Sometimes, a customer may not have their wallet or be able to pay for a particular service. In such situations, you can issue the customer an IOU (I owe you), which they can pay back later. By issuing an IOU, you can still check out a customer without accepting payment. Once an IOU is added to a customer's profile, you will receive a reminder of their outstanding IOU at Checkout. You can also view all unpaid IOUs from the IOU Report.
Note
You can't clear an IOU with an invoice.
Prerequisites: This feature is available for all Vagaro businesses.
To add an IOU:
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Go to the Checkout
screen, or check out the customer directly from the Calendar.
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Select a customer and add items to their shopping cart.
Note
For existing appointments or classes, the customer is already selected and ready for checkout.
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In the IOU field, enter the amount owed.
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Select Checkout.
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In the Add IOU popup, enter a Comment about why the IOU is being given.
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Select Proceed or Yes.
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Optionally, print or email a receipt.
Comments
10 comments
It would be great if customers could add a tip on an IOU. I haven't seen an option when having them pay an IOU and then when they use a credit card they don't have any way of giving us a gratuity. It also doesn't give us any way to swipe the card from the IOU, just to manually enter the card details.
Hi Monica... If you've added the tip on the checkout screen before you create the IOU, there's no need to add a tip when paying the IOU. Also, If your card reader is connected to your device when you start the checkout for the IOU, there will be an option to tap, dip or swipe a card (depending on the reader and card type you have).
You could create a workaround by setting up some percentage-based fees to use in place of tipping on an IOU checkout. I made up one that I called "late tip-20%." When I added it to a test customer checking out an IOU, it added 20% of the IOU amount to the checkout.
Please consider adding this as a feature request!
Is there a way to permanently remove a voided IOU on your sales report? I did a test IOU to see what the process was like for the customer and it has now impacted my sales report.
Hi,
You can't currently remove or change information from the Sales Report. This ensures that all of our reporting is accurate, even if it contains your test information.
Thanks,
Jamie
Is this something we could add as a balance on a no-show appointment? Or is there a way to add a balance to their account that they must pay along with deposit when booking their next appointment?
Hi Kimberly,
IOUs can definitely be used as a balance when a customer no-shows; however, this balance is only shown for in-house checkout and will not display when booking online. So, you can charge the customer the remaining IOU balance when they come in for their next appointment.
I recommend charging a 100% deposit for your services if you are looking to charge customers for no-shows. Deposits are much harder to chargebck than a cancellation fee or IOU, and we've found that customers deal with fewer chargebacks when they charge a 100% deposit.
Thanks,
Jamie
Is there a way for a client to pay in advance and have money on their account?
Hi, Ruston. Your client can purchase a package so they can prepurchase services and book them later.
Here is an article about how to set up packages: https://support.vagaro.com/hc/en-us/articles/360005849033-Create-a-New-Package
Any chance an IOU could be used with an invoice? For example, we do extensions and charge for the extensions themselves as a product/inventory separate from the service to install/move-up and we ask for the full cost of the hair up front in-lieu of a deposit. We revamped how we do this starting this year, and in July had a long-term client pay for new hair. It's easier to send an invoice for the cost of the hair, but as this was the first time doing it this way with her, we allowed for her to pay half early and then pay the balance at her appointment. Because we sent an invoice for half down, I had to give her a 50% discount on the invoice and another 50% discount at checkout, which completely skewed the Sales by Brand numbers for July. If I could have done it as an IOU, I think it would have been much cleaner in reports (although I have separate questions about IOU's in reports).
Hi Brittany, right now, you can't do this on Vagaro. You'll need to submit it as a feature request. I'd say a deposit is the best option for this going forward.
Thanks, Jamie
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