Deposits, cancellations and a sightseeing day that changes shape

What the deposit is for

An evening booking takes a block out of a therapist's day that cannot be filled any other way. When she agrees to be at your door at half past seven, the time around that hour is committed too, because it is too short and too broken up to offer to anyone else. The deposit is the part of the fee that makes the arrangement binding on both sides. It is not held in reserve and returned after the visit. It is the first half of the price itself, worked out from the figures on the profile of the therapist you named, stated in writing in the booking thread once the hour is agreed, and paid before she leaves for your address.

The bookings that carry half in advance

Each profile on the roster lists the complete set of figures, for a single guest and for a couple, with one therapist or with two. Half of the figure that fits your booking is paid ahead in each of these seven situations:

• the booking is made more than twenty-four hours before it starts, which includes an evening arranged before you have even left home;
• it is an overnight of eight hours, whatever time it begins;
• it involves two therapists at the same time, at any length;
• it is for a room at Schiphol or at a hotel beside the airport, which is always arranged apart from the city, with the journey time agreed with you before anything is fixed;
• it falls on a peak date: King's Day, Pride, the Amsterdam Dance Event, the days from Christmas to New Year, or a week with a large conference in the city, any of which the house will name if you ask;
• it runs for three hours or longer, on any date;
• it is the first booking you have made with the house, whatever its hour or length.

Some worked figures make the halves concrete. An overnight at EUR 1,250 means EUR 625 in advance and EUR 625 at the door. The same eight hours with two therapists comes to EUR 2,880, of which EUR 1,440 is paid ahead. Three hours on the last evening of a trip, at EUR 540, is secured with EUR 270. A couple with a therapist each for two hours pays EUR 1,440 in all, EUR 720 of it beforehand. Ninety minutes at EUR 270, arranged for the evening after tomorrow's walking tour, is secured with EUR 135.

Exactly one kind of booking needs nothing in advance. If the house has looked after you before, you are at an address inside the city, and you want one or two hours later the same day, the whole fee is paid when she arrives. Change any one of those conditions, or add a second therapist, go past three hours, choose an airport hotel or land on a peak date, and half is paid ahead once more.

Card first, and the balance at the door

The deposit is paid by card as the first option, or by Revolut, Wise or cryptocurrency for those who prefer them. PayPal and bank transfers are both left out. Cash cannot be used for a deposit, simply because the deposit is settled before she sets out and cash can only change hands once she is in the room. Once the hour is agreed, the booking thread states the exact figure and its destination; no other channel ever carries them. All prices on this site are in euro and include all taxes. Whatever remains is settled at the door on her arrival. Cash in another major currency is accepted for the balance, with the precise amount in that currency confirmed to you in writing before she leaves for your address. The booking page lays out the sequence of messages.

The price of cancelling

No cancellation, however late, leaves you owing the house damages. What can be kept is limited to the part of the fee already earned at the moment your message arrives, and the amount of notice you give is all that decides it:

• With more than twenty-four hours to go before the booked start, nothing is kept, and the full deposit comes back to you.
• Within the last twenty-four hours, provided she has not yet set out, half the deposit is kept as fee already earned and the other half comes back.
• From the moment she has set off towards your address, all of the deposit counts as fee already earned and is kept.

Two further points can lower even that last figure. If another guest takes the hour you gave up, the deposit is returned in full, because nothing was lost in the end. And if you can show that the house lost less than the share it kept, only that lower sum is kept.

Consider ninety minutes at EUR 270 booked for eight in the evening, with EUR 135 paid ahead. Cancel at noon the day before, and all EUR 135 comes back. Cancel at two that afternoon, while she has not yet left, and EUR 67.50 is kept with EUR 67.50 returned. Cancel at a quarter to eight, when she is already crossing the canal ring, and the EUR 135 is kept, unless the hour goes to someone else.

When nothing went ahead on the day

A returning guest's same-day hour or two at a city address has no deposit behind it, so the notice scale has nothing to work on. Cancel it before she has left for your door, and nothing is owed. Cancel it after she has set out, and what is owed is the share of the fee that her journey represents, and nothing beyond that.

Moving to another date

You may change the date once without cost, provided the request reaches the thread more than twenty-four hours before the booked start and the new date is no more than fourteen days away. When both are met, the deposit moves across in full. A second change, or a change requested within the last twenty-four hours, is treated on the notice scale exactly as a cancellation sent at that moment would be, and whatever the scale leaves unkept moves across to the new date.

When the city itself stops the evening

Now and then a booking is stopped by something neither side could have prevented: a halt to public transport, serious disruption across the city, or an order from the authorities that makes the journey impossible. In such a case nobody forfeits anything, and there is no argument to be had. The deposit turns into credit, kept for a date you do not need to choose straight away. Feeling unwell, a change of itinerary, a museum visit that ran long, a flight moved by the airline or simply deciding at eight that you would rather stay in are all on your side of that line, and each is handled as a move or as a cancellation on the scale above.

If the booking fails on the house's side

If the house cannot provide the session you booked, the choice is yours, not the house's. You can have the deposit returned in full, or keep it as credit towards a new date for as long as you need to pick one. If the therapist you named is unable to come, you are told as soon as the house knows, and you then either choose another name from the roster or take the deposit back.

A booking agreed at a distance, and why fourteen days do not apply

A booking agreed in writing, without the two sides having met, is a service contract concluded at a distance. The rules for a contract of that kind are found in articles 6:230m to 6:230z of Book 6 of the Dutch Civil Code, the part of it that takes the European consumer rules into national law. Under those articles a consumer normally has fourteen days to withdraw from a distance contract. Article 6:230p lists the contracts to which that right does not extend, and one of them is a service connected with leisure activities where the contract sets a specific date or period of performance. Every booking with this house fixes an hour on a stated day, which is exactly the case that article covers. So on these bookings the fourteen-day right never comes into being. These terms ask you to waive no right, since there is no such right to waive.

For a session on the same day there is an additional ground. Before she leaves for your address, the house asks you to confirm in the thread that you want the session performed straight away and that you understand the fourteen-day right will no longer apply once it has been performed. Everything else agreed between you and the house is in the terms.

A session cut short

If you decide partway through that the evening is over and end the session before the booked time is up, the full fee remains due and nothing is refunded. The time was set aside for you, she made the journey, and the remainder cannot be offered to anyone else at that stage of the evening.

Your therapist decides what a session includes and states her limits before it begins, and those limits apply for the whole visit. Should her safety or her comfort be disregarded, or a limit she has named be pressed, the visit is over at that point. The fee for the time reserved remains due, and nothing on top of it is charged.

False bookings, and the brief note written after one

Any one of the following makes a booking a false one:

• it was made in a name that is not the client's own;
• it was sent from a phone number or a profile that belongs to someone else;
• it was sent as a practical joke;
• any of the three above was followed by a no-show.

Missing an appointment, taken alone, meets none of those tests. A guest who booked honestly and then did not come to the door has simply cancelled, and the notice scale deals with it like any other cancellation.

When a booking does meet one of the tests, or a visit is ended because a limit was pushed, the house makes a brief internal record. It notes the date, what happened, and the name and number the booking was made from, and it is kept for twelve months. It is seen by no one outside the house, and its single use is to settle whether that name can book again. How to object to such a record, or have it corrected or deleted, is set out on the privacy page. Where the facts indicate a criminal offence, the house may pass the matter to the police.

A guest who books under his own name and is in the room when she knocks will never need anything in this section. The practical questions about the door, the timing and the room are answered in the FAQ.