EP 55: WHAT TO SAY When a Client Cancels

 

As a small business you may occasionally find yourself in sticky situations where you don’t know what to say or do. My students share these situations and we work through them together inside The Bodywork Project, but I wanted to give all of my listeners some guidance on some of the most common scenarios you may find yourself in.

I begin this series focusing on what to say when a client cancels an appointment. In today’s episode I’ll guide you through a few responses to help you to feel confident with your boundaries while continuing to be kind and intentioned with your clients.

“The most important thing is that you have a clear, concise cancellation policy. It doesn’t have to be really long; it doesn’t have to be endless. But you must have it in place.”

This week on the Do It With Intention Podcast:

  • How a clear and concise cancellation policy will help you to maintain a safe container for your clients.

  • Simple steps to take after a client cancellation so that you can simultaneously look out for the best interest of your client’s desires and your business’s needs.

  • Knowing when to bless and release certain clients, so that you can allow space for your most ideal clients in your practice.

Resources from this episode:

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

MINDY TOTTEN: Hey hey there. Welcome back everyone, to the Do It With Intention podcast!

I am really happy to be with you today. And I want to ask before we start off, how are you all doing? How are you hanging in there? Are you trying just to take every day as it comes, or are you rolling with the punches rolling with the waves or are you having days of freak outs?

I'm doing a little bit of both. Doing my best to stay grounded, stay centered and just try to do my very best to be of service to people each and every day. So no matter where you are on that continuum, I hope that you're doing well. I see you, and I'm holding you in my heart. I am excited today because it's the first of a series, right?

New series of podcasts that I'll be doing on what to say. Or what to do, particularly what to say in sticky situations. So we all have them and inside The Bodywork Project, we talk a good deal about, somebody says, Oh, this just happened. What should I say? Or how should I respond? And we give each student feedback.

And sometimes we role play inside the body work project. So people can feel confident and holding their boundaries and also being kind. To your clients or to people who are calling you for information. So today's episode is the first in the series and it's going to be what to say. And somebody cancels.

Now, I'm not talking about when somebody knows shows, that's a different episode. We'll do that at another time. But when somebody cancels their appointment and you're not sure why, they've given you 24 hours notice or whatever is part of your cancellation policy. So it's not something that you have to.

figure out and fairly direct with right away, but it's something like, well, what do I do? Do I just let it, let the person cancel and what should I do? And. This, as I say, came up inside the bodywork project. And so I thought I would share with everybody in this community too, a couple of simple things that I want you to think about when somebody cancels their appointment and you're not sure why, you're not sure what to do.

So before we get into that, the most, most important thing is that you have a clear, concise cancellation policy and it doesn't have to be really long. It doesn't have to be, endless. And then if this, then this just. Mine is two sentences long. And if you're struggling with that, we have got an example inside of a PDF that I offer.

That's called the business, this kit. And we'll put a link to that in the show notes so that you can take a look and see if you're interested in that. It gives you an example of a cancellation policy that is simple, straightforward, and then you just have your, your new client sign it. When they come in the very first time and then, boom, it's all done.

It's not, it doesn't have to be a really huge deal, but you do have to have one and it's got to be clear. And you've got to honor it. You have to honor it for yourself and for your clients. You're creating that safe space in your practice. Not only in the therapeutic side, but also on the business side of your practice.

So that's number one, make sure you've got that cancellation policy in place. Okay. So let's say though that you've got it in place and let's say you have to have 24 hours notice. Okay. Someone has given you 36 hours notice. So what do you do then think about here's the second thing to think about? How are people communicating with you to let you know that they're not coming in?

What I mean by that is they could be calling you. That's a very easy one. Cause you can talk with them on the phone about, making sure they're okay. Making sure that, seeing if they want to reschedule with you, that's an easy one. Most people in my experience will not call you on the phone because they just want to, they don't want to talk to you.

They want to just cancel it and be done. Right. So if you are a therapist who mostly communicates via text, You may get more of these types of cancellations. I do most of my communication with my craniosacral therapy clients via email. And so I'll get these emails that come in. So think about how you want your clientele to communicate with you.

What is the best way for you now? I have students who say, well, Such and so client, they just, they just want to text. So I text with them. I want you to consider, I'm just planting the seed in your head right now. I want you to consider that you can let your clients know how you want to be communicated with, so it's your practice.

