Deposits, cancellations and the flight that landed late

Why the airport always takes half first

A booking for a room near the runway commits a therapist to a long journey at an hour when nothing else can be fitted around it. From the moment the start is confirmed, that stretch of her night belongs to your booking, and so do the hours on either side of it, which are now too broken up to offer anyone else. The deposit is how that commitment becomes a shared one. It is not money parked somewhere and returned later; it is the first half of the fee, worked out from the rate on the profile of the therapist you chose, stated in writing in the booking thread once the start is agreed, and settled before she leaves.

Seven bookings that confirm with half

Each profile on the roster lists the figures for one guest and for a couple, with one therapist or with two, and half of the relevant figure goes ahead. That half is asked for on these seven kinds of booking:

• a room at Schiphol, Schiphol-Rijk, Schiphol-Oost or any airport hotel, arranged with her journey time agreed with you before a start is fixed;
• any booking placed more than twenty-four hours before its start, which covers nearly everything written from a departure lounge the day before;
• the eight hour overnight, at whatever hour it begins;
• two therapists together, at any length;
• a peak date: King's Day, Pride, the Amsterdam Dance Event, the weeks from Christmas into New Year, or a large conference week, any of which the house will name if asked;
• a session lasting three hours or longer;
• the very first booking a client makes with the house, whatever its length or hour.

Worked as halves, the rule is easy to follow. An hour after a late landing confirms with half its fee, and so do ninety minutes on the night before a dawn gate. Two hours for one guest with two therapists confirms with half of that doubled fee. A couple with a therapist each for an hour sends half of their combined figure in advance. An overnight confirms with half its block fee, and the same night with two therapists confirms with half of that larger block.

Only one kind of booking goes ahead with nothing paid in advance: a returning client, in a room inside the city, asking for an hour or two later that same day. That booking pays its whole fee at the door. Move it to an airport room, to another day, to three hours, to two therapists, to a peak date, or make it a first booking, and half is asked for again.

Paying the half, and the rest

A deposit is paid by card as the first choice, and Revolut, Wise or cryptocurrency are accepted for travellers who would rather use one of them. Neither bank transfer nor PayPal forms part of it. Cash cannot act as a deposit, for the simple reason that a deposit is settled before she sets out and cash only changes hands once she is in the room. The exact sum and the way to pay it are given in the booking thread after the start is agreed, and in no other place. Each figure the site shows is a euro figure. The second half is settled at the door when she arrives, and a traveller still carrying notes from home may settle it in cash in another major currency, with the exact amount in that currency confirmed in writing before she sets out. The booking page lays out the order in which the messages run.

What cancelling costs, by notice

Cancelling never gives the house a claim against you for damages. What may be kept is the part of the fee already earned when your message arrives, and that part depends only on how much notice you give:

• With more than twenty-four hours still to go before the booked start: nothing is kept, and the deposit comes back in full.
• Within the last twenty-four hours, while she has not yet set out: half the deposit is kept as fee already earned, and the other half is returned.
• Once she is on her way: the deposit is kept in full as fee already earned.

Two things can lower even that last figure. If another client takes the time you gave up, the deposit is returned in full, since the time was not lost after all. If you can show that the house lost less than the share it kept, it keeps that smaller sum and no more.

Take ninety minutes at a hotel beside the terminal, confirmed with half the fee, for a flight due at a quarter to midnight. Cancelled the morning before, with a day and a half to go, the whole of that half comes back. Cancelled at eight that evening, when the departure board shows a long delay and she has not yet left, half of the deposit is kept and the other half returned. Cancelled at half past eleven, with her already on the motorway, the deposit stays with the house, unless the slot is taken by someone else.

Cancelling with nothing paid in advance

A returning client's same-day hour or two in a city room goes ahead without a deposit, which leaves the notice scale nothing to measure. Cancel it while she has not yet set out and nothing at all is owed to the house. Cancel it once she has set out and the house asks for the part of the fee that her journey represents, never more.

Moving to another date

A booking can move to another date once at no cost. The request must reach the thread more than twenty-four hours before the booked start, and the new date must fall within fourteen days of the old one. Meet both conditions and the whole deposit carries across. A second move, or a move asked for inside the last twenty-four hours, is read on the notice scale in the same way as a cancellation sent at that moment, and whatever the scale does not keep carries across to the new date.

Force majeure, and what counts

Occasionally something outside either side's control stops a booking: a shutdown of transport, a serious disruption in or around the city, an official instruction that makes her journey impossible. In that case nothing is forfeited and there is nothing to dispute. The deposit turns into credit, held for a date you need not pick at once. An airline delay, a cancelled or rescheduled flight, a diversion, a missed connection, a cold caught on board, a change of plan and a late decision that sleep would be better all fall on your side of that line, and each is treated as a move or a cancellation on the scale above.

If the house cannot perform

If the house is unable to provide the session you booked, what happens next is your decision. You may take the deposit back in full, or leave it as credit against a new date for as long as you need to choose one. If the therapist you chose cannot come, the house tells you as soon as it knows, and you either choose another therapist from the roster or take the deposit back.

Bookings at a distance, and the fourteen-day right

A booking made in writing, without the two sides meeting beforehand, is a service agreed at a distance. The rules for such agreements are found in Book 6 of the Dutch Civil Code, in articles 6:230m to 6:230z, which bring the European consumer rules into Dutch law. Ordinarily they give a consumer fourteen days to withdraw from a distance agreement. Article 6:230p lists the agreements to which that right does not apply, and it includes services related to leisure activities where the agreement sets a specific date or period of performance. Every booking with this house fixes a start on a named day, which is the case that article describes, so the fourteen-day right does not arise. Nothing here asks you to give up a right, because no such right exists for this kind of booking.

For a session on the day itself there is a further basis as well. Before she sets out, the house asks you to state in the thread that you want the session carried out straight away, and that you understand the fourteen-day right will not apply once it has been carried out. Everything else between the two sides is set out in the terms.

Cut short, by you or by her

If the tiredness of a long flight wins and you bring a session to a close before the booked time has run, the full fee stays payable and nothing is refunded. The time was held for you, she made the journey out to the airport, and the minutes that remain cannot be offered to anyone else at that hour.

Your therapist decides what a session includes and states her limits before it begins, and those limits hold for the whole visit. If her safety or comfort is not respected, or a limit she has stated is pressed, she closes the visit at once. The fee for the time reserved remains due, and nothing further is added to it.

False bookings, and the note that is kept

A booking counts as a false booking if any of the following applies:

• it was made under a name that is not the client's;
• it came from a phone number or a profile that belongs to somebody else;
• it was made as a prank;
• a no-show followed one of the three above.

A missed booking, by itself, meets none of those conditions. A traveller who booked honestly and then slept through the knock after a long flight has made an ordinary cancellation, treated on the notice scale like any other.

Where a booking does meet one of the conditions, or where a visit is closed because a limit was pressed, the house writes a brief internal note. The note holds the date, an account of what occurred and the name and number used to book, and it is kept for twelve months. It is never shared outside the house, and it serves one purpose: deciding whether another booking from that name is accepted. How to object to a note, or ask for it to be corrected or deleted, is explained on the privacy page. Should the facts indicate an offence under criminal law, the house may pass the matter to the police.

A traveller who books under their own name and is in the room when she knocks has nothing in this section to consider. Practical questions about timing, entrances and what to have ready are answered in the FAQ.