How to Stop No-Shows in Your Detailing Business: Take a Deposit at Booking

Where this stands: deposits at booking aren't available in Brilla yet; they're on the roadmap. The advice on why a deposit works and how much to ask for holds for any detailer, and this post will say so here the day the feature is live.

A no-show in detailing isn't a small thing. A full interior and exterior is three to five hours of your day. When the customer isn't home, or the car isn't in the driveway, or nobody answers the door at the shop, you don't just lose the $220. You lose the slot you turned someone else away from, plus the drive if you're mobile. Two of those a month is a car payment.

The fix most detailers land on eventually is the same: take a deposit when the job is booked. People who've put $50 down show up. People who were only half-serious don't finish booking, which is also fine, because they weren't going to show up anyway.

How detailers take deposits today

• Venmo, Zelle or Cash App after booking. Works, but you're chasing it by text, and the booking is on your calendar whether they pay or not.
• A payment link sent by hand. Same problem: the link is separate from the booking, so you have to match them up.
• No deposit, just a reminder text. Reduces no-shows a little. Doesn't stop the customer who knows they won't be home and doesn't care.

The weak point in all three is the gap between "booked" and "paid". Until the money lands, the time is held for someone who might never pay.

How Brilla's deposit at booking works

"Deposit at booking" is a switch on the Automations page. Once your online payments are connected (Settings, then Integrations), customers who book through your online booking page pay a deposit as part of booking. You choose the amount:

• A fixed $25, $50 or $100, or
• 20% or 50% of the service price.

The percentage is worked out on Brilla's side from your own service prices, including the price for the vehicle type they picked, so a customer can't change what they owe by fiddling with the page. A fixed deposit is never more than the job itself: a $100 deposit on a $60 wash is just $60.

The 30-minute hold

This is the part that matters for your calendar. When the customer picks a time and goes to pay, the booking is saved straight away and the slot is held for 30 minutes. If they pay, the booking is marked paid and it's yours. If they don't finish paying within 30 minutes, the hold ends and the time opens up again for somebody else. Nobody is stuck holding a Saturday morning for a customer who closed the tab.

There's one edge case handled on purpose. If a customer was slow on the payment page and pays after their hold ran out, Brilla doesn't lose their money or silently double-book you. The booking comes back as a pending request, and you confirm or reject it like any other request.

How much should the deposit be?

There's no single right number, but here's how to think about it:

• Maintenance washes ($60 to $120): a fixed $25 is enough to filter out casual bookings without putting anyone off.
• Full details ($180 to $350): $50, or 20%. Either covers your drive and the hour you'd have lost.
• Paint correction and ceramic coating ($600 and up): 50%, or a fixed $100 if you want the booking to feel lighter. A coating job ties up a full day or two, and you may be buying product for it in advance.
• Multi-vehicle bookings: a percentage scales with the booking, which is usually what you want. More on pricing those in multi-vehicle bookings.

The math on one month

Say you run about 60 jobs a month at an average of $200, and two of them are no-shows. That's $400 of work gone, plus two slots you can't refill at short notice, plus the drive. With a $50 deposit on every online booking, the two customers who were going to flake usually either don't finish booking (and the slot stays open for someone real) or they've paid $50 and show up. Even if one still no-shows, you've kept $48.20 for the trouble instead of nothing. The deposit doesn't have to stop every no-show to pay for itself; it has to stop one.

What it costs

Deposits are card payments, so they carry the same processing fee as any other card payment through Brilla: 3.0% + $0.30, taken from the payment. On a $50 deposit, that's $1.80, and you receive $48.20. We break the fee down fully in getting paid by card on the spot.

What to tell customers

Put your deposit and cancellation policy in plain words on your booking page and in your confirmation: what the deposit is, that it comes off the final price, and what happens if they cancel late. Brilla takes and records the deposit; the policy around it (how much notice gets a refund, whether weather moves are free) is yours to set and to apply. Speaking of weather: if you're mobile, read how to reschedule around the rain before you write the cancellation part.