It's your business. You're the one who does this beautiful, beautiful therapy to be of service to other people. So you can say, if you want to contact me the way to do it is. XYZ telephone or email or whatever it is that you prefer. So that's something to think about too. Alright. So let's say the person you've got your cancellation policy, the person's giving you 36 hours.

Notice they've sent you an email. Let's say, what do you do? What do you say? So I suggest number one, that you follow up with the person that day. So let's say that Sally has sent you an email that said, Oh, Mindy, I'm so sorry that I can't make my appointment next Thursday. Thanks. Okay. What do you do with that?

I suggest you follow up that day and you can say something like, Oh, hi, Sally. thanks so much for letting me know that you can't make it next Thursday, or whenever she says I wanted to check in to make sure that everything is okay with you and your family. Let me know if I can support you in any way and please drop me a line when you can to let me know that you're okay.

All right. And then that opens up the door for them to get back to you. This is also good. If let's say you use a, a booking platform and you just get a notification that Sally has canceled and you have no idea why you can reach out then via email or text or a telephone call that just says, Hey, I'm just checking in to make sure that everything's okay with you and your family.

is there anything I can do to help? So notice that first check-in is being genuine. You're genuinely asking everything. Okay. Because you never know. Right. You never know why somebody has to cancel. So in that first check in, yeah. You're not saying, Hey, what's going on? You want to reschedule or what?

You don't say that each check in genuinely from your heart, I saw that you had to cancel or I got your message. Please let me know that. Everything's okay. That's the first step. Now, if you hear back from Sally and she said, Oh, thanks so much for reaching out. Yeah. I dunno, such my kid had soccer practice and I double booked or whatever, then invite her to make another appointment at that point.

So you can say, Oh, I'm so glad to hear that. You're okay. If you'd like to reschedule, I've got an opening at three o'clock on Tuesday, give a specific time. One that may work for her. If you've been working with the person along can give a specific time, rather than just saying, Oh, would you like to reschedule?

By giving a specific time that encourages the person to look into their calendar or their appointment book or whatever at that time to see if they're free. And if not, you can make another appointment at another time. That's really, really important with that second followup, not just saying, Hey, do you want to rebook your appointment?

But you say, Hey, I'm glad to hear everything's okay. If you'd like to reschedule, I've got an opening at blank time on blank date. Let me know what will work best for you. And I'll reserve that spot in my appointment book. So you can either say, if you'd like to reschedule, I've got openings on Tuesday and Thursday next week at two o'clock or whatever it is, let me know what will work best and we'll take it from there.

So set specific times in that second followup. Now, what if you reached out that first time and you said, Hey, I hope everything's okay. And you don't hear anything back then. I suggest you wait about a week and then send a second followup. You say, Hey, Sally, just checking in again, to make sure that all is well in your world.

If you'd like to reschedule the appointment that you had to miss, I've got openings at blank times on blank dates available. Let me know what will work best for you with your schedule. We'll get you all set up all my best to you. That's it. So you follow up one more time in about a week or so, if you don't hear back from the followup.

Bless and release as I call it. Bless and release. So. Whatever is going on is probably not about you. It's probably not about your body work. So just bless and release the person if they want to come back later. Great. If they're on the next stage of their journey, that's great to bless and release either.

She'll come back at a more perfect time for you to work together. Or, and this is what I like to think about because I've seen it happen over and over and over again in my own practice, but also in therapists who I coach through the years. If she doesn't come back then that opening is allowing an even more ideal client, the space to work with you.

So remember that bless and release. Now, one last thing to look at, as we are finishing up here, how are you taking care of your clients? Think about this when they have to cancel this as a perfect example, this kind of script that I've given you today is a perfect example of. Really taking care of your clients, creating a safe container for them, as I said, not only in the treatment room, but also on the business side of your practice.

If you feel like you're struggling in that area a little bit, I've got this resource that you can use. I mentioned it at the beginning of the podcast, it's a free master class. That's called how to grow your body work business without constantly hustling to get new clients. And you can access this free on demand training@mindytotten.com slash grow.

And we'll put a link into it for the show notes to the show notes you can find at Mindy totten.com/podcast/episode 55. Keep doing your beautiful work in the world. Keep smiling and keep doing it with intention.

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Mindy Totten