Input Wanted: No-Show Policy

Part of the ethos behind eduFire is that we’re not a company that’s simply going to hand down our policies/rules from on high and force our students and tutors to adhere to them. Rather we want to involve each of you in many of the decisions we’re making as we grow this community and service. To that extent I’m posting a couple of threads today related to decisions we’re facing as a company that we would like to get your input on. Through this dialogue I think we’ll be able to reach a much more creative and effective solution than if we were simply pondering this stuff in isolation.

So without further ado, here’s our first question: What do you feel is the best way to handle student or teacher no-shows?

When a session has been scheduled and someone isn’t present in the room at the time of the session how should we handle that? Some options include:

-Let the other person leave negative feedback. This feedback would show on the user’s profile page.
-Have a “# of No-Shows” item on user profile pages.
-Rather than a # of No-Shows item have a “Attendance” # on a user’s page. For instance, if a tutor has done 100 sessions and not shown up twice than their attendance rating would be 98% (kind of like an airlines on-time rating).
-Don’t do anything. Simply rely on the fact that people are responsible and will show up on time.

Keep in mind too that occasionally no-shows are not simply a case of the person now showing up but there could have been technical difficulties, etc. so one of the challenges with punishing a no-show too harshly is that it might have been something out of their control.

OK, that should give us enough to have a good conversation here. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!

I would like to see an overall score, which is comprised of ratings in 3 sub-categories:

- Quality of Instruction
- Value of Session/Cost
- Attendance and Customer Service

I would like to see a place where a tutor or student can click to show that one party didn’t show up without rating them negatively. There should also be a place for that person to explain the no show. I feel that most people will show up. Even if they are late, I always wait ten minutes for them. If they don’t show up a second time, then they might only be allowed to schedule a session under a pre-payment plan. That way, other students don’t have to do the prepayment, since they are responsible participants.

I do give the benefit of the doubt to people…but as a tutor I think we should get paid anyway for a “no show” and have a “same day cancellation fee” as well…

I agree with Candy.

I would also like to see a rating on the response time for session requests. It is really annoying to send a lot of session requests to a tutor and get no response. Are they not getting an email? Do they not want the session? It just seems rude to not respond in some way.

I like Candy’s idea of reporting a no-show, but also giving the tutor the option to explain the no-show.

I think that no attendance statistics should be public. People can have different reasons to not show up. My suggestion is:
- make a button “the other patry hasn’t shown up”
- in case a student does not show up two times in a row, the next session he/she schedules should be pre-payed
- in case a teacher doesn’t show up, the student should have a possibility to leave negative feedback
- in case the session is pre-payed and the teacher doesn’t show up, the money should be returned to the student

I and my student Chris, we had a problem about ten days ago because of a page malfunction. But the session remained scheduled, and we then had to cancel it manually. I wonder if this can be fixed in the future.

Thanks

Jon, yes I am fine. Thank you. I was just shocked and upset in the moment mostly. You know? And sore for a couple of days thereafter. But it was a valid reason for not making my session. Not many things would have kept me from showing up, but this was one of them.

I think Candy’s idea is a good one…not making the person feel bad for the no show but making it visible to the community when a student is a no-show

I definitely think there should be a tracking if someone has or has not shown up and a place for them to explain. For instance, I missed my session last week because I got into a car accident just before it and didn’t make it back in time for the session. Accidents happen. Obviously if someone is chronicly not showing up they are going to have A LOT of excuses LOL and I think people will get the idea to not trust them and go with someone else.

I think the same day cancellation fee is a good policy but it definitely would not have been ideal for me to pay for my session I missed because of a car accident but I guess those would be limited cases.

Great feedback everyone. Please keep it coming. A few thoughts…

@Maria – While having students pre-pay for sessions (the only way to really pay teachers if there’s a no-show) is something we’ve talked about the challenge is that more people may be hesitant to try eduFire if they have to put in a credit card before having a session. So that could actually hurt tutors over the long run. The question is whether the higher accountability we’d like get by charging the student upfront offsets a lower rate of people trying it out.

@Liz – Agreed that tutors not responding is an issue. One of the things we’ve talked about is dropping tutors who don’t respond (or don’t respond promptly) down in the rankings for each category. That’s something we certainly may do in the future.

@several of you – I like the suggestion that if a student doesn’t show up once then in the future we make them pre-pay. That’s a possible option.

