Music Teacher Studio Policy: A Template
A music teacher's studio policy sets the monthly fee, make-ups and holidays. A six-point template plus the two French legal rules you must include.
A music teacher's studio policy is the written document you give each family before the first lesson: it sets the fee, the lesson rhythm, make-ups, and what happens when a student misses a lesson or stops. Without it, every case gets settled on the spot, usually at the worst moment.
This policy works for a piano, guitar or singing teacher working alone, and for a small studio with several rooms. Here are the six points to cover and the two legal rules you cannot skip in France.
Why a written policy changes everything
A music lesson runs across the year: a family signs up in September and comes every week until June. Over ten months, the same questions keep coming back. The student is ill on a Wednesday: do you give a make-up or not? The family goes skiing for a week: do they still pay? A parent wants to stop in March: what is left to settle?
Write the answer once, have the family sign the policy at sign-up, and you stop renegotiating ten times a year. The document protects the family too, because they know what they are committing to.
A good policy fits on one page. Six points are enough: fee and payment, calendar, absences, make-ups, home practice, and end of enrolment.
The monthly fee: what it covers
Most music teachers charge a fixed monthly fee rather than per lesson. For example: 30 minutes a week at 100 € a month, from September to June. The amount does not change whether a month has four or five weeks, because the yearly price is divided by ten and the school holidays are already taken out.
Put it in writing:
- the fixed slot: day, time, length;
- the number of lessons guaranteed over the year, for example 32 sessions;
- the payment date, for example the 5th of each month;
- what is included (the lesson) and what is not (instrument rental, sheet music).
A fixed weekly slot is easy to run with a recurring lesson schedule: you set the lesson once, it comes back every week, and you see at a glance which rooms are busy.
Want to see at a glance which families have paid for the current month?
Try it freeAbsences and make-ups: one rule only
This is the sore point. Set one simple rule and hold it:
- an absence flagged at least 24 hours ahead earns a make-up;
- an absence with no notice is charged and not made up;
- make-ups happen on one shared slot, Saturday morning for example, not on demand;
- a lesson cancelled by the teacher is always made up or refunded.
Grouping make-ups on a single slot keeps you from finding eight loose hours to place at the end of term. For the detail, see tutoring make-up lesson policy.
Home practice and holidays
A music student mostly improves between lessons. The policy can set a clear expectation: for example 15 to 20 minutes of practice a day, five days out of seven. It is not a contractual duty, but a written expectation heads off the misunderstanding with parents later in the year.
For school holidays, pick the rule and announce it: the studio closes during the regional holidays, and those weeks are not billed since they are already out of the yearly fee. Reminding the family the day before lessons restart avoids no-shows; with Kadrella, the WhatsApp reminder goes out in one click, not on its own.
Renewal and withdrawal: two rules to respect
A yearly enrolment that renews on its own is an automatically renewed contract. According to service-public.fr, you must tell each family in writing about their right not to renew, no earlier than 3 months and no later than 1 month before the deadline to say so. If that notice is missing, the family can cancel at any time, free of charge, and you refund money paid in advance within 30 days (Code de la consommation, articles L215-1 to L215-5).
Second rule: if the family signs up online or by phone, they have a 14-day withdrawal right, counted from the day after signing (articles L221-18 to L221-28). A lesson given before that period ends can be billed pro rata if the family asked to start right away.
Both clauses fit in three lines of the policy. A tutoring contract template already includes them.
Free tool: the lesson contract generator builds a contract with the cancellation and withdrawal clauses, ready to print and sign.
Sources
Computer science engineer, Sorbonne UTC graduate. Founder of kadrella.com, the platform built for private tutors.
- organisation
- cours de musique
- contrat