumer”. If someone else books and pays for the court after a late cancellation, consider refunding the first player or giving them credit.
Be symmetric. If you keep the player’s money when they cancel, refund in full when the club cancels — for maintenance, an event or bad weather. A term that lets only one side keep the money is on the same UK and EU lists (Schedule 2, paragraph 4; Annex, point 1(d)).
There is no 14-day cooling-off period for a court booked for a set date. Leisure services with a specific date or period of performance are excluded in the UK (Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013, regulation 28(1)(h)) and the EU (Consumer Rights Directive, Article 16(l)). Your own cancellation rule is what applies.

This is a summary of public guidance, not legal advice. Outside the UK and the EU, check the consumer rules where your club is.

Rules that make the fee stick

Publish one exact deadline

“Free cancellation until 24 hours before” or “until 17:00 the day before” — and show the actual date and time on each booking, so nobody has to do the arithmetic.

Show it before payment

The rule should be on the checkout screen, in the confirmation and in the reminder. A fee the player first hears about after the no-show is the one that ends in a dispute.

Same rule for every channel

If bookings taken by phone or at the desk skip prepayment, that is where your no-shows will gather. Whoever takes the booking, the same deadline and the same fee apply.

Remind before the deadline, not after

A reminder that arrives after the free-cancellation deadline only tells the player they are too late. Send one shortly before it, while the slot can still be resold.

Decide who pays in a group

When four players share a court, say whether the booker pays for everyone or each player’s share follows the same rule.

Write down your exceptions

Illness, injury, a closed road. Waiving the fee is fine — do it to the same standard for everyone and keep a record, or the rule stops meaning anything.

Need the wording? Our cancellation policy template for court bookings covers deadlines, no-shows, group bookings, weather and club cancellations, with blanks for your own numbers.

How Playmore handles no-shows

The club sets its free-cancellation window in hours before the booking, or as a clock deadline such as 17:00 the day before.
On each booking, players see the exact date and time until which they can cancel free of charge.
Online prepayment can be required for every booking: card, Apple Pay, Google Pay or a payment link, with split payment between players.
A cancellation in time is refunded to the player’s Playmore wallet or back to the card, depending on how the club takes payments. A late cancellation is not refunded.
An unpaid late cancellation stays on the player’s account as an amount due. Reception can send a payment link, and the player is asked to settle it before booking again.
Reception can mark a player as not present and can change a late cancellation to an on-time one as a goodwill gesture; those changes are listed in a report.
No-show and late-cancellation reports show what they cost, when they happen by day and hour, and which players do it most often.
Reminders reach players by push, SMS and email.

More on bookings and payments: Playmore court booking system.

Sources (checked October 2026)

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