@Christina – The point you raised illustrates why we’ve chosen to do things this way for now. Like eBay and craigslist we take the tack that people are generally good and responsible and for the most part will show unless, well, they’re in a car accident (you’re ok right?!). Unfortunately that’s not always the case which is why we’re having this discussion. :)

Keep it coming everyone. You’re helping to decide the future of eduFire right now!

Hi Everyone,

I think everyone has great ideas and if these ideas are implemented I think that both tutors and students will feel safe and backed up.

I think that the idea about having the classes turn to pre-paid after say three no-shows by the student would be a good idea.

I think that the stats for no-shows should be public but with an explanation. Either generic button options or a comment field to explain why. Car accidents and illness really are different than being hungover or lazy.

I think a same day cancellation policy is a great idea. If the student cancels with 24hours notice then that is fine, but on the same day it is a little frustrating.

As for tutors canceling, I think that we need to try and do the same as the students (show up and not cancel last minute BUT if we do have to cancel last minute I don’t think we should be charged. I think that we should be obliged to offer a make-up class at a different time.)

I think that is about it. I think that Edufire is the next best way to learn English. It seems like a mini community of like minded people that are all trying to help each other learn. I love it. I am going to write a review of it and promote it on my website. :) www.helping-you-learn-english.com

Have a great day!
Diana

I think there are pros and cons to any policy, however a policy is definitely needed. I think it is essential that there be a way to “rate” both students and teachers.

Glad to hear you weren’t banged up too badly. And definitely a valid reason for not making a session!

“Hola” again!

I completely agree with Diane. About what she says: “I think that we should be obliged to offer a make-up class at a different time.”, talking about teachers, after some years teaching online, I can really affirm these things happen! Maybe you have to go to hospital with your son, or maybe, a lot of traffic, or… 1000 reasons!. So, what I’ve always made is offering a different day/time to have the class. I think that’s very important.

And finally, I also agree with Diane… EduFire is doing something I have never seen before, that is, creating a great community of people who really love to learn!

Have a great day!
(By the way, today, here in Spain, we have the “Día del trabajador” similar to US Labour Day)

Hello everybody !

Yesterday, May 05 2008, I had, as I call them, a “ghost pupil” but the ghost sent me apologies. I forgive him. Basically I propose to offer my first lesson as a free trial due to any honest pupil who wants to test the teacher. I think it’s fair and normal. But I consider for the success of this site that any person who is not able to apology, has nothing to do on this site. Many people think that the Internet is a virtual world. I don’t think so : if a person is able to be dishonest on the Web it is easy to understand that this person behaves likewise in the so called real life.

@Patrick: I think a free lesson is a great idea. We don’t have that built into our system yet but we’re rolling out something along those lines very soon.

@Tina: Totally agreed that showing up on time should factor in. The nice thing about our service is that we know when the tutor and the student enter the room so it’s easy for us to track who’s showing up on time and who’s chronically late!

@Jean-Marie: I think you nailed it. :) The key thing is going to be finding the balance between something that is strict enough to not allow for chronic no-shows while flexible enough to allow for the occasional emergency.

This has all been great feedback that we’re going to incorporate into our service. I’m going to “de-sticky-ify” this thread for now but please feel free to keep adding to it. This service and community is about you guys and we listen very closely to the feedback that we receive from our tutors and our students.

I find that aside from showing up, showing up on time is also a factor of importance. Something to consider in relation to the rating system.

All the ideas proposed above are interesting. I believe each party (tutors and students) should be informed from the very beginning that since they are part of a community, they must respect a certain number of rules applicable to everybody. Of course, there is a distinction between a chronic no-show and occasional emergency. At a minimum, a student who cannot attend a class should send an email as soon as possible. A chronic student no-show profile should be penalized in some way because it is a waste of time for the tutor. Regarding the ratings of the tutors, it is good to rate them, but there should also be a way to rate the students. Online tutoring must be a win-win deal. Many other tutoring sites clearly state on the main page the rule that if a student is a chronic no-show then he or she will be blocked. Typically the allowable number of no-shows is three.

I just wanted to add that I have had a couple of sessions where there were technical difficulties and the tutor just sent me a message. I opened an additional window to check for a message and lo and behold there was a message from my tutor who could not get back in. There are ways to communicate if the session is having the technical issues, and not the tutor’s computer.

Hope I’m not too late to be chiming in with my 2 cents!

Tonight I experienced my first “no show” when, in fact, it was supposed to be my first lesson.

It’s odd, because I met my student through the language school I taught at many months ago, and she was always considerate and gave me notice if she was going to be even a few minutes late. Maybe she forgot that we have each other’s phone numbers.

