Book and pay online

Puts a Book and pay now button on your booking form, next to “Send an enquiry instead”. A hirer picks a room and a time, presses it, pays by card, and the booking is confirmed and paid — nobody on the committee has to answer an email, send an invoice or check the bank.

While they pay, the time is held for them (30 minutes unless you change it), so nobody else can take it. If they do not pay, it is let go and they are emailed to say so. Before letting a hold go, HallPro asks the payment company one last time, so a payment that is simply slow to be reported is not lost.

It only works for a time that is completely free: no booking, no enquiry, inside opening hours and not closed. Anything else is refused and the hirer is asked to send an enquiry instead, with what they typed kept in the form.

You choose who can use it: which kinds of hire (one-off hires to start with), which rooms, how much notice, how far ahead and how long. Everybody else sees the button but is told politely to send an enquiry.

The price is what an invoice would say — the room’s rates and any rate rules for that kind of hire, with VAT if you charge it. The invoice is given its number when it is paid, so abandoned bookings never leave gaps in your invoice numbers.

It is in the hirers’ app too: a hirer whose kind of hire can use it sees Book and pay now on the Book screen, pays, and comes back to the app with the booking confirmed. Everybody else sees the request form as before.

Card payments only: Stripe or SumUp, connected on the Invoicing & Payments screen. GoCardless is Direct Debit, which takes days to clear. On the Standard plan.

For example: Sarah wants the small room for her daughter’s party on a Saturday afternoon in three weeks. At 10 at night she picks 2 till 5, presses Book and pay now, pays £45 on her phone and gets a confirmation email with invoice INV-0142. The booking secretary finds it in the diary the next morning, already paid, and has nothing to do.

Questions people ask

What if somebody pays after their time was let go?
If the room is still free, the booking is confirmed anyway. If somebody else has booked it since, the committee is emailed to refund the payment from the payment company’s dashboard.

Do we need Stripe’s webhook set up?
It is best to — the address is on the Invoicing & Payments screen. Without it HallPro still finds out when the hirer comes back from paying, and asks Stripe before letting any hold go.

Can our regular groups use it?
Only if you tick Regular. Most halls leave it for one-off hires, because a weekly group is better booked as a series from the Bookings screen.

Someone is stuck part-way through paying.
They are listed under Waiting for payment. “Has it been paid?” asks the payment company now; “Let it go” frees the time.