Managing Booking Cancellation Fees

Cancellations are unavoidable, but they don’t have to mean lost revenue or empty calendar slots. The booking cancellation fee in OctopusPro lets you charge a fixed fee when a job is cancelled too close to the appointment time, helping you enforce your cancellation policy and protect your team’s schedule.

This feature is ideal for any service business that relies on booked time – for example mobile pet groomers, cleaners, therapists or trades – where a late cancellation means you may not be able to re-sell the time.

Key benefits

Protect revenue from late cancellations – recover part of your costs when a booking is cancelled inside your notice period.
Increase customer commitment – a clear cancellation fee reduces “no-shows” and last-minute changes.
Keep your schedule stable – fewer last-minute gaps means better utilisation of fieldworkers and resources.
Consistent invoicing – the fee is added as a separate line item on the invoice, making charges easy to explain and track.
Configurable and overrideable – set a default company-wide fee, then adjust the amount or waive it on individual bookings when needed.

Use the Call-Out & No-Show Fee feature instead for jobs where a fieldworker has already attended but work couldn’t proceed (for example, no access or the customer isn’t on site). Those scenarios should use a Failed status with a call-out or no-show fee, not a cancellation fee.

How the cancellation fee works

The cancellation fee is a fixed amount in your account currency that you configure under Financial Settings. It is not percentage-based.
When a booking is cancelled within your defined late-cancellation window (for example, within 24 hours of the scheduled start time) and its status is changed to Cancelled, OctopusPro prompts the user to add the default cancellation fee to the invoice.
Admin users and fieldworkers can accept the suggested fee, change the amount, or skip the fee completely, depending on your company policy and any exceptions.
The fee appears as a separate line (for example, Cancellation Fee) on the customer’s invoice and in reports, so you have a clear audit trail of when and why the fee was charged.

Step 1 – Set your default cancellation fee

Log in to your OctopusPro admin portal.
Go to Settings ▸ Financial Settings ▸ Tax & Fees.
On the Tax & Fees page, locate the field labelled Cancellation Fee.
Enter the default fee amount you want to charge for late cancellations (for example, 50 or 150).
Click outside the field – the value saves automatically and a confirmation message appears on the page.

Note: Cancellation fees are configured as fixed amounts, not percentages of the booking value. You can still override the amount on individual bookings or invoices to cater for different services or situations.

You can also set this value during onboarding in the Tax & Fees step – it’s the same setting and can be updated at any time later from Financial Settings.

Step 2 – Set the late-cancellation window (by hours)

Below the Cancellation Fee field you can define when the fee should automatically apply, based on how close to the appointment time the booking is cancelled.

Use the option:
“Apply the cancellation fee if the booking is cancelled within [ X ] hours of the scheduled booking start time.”
Enter the number of hours’ notice included in your cancellation policy (for example, 24, 48 or 72 hours).

How it behaves:

If the booking is cancelled inside this window (e.g. 4 hours before a booking when your window is 24 hours) and the status is changed to Cancelled, OctopusPro will prompt the user to apply the default cancellation fee.
If the booking is cancelled earlier than this window (e.g. 3 days before a booking with a 24-hour window), the system will not automatically suggest the fee. Admins and fieldworkers can still add or adjust a fee manually on the booking or invoice if an exception is required.

This setting works alongside your other cancellation controls, such as the minimum time required before customers can cancel via the portal. That setting controls whether a customer can cancel online, while the cancellation fee window controls when a fee is suggested if the booking is cancelled by staff or via other channels.

Applying cancellation fees in daily operations

Once the default fee and time window are set, they become part of your normal workflow for admins, fieldworkers and customers.

Admin users (web portal)

Open the booking from Bookings ▸ All bookings.
Change the booking status to Cancelled.
If the cancellation occurs within your configured time window, a prompt appears:
“Do you want to add the default cancellation fee to this invoice?”
Choose:
- Apply fee – inserts the default cancellation fee as a line item on the invoice (you can edit the description or amount if required).
- Skip – leaves the invoice unchanged; you can still manually add a fee later from the booking or invoice page.
The fee is visible in the invoice summary and in financial reports, allowing you to track revenue from cancellation fees and measure the impact of your policy over time.

Fieldworkers (mobile app)

From the job details screen in the fieldworker app, the fieldworker sets the booking status to Cancelled when a customer cancels.
If the cancellation is within the defined time window and their role has permission, the app prompts them to apply the default cancellation fee.
The fieldworker can:
- Apply the default fee,
- Edit the amount (if allowed by their permissions), or
- Skip the fee when your policy allows exceptions.
The applied fee appears in their job summary and in the customer’s invoice, so they can clearly explain any charges on site if needed.

Customer experience

Customers do not apply the fee themselves, but they see it clearly itemised on their invoice whenever a cancellation fee has been charged.
In the customer portal, cancelled bookings display the Cancelled status and the associated invoice with the cancellation fee line, ensuring full transparency.
To avoid disputes, make sure your cancellation window and fees are clearly stated in your Terms & Conditions, booking confirmations and reminder emails/SMS.

Best-practice tips for cancellation fees

Publish your policy everywhere – website, quotes, confirmations, reminder messages and customer portal.
Keep fees reasonable – align with your industry and average job value so charges feel fair to customers.
Allow exceptions – empower admins to waive or adjust fees for emergencies, long-term customers or special circumstances while keeping an audit trail in the booking history.
Combine with deposits and call-out fees – use deposits for high-value jobs, cancellation fees for short-notice cancellations, and call-out/no-show fees for failed or unattended appointments to give you end-to-end protection.

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