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Your cancellation policy belongs to your practice. Open Therapy enforces the one you choose rather than imposing one. Set it under Availability in your workspace.

The four presets

What each is for:
Suits short-notice and first-time bookings. Worth considering for initial consultations specifically: someone who’s never met you is the most likely to get cold feet, and a fee at that moment costs you the client rather than the hour.
What most therapists here use, and the default.
For a diary that’s hard to refill.
The strictest we’ll enforce.
The four are spread so that two differ only in the fee and two only in the window. That lets you move one dimension at a time — if 24 hours isn’t enough notice, try Firm before reaching for Strict.

Choose one before you take bookings

A session booked before you’ve chosen a policy carries no fee for anything — no late fee and no no-show fee. A fee nobody chose is not one we’ll collect on your behalf.
Changing your policy applies to new bookings. A session already booked keeps the terms it was booked under, which is what makes them enforceable.

Two rules that aren’t yours

You never charge for your own cancellation

If you cancel, the client is refunded in full regardless of notice. Not a setting, and deliberately not one.

Cancelling after the start time is a no-show

A client who cancels once the session was due to begin pays the no-show rate, not the late rate. Otherwise the no-show fee is avoidable by anyone who remembers to press the button on their way past.

What the client sees

The policy is generated from the terms actually in force, so the wording on your profile, at checkout, in the confirmation email and in the cancellation dialog is the policy being enforced rather than a description of it. On Standard, a client reads: And in one line on your profile: “Free cancellation up to 24 hours before. Inside that, 50% of the fee.” Before confirming, the client sees the exact amount on the confirm button — for example, Cancel and pay $105.00 — so the charge can’t be dismissed by reflex.

What you receive

A cancellation fee settles like a session fee: the platform fee, card processing and GST come off it, and the rest is yours. Card processing is clamped so a refund can never put you in debt — you net zero rather than owing us the difference. See Fees and Refunds and disputes.

Worked example

A $210 session on Standard: