How do I sell an experience, like afternoon tea or a tasting menu?

Sell afternoon tea, a tasting menu or a masterclass as something guests book, with its own price, times, places and refund rule.

An experience is something guests book with its own price, times and places — afternoon tea at £32 a person, a tasting menu, a bottomless brunch, a cocktail masterclass. Guests choose it on your booking page, pick one of its start times and pay online, straight into your own Stripe account. Your tables, pacing rules and table assignment work exactly as they do for any booking.

Experiences are Available on Pro plan and above. Owners and Admins set them up, and so can anyone whose role has Experiences (Managers have it by default) — on the staff tablet too, where Experiences sits beside Events in the menu. Paid experiences need Stripe connected; a free experience doesn't. If Stripe isn't connected yet, the owner can click Connect Stripe (anyone else sees "Only the venue’s owner can connect Stripe.") on the experience's Price step: the experience's answers are kept, Stripe's own sign-up opens, and when you finish you're back on the same experience and step.

Setting one up

Open the Experiences page and click New experience. The sheet has five steps:

• About — the Name, a Description (what's included, anything guests should know) and a Picture from your image library.
• Price — under How guests pay, choose Pay in full when they book (the usual choice) or A deposit to book (part online, the rest at the venue). Set the Price and whether it's Per person or For the whole booking. A price of £0 makes it free to book.
• When — How long it lasts (the table is held this long), then the Days and start times. Use Add a start time for each time, and Add other days with different times if, say, weekends run later. Under More options you can add Extra dates (a one-off Christmas Eve sitting), Dates it doesn’t run, and a season with On sale from and Until.
• Places — Places at each start time (when these are booked, that time shows as full), plus the Smallest group and Largest group one booking can be. These group sizes replace your everyday online limits for this experience; a special date's own limits still apply.
• Booking and refunds — when Online booking closes (hours before the start; your team can still add bookings after), and If a guest cancels: Full refund, Part refund or No refund, with how many hours before counts as cancelling in time.

Click Save as a draft. Guests can't see a draft.

Putting it on sale

In the experience's … menu, click Put on sale. It then appears on your booking page as a choice beside an ordinary table booking, and as a card under What we offer on your venue page — tapping the card opens your booking page with that experience already chosen. Each experience also has its own link — click Copy the booking link to share it on Instagram or in an email; it opens your booking page with that experience already chosen.

Pause takes it off your booking page without touching bookings already made; Archive retires it (past bookings keep its name). An archived experience can come back with Bring back as a draft. Use Move up and Move down to set the order guests see.

Money and refunds

The guest pays the price shown, into your own Stripe account. Changing an experience's price or refund rule only affects new bookings — a booking already made keeps what the guest agreed to. Refunds follow the experience's own rule and are made from the booking, like any other booking payment. A free experience follows your usual rule for asking guests to save a card; a paid one never asks for a card as well.

If you move to a plan without experiences, your experiences stay listed: you can still pause or archive them, and bookings already made stand. They can't be put on sale again until you're back on Pro or Complete.

When guests book and change

A booking for an experience keeps to the experience's own rules: its start times, its smallest and largest group (they replace your usual online party-size limits; a special date's own limits still apply), its places and when online booking closes. It is held for the experience's own length. Pre-orders aren't offered with an experience — the experience is the package.

Guests can change their own booking online — to another of the experience's start times, or to a different group size — while it's on sale and before online booking closes for that time. To swap to a different experience they cancel and book the new one. A paused or archived experience can't be changed online; your team can still change the booking.

Changing a booking to another experience

Your team can move a booking to a different experience without cancelling it: open the booking and choose Change experience, pick the experience and its start time, and you'll see what the guest has paid, the new price and the difference. Only the difference changes hands:

• If the new one costs more, Send a payment link for the extra, Take it at the venue, or choose No charge (a free upgrade — say why, and it's kept with the booking).
• If it costs less, Refund to their card or Give a gift card for the difference (a gift card only where you sell them). Both ask for your password or a manager's PIN.

If there aren't enough places, or no table is free for the new time, you'll see a warning and can choose Change anyway. The booking then follows the new experience's refund rule. A booking can change experience until the guests arrive.

Related: How do I sell extras with bookings? · How do I connect Stripe?