Anyway, tonight I sent her a text message when she was 20 minutes late. Her response was a simple she was still at work.

I’m not sure if this discrepancy between how she was in the past and what happened tonight was just a matter of 1) her forgetting that she had my number, 2) that in the past she was abiding by the language school’s 24 hour notice cancellation policy, 3) her being tired after a long day at work (indeed our lesson was at 9 p.m.), or 4) some other reason that I can’t think of now. I’ll have to follow-up tonight’s text messages with an email.

I think it would be wonderful if we tutors had the option of setting our own terms. For example, if a student doesn’t give me a 24 hour cancellation notice, I still need to be paid because the option to schedule another student (online or in real life) is no longer one. After all, I teach not only because I enjoy it, but also because it provides me with income.

I think that there should be a tally system on each person’s profile. Perhaps there can be an “emergency no-show” for those rare and unfortunate instances like Christina’s (if a person has 10 emergency no-shows the poor soul has very bad luck and the chances of them showing up is not good!); “no-show with less than 24 hour notice” (pretty self-explanatory); “on time”; “cancellations”; etc… This tallying can be done by the student or teacher after they speak to the respective party and understand the reason behind the “no show”.

About 20 minutes into my waiting tonight, it dawned on my that the timer in the session window doesn’t start until the other person logs in. (Does this mean that if a student is a half hour late, that we only get paid for a half hour?) In my private practice my sessions end when they are scheduled to end. It is the responsibility of the student to be on time, as I am. I think it would be nice if the timer could be controlled by the tutor. So, if a tutor doesn’t feel comfortable starting the time until their student arrives, then that’s their chose. Of course, it wouldn’t be appropriate to start it earlier than the scheduled time, and giving somebody a 5 minute buffer is nice, too.

What are the language options for this website at this time? Is it English by default? If this is the case, I wonder if this contributes to the problem of “no shows” as well.

About the payment— I think that the first session should be free for every student and that teachers don’t get paid for this first hour. I, for one, like to see if there is a good match between me and my private lesson student—not everybody is going to like my personal or professional style. I also like to interview them to determine their level and to see what their specific needs are. Ideally, this is done face-to-face and not over email or messages (at least for me!). Perhaps this can be a choice for the tutor, too, whether or not to charge for the first session, and to set the length of that session.

If the payment system (pre-paid or not) is determined by the teacher, then the student knows that before they even schedule the first free session. If there is a legitimate reason (or if the tutor wishes to forgive the first “no show” incidence regardless of the reason) then the session can be rescheduled. I guess there can be “normal session”, “first free session”, and a non-charged “rescheduled session” (meaning it was already paid for) options.

Well, that’s my 2 cents and super long comment! :)

Isn’t this all easier said than done? I’m tired and all I did was type out my ideas! I can’t imagine designing a functioning web site with all of the cool features this site already has. Bravo to the people who brought this site this far!!!

(I’m still reading old forum posts, so please forgive me if there are redundancies here.)

Ciao!
Janelle

Janelle, great post bursting with ideas! I just wanted to thank you for taking the time and trouble to share your views. They are essential for eduFire.

Thanks! :)

Di niente, Marco! My pleasure! It’s nice to belong to a community that values everybody’s thoughts and ideas.

:),
Janelle

Great ideas, Janelle, my new friend! Giving the tutor autonomy over their policy on lateness would be a win-win situation. Students could chose a more laid-back tutor or be willing to accept a tutor with less flexibility. I had this happen when I turned down a student because of another student wanting the same time, and the scheduled student didn’t show up after fifteen minutes. That’s my limit, especially when it’s very late at night, and I’ve already stayed up until the crack of dawn.
The only thing I just thought of, in response to your ideas was, if I gave a free lesson to each new comer, then I wouldn’t get paid at all! I would much rather offer a free lesson to students who keep taking lessons from me. If they took four lessons, the fifth one would be free, etc.
This continues to be an area of great discussion and I thoroughly value and enjoy everyone’s comments and terrific ideas.

I also agree with many of the points Janelle has made. Today was my third scheduled tutor session since joining eduFire (glad to be here by the way) and it was also my third “no-show”. I was beginning to think there was something wrong with my connection to the session room… so I hit the help button and rejoined again (in a new window) just to be sure. After 12 minutes and no student, I finally ended the session. Since I have been doing alot of offline tutoring lately, I haven’t been able to log on as often as I would like. However, that will be changing soon and I would love to make myself available for more sessions, but would like for the students to actually show up. I agree that there needs to be some sort of preventative policies in place to halt the “no-shows”.