Hi all,
We are thinking about offering payment plans as a way for people to pay for series subscriptions (we essentially have a choose your own package setup). We're worried about whether the economy will affect subscriptions and we think that maybe by allowing them to pay in installments they won't shy away from getting a subscription.
Do you offer this? How do you do it, if you do? Do you just do it with people who provide credit cards? How many installments in a payment plan do you allow, and do you allow the patron to pick the number of installments, or do you set it? Do you set a minimum? Do you ever have problems with nonpayment or bad credit cards?
One of the concerns that's been raised is that we offer discounts during the subscription period so that we can get the money in advance. If you've offered payment plans for awhile, have you seen more and more people take advantage of them, or is the percentage about the same from year to year?
Thanks for any guidance!
Leigh
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Leigh Chandler
Director of Marketing
Flynn Center for the Performing Arts
153 Main Street
Burlington, VT 05401
802.652.4509 direct
802.863.8788 fax
www.flynncenter.org
www.flynntix.org
We have offered a 2 installment plan for many years and have actively promoted it as long as we have had it. This year, with the way the economy is, we have added a new payment plan that is a total of 7 installments.
In this new plan the patron pays 25% on the first payment then the rest of the payments do not begin until July. This plan is only available to renewing subscribers and our renewal deadline is May 29th. The remaining balance is split over 6 months. We do charge a fee for this plan, because of the amount of work that goes in to it, but if they choose the 2 installment plan (the first payment is at the time of the order and the second payment is an arbitrary date, this year is July 31) we do not charge a fee. In the case of this new plan, they will not receive their all their tickets at once as they will not complete paying for the tickets until after the season has already started.
We are paying off all the orders by invoice so that we can print tickets in advance of full payment. Both plans are credit card only. While we do get some rejected cards, for the amount of transaction we are processing (usually 1,000+) the percentage of bad cards is very small and patrons are quick to respond when we call about needing a new card. We find that most of the rejects are cards that have been reported lost/stolen and the patron forgot to inform us.
As for the percentage of people, we have seen about the same percentage take advantage every year of our 2 installment plan, and so far this year this new payment plan hasn't really changed that. Most people still prefer paying in full.