Payment Policies
...and the rest
Classes
PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT US WITH QUESTIONS ABOUT A PAYPAL PAYMENT YOU HAVE MADE UNLESS YOU INCLUDE THE TRANSACTION ID NUMBER PROMINENTLY IN YOUR EMAIL. THIS NUMBER IS IN THE EMAIL YOU RECEIVED DIRECTLY FROM PAYPAL IMMEDIATELY AFTER MAKING YOUR PAYMENT. WE ARE UNABLE TO ADDRESS ANY ISSUES RELATED TO PAYPAL PAYMENTS WITHOUT THIS NUMBER. THANK YOU!
ALTHOUGH WE DO OUR BEST TO RESPOND PROMPTLY, WE ARE AN INDEPENDENT BUSINESS WITH A SMALL STAFF. PLEASE GIVE US UP TO THREE DAYS TO RESPOND TO YOUR EMAIL.
Thank you for registering for a class with the New York School of Burlesque! If you are unable to attend a class you registered for and are interested in a refund or a transfer/substitution or class credit, please request this no less than THREE (3) full business days before the class is held. We are unable to issue refunds or transfers or class credit on requests received with less than three days notice.Unlike airlines, we do not "overbook a flight," or a class. Most of our classes have a limit to the amount of students we accept to assure our teachers can provide a quality class to every student who enrolls. When you purchase a slot in one of our classes, you really own it, and no one else can have it whether you show up or not. If you rent a hotel room and don't sleep in it, the hotel still can't rent it. We understand that people get sick and things break and life happens, however we cannot afford to issue refunds or transfers unless we have enough time to try to process your replacement in the class. We hate it but please understand our budget is based on this. And if you try to cancel the day of or after a class or series begins, we will have already paid for the instructor, studio, and other overhead. Please note that this is standard business practice for dance and theatre classes.
If we have to cancel a class due to one of our instructors being ill, or weather, or other concerns, or if there was an error on our end that led to several people missing the class, we will make it right. Similarly, if several people have the same problem with a class (for instance, if three or four people say they thought the class was at a different time), we will assume that it is our fault. Otherwise, however, we will assume that we have made all the appropriate effort to present the information you need and have provided the class as we said we would.
If you need to cancel and give us THREE or more days notice, we will refund you immediately. You may then stay on our email list to be notified when the class is offered again. Unfortunately, we are unable to transfer the credit to the next offering of that class.
If you have paid a deposit on a series, you will be invoiced for the balance 10-7 days before the class series begins, and must pay it within three days or you will lose both your slot in the class and your deposit. We won't have time to fill your slot with a paying student!
If you have a gift certificate someone bought for you, you can use it in any class which is not held as a charity or benefit, but you must still register ahead of time and are still subject to class space availability and refund and payment policies. The size of a scheduled class is based on sightlines, space, number of props available, etc., and is not arbitrary or negotiable.
Please email nysbinstructors@gmail.com to request a refund or transfer.
Private Party and Event Deposits:
Thank you for planning your event with the New York School of Burlesque! If something has come up and you will not be able to plan your event with us, we do offer refunds. Please allow THREE (3) full business days before your event to request a cancellation if you would like a refund. Without this THREE (3) day notice for cancellation, we will be left holding the cost for studio rental, and the instructors will be unable to book themselves for other classes or events if they reserved their time for you. The deposit is intended to cover our costs if you must cancel with short notice.If your event (such as a bachelorette, birthday, or other private party) allows a deposit (not all classes do), that deposit is fully refundable up to ten days before the event, and 50% refundable up to a week before the event. After that it is nonrefundable and nontransferable.
Parties or private lessons or events booked less than a week in advance must be paid in full in advance. If you have to cancel we will refund all but your $100 deposit. Change of date is the same for us as a cancellation because we still had to reserve your time slot and turn down other people who might have been interested.
For parties, you may not consider your reservation confirmed until we have received a deposit. If we don't hear from you for awhile and don't receive a deposit, we will assume you have changed your plans.
If we cancel for ANY reason—bad weather, accident, etc.—we will refund your payment as quickly as we can, even if it is difficult for us to repay you, even if it costs us additional money.
ETC...
The New York School of Burlesque is a small business, a collective of teachers, not a corporation, and it is difficult for us to refund a slot and re-promote a sold out class. We may have already paid the teacher. We also have to pay for the studio rental space even if we don't use it.Be very clear about which email address you want to use to communicate with you if it is not the same as your paypal email address.
If these policies change, the policy that will be in place will be the one that was stated at the time you made your reservation.
And that's it! You now know all you need to know. If you'd like to know more about why our policies are as they are, please continue reading. Otherwise, we hope you can attend another class with the School of Burlesque in the future! As a small business, our dilemma is that although we are eager to provide personal attention and accommodate genuinely interested students, unfortunately, last minute refunds, class transfers, and class substitutions cost us money, and are unfair to other students interested in taking the class you are dropping. If we cancel or fail to provide a class for any reason, we will refund your cost because we don't want to take your money for nothing, and we want you to have a pleasant experience with NYSB.
When you purchase a slot in one of our classes, you really own it, and no one else can have it whether you show up or not. It's as if you'd rented a hotel room---no one else can stay in it whether or not you sleep there. If you cancel right before a class or series, we can't give you a refund or credit because it would cost us every penny of what you paid, since there isn't time for us to offer someone else the slot. Even if we keep your deposit, we still lose out on the balance someone would have paid to take the class; For this reason we can also NOT offer partial series attendance. If you can't make a class during a series, we can't offer you a substitute class, because we can't refill a slot in a series. It's as if you rented a car and didn't drive it--it's still the case that no one else could drive it during the day you had it rented. You may, however, offer it to a friend and have them pay you, as long as you let us know someone else will be attending in your place. But we will not be responsible for collecting from them--they must pay YOU.
Our payment policy is linked in the sidebar on every page of the site, and on the webpage for each class. We accept that you may choose not to register for a class because you do not like our refund policy. However, registration implies that you understand and agree to our payment policy.
Please note, if you are a first-time registrant and you read our policies and still require a transfer or refund with less than the required THREE (3) days notice, we will make note of your breach, because it is so very financially hard on this small independent business.
Not to beat a dead horse, but so you know: if we allowed refunds for short notice cancellations (fewer than three days before the class), it would destroy our business. We know this because we used to allow it and have done research on other business and dance school policies, and our policy here is consistent. Because our policies are common practice, we believe them to be reasonable.
