Bally Rehearsal Studios.
Tottenham Hale, N17. London. 

We try to make sure that the session prices are kept as low as possible, so that it is more affordable for the bands to rehearse with us, and to ensure the long-term future of the studios. Therefore, we have to charge the cancellation policy wherever applicable, to prevent a rates rise across the board.
 
This are our cancellation policy.
 
Cancellations are charged at the following rates 

Less than 48 hours notice – Full Price 
2-4 days – 50% of session fee 
5 days or more – No Cancellation fee


When a band cancels their rehearsal, we will always try our best to get a band to replace their rehearsal, and if we can, then there will be no charge. NONE!! In the past, we have been able to get a replacement band in at less than 2 hours notice, (though please be aware that whilst this is very rare), and we will always try our best to do what we can to find a replacement band to take your session, but if we are unable to, the cancellation fee must be paid in all circumstances.  
 
As a matter of course, we always let all bands know about the cancellation policy,  and we cannot give any exceptions at all. We have had some bands say to us, "Well, if you are going to charge a cancellation policy, we will just go elsewhere!"     Of course, we want to do everything that we can to keep all of the bands that come to us coming to us, but, with respect, there is no point in us going out of our way to keep these kinds of bands, as these bands cost us money in the long run, and therefore we are more than happy for these bands to go elsewhere, with respect.   Especially as we are in a fortunate position where we have more session enquiries than we have sessions available, it means that  there is no point in us going out of our way to take a financial loss on a band that is more likely to cancel their session in the future, whilst turning away a band that has never cancelled before.  
 
The studios is our way to make a living, but we cannot make a living from bands that cancel their session at the last minute and don't pay a cancellation fee.  The only bands that can keep the studios going are bands that make their sessions, and bands that pay the cancellation fees.  Each session that is booked costs us money in staff wages, rent, bills and general running costs, so when a session is cancelled, we have paid out money, and get none back in return.    Bands that book sessions and then don't keep them don't generate any profits for the studios, and we must prioritise the bands that will keep their bookings, simply to protect the long term viability of the studios.  We have gone into this detail as we have quite a few bands that have cancelled 2-3 sessions in the past, and then ask why they have to pay up front for their rehearsal, and why we refuse to take a booking from them unless they do so.  We do this as we are running a business, and cannot leave something is fundamentally important as getting paid for our work to chance, and  this is what we would be doing if we were to book in a band that had cost us money in the past, while hoping that they did not do the same again in the future.
 
At the studio, we have kept our rates nearly the same since 2005, (we have only put them up by 14% in 10 years) and in that time our costs have gone up by 71%. We've invested over £28,000 into improving the studios since 2005, on top of the usual running costs, and that isn't even accounting for inflation. There are 2 ways that we can keep the studios running; one of them is to raise the session rates, which we'd rather not do, and the other to to enforce the cancellation policy as strictly a possible. Pre-pandemic we had an occupancy rate of about 93%, and that's pretty much 24/7. We need to keep the occupancy at above 90% to make the studio work for us. From 2005-2012, 18% of all sessions that were booked in were cancelled later, so if we didn't charge for these sessions, then we'd only be at 75% of occupancy, and therefore we wouldn't be able to keep the prices at the rates that they are currently at. So it is only by enforcing the cancellation policy, wherever we have, that we can keep our rehearsal room rates down.
 
We are not the only studios in London that has a cancellation policy. Pretty much every single rehearsal studio will have one. Our cancellation policy is on our website, available in the office and is also in all of the rooms on the walls.
 
We hope you understand why we have this policy.
 
Many thanks - Bally Studios