Every music teacher has had this conversation. A student misses a lesson for a school trip, a cold, or a birthday party, and a parent asks when the make-up is. Without a clear policy, each absence becomes its own negotiation, and the teacher usually ends up teaching extra hours for free.
A written make-up policy fixes that. It doesn't have to be strict. It just has to be decided once, shared up front, and applied the same way to everyone. Below are three policies teachers commonly use, with wording you can copy, and how to run each one without a weekly text thread.
What a make-up policy has to answer
- •How much notice a family has to give for an absence to qualify.
- •How many make-ups a student can have in a term.
- •Where make-ups happen: any open slot, a dedicated make-up week, or a group class.
- •Whether unused make-ups expire at the end of the term.
- •What happens when you're the one who cancels.
If your policy answers those five questions, you'll rarely need to explain it twice.
Policy 1: Make-ups with notice
The most common approach. If a family tells you ahead of time, the lesson can be moved. If they don't, it's forfeited.
If your child can't make a lesson, please move it using the link in your confirmation email at least 24 hours before it starts. Lessons missed without 24 hours' notice can't be made up.
This is fair, easy to explain, and it rewards families who plan ahead. The risk is that a busy studio may not have enough open slots to absorb every moved lesson, so pair it with a booking window that keeps make-ups within a couple of weeks.
Policy 2: A set number of make-ups per term
Each student gets a fixed allowance, often one or two per term, whatever the reason for the absence.
Each student can make up to two missed lessons per term, as long as you let me know before the lesson. Make-ups must be scheduled within the same term and don't carry over.
This caps your extra teaching time, which matters most in a full studio, and it removes judgment calls about which reasons count. The tradeoff is a little bookkeeping: you need to know who has used their allowance.
Policy 3: A make-up week or group make-up class
Instead of finding individual slots, set aside time for make-ups: a lesson-free week at the end of term, or a group session where students who missed a lesson come together.
Missed lessons aren't rescheduled one by one. Instead, the last week of each term is a make-up week, and students who missed a lesson with notice can book a make-up slot during it.
This protects your regular schedule completely, since nothing moves mid-term, and it works especially well for group programs. The downside is the wait: a student who misses week two waits until the end of term for the make-up.
Comparing the three
| Policy | Best for | Your admin | Tradeoff |
|---|---|---|---|
| Make-ups with notice | Studios with some open slots | Low | Can crowd your open slots in busy weeks |
| Set number per term | Full studios | Medium, since you track who used what | Families may treat the allowance as owed |
| Make-up week or class | Group programs and packed weekly schedules | Low during the term | A long wait for the make-up |
When you cancel, it's different
Whatever you choose for student absences, lessons you cancel should always be made up or credited. It's the part of the policy families check most closely, and saying it plainly builds a lot of goodwill.
If I need to cancel a lesson, you'll always get a make-up or a credit toward next term.
Running the policy without a text thread
Writing the policy is the easy part. Applying it every week is where teachers lose time, and a booking page takes most of that off your plate:
- •Notice-based make-ups mostly run themselves. Every confirmation includes a reschedule link, so a family that gives notice moves the lesson into an open slot on their own, within your minimum notice and booking window.
- •For an allowance, create a separate Make-up lesson session type and turn on approval, so each request arrives as pending and you confirm it after checking the student's allowance.
- •For a make-up week, switch the Make-up lesson session type on for that week and off again afterward. For a group make-up, give it a capacity so several students can book the same slot.
- •To find a time for a group make-up, run a scheduling poll with a few options and let families vote.
Share the policy where families book
Families are far more likely to accept a policy they agreed to before the term started. Put it in three places:
- •The description of your lesson session types, so it's on screen when families book.
- •A required checkbox intake question, like 'I've read the make-up lesson policy.'
- •Your start-of-term welcome email, as one short paragraph.
Keep the wording to a few sentences. A policy that fits on a phone screen gets read, and a page of rules doesn't.
Pick one and write it down
There's no single right policy. Notice-based make-ups suit most studios, a set allowance suits full ones, and a make-up week suits group programs. What matters is deciding once and applying it the same way for everyone. For the rest of your term setup, see our guide to scheduling weekly music lessons for a whole term, or see how a studio page fits together on our page about scheduling software for music teachers.
Frequently asked questions
Do music teachers have to offer make-up lessons?
No. It's a business decision, and some studios offer none at all. Whatever you choose, write it down and share it before the term starts so nobody is surprised.
How much notice should families give to get a make-up?
24 hours is a common choice because it leaves time to offer the slot to someone else. Pick the notice period that matches how quickly you can actually refill a lesson.
Should unused make-ups roll over to the next term?
Most teachers find it simplest to have them expire at the end of the term. Rolling them over means tracking balances across terms, and those balances tend to grow.
What if I'm the one who cancels a lesson?
Offer a make-up or a credit every time, whatever your policy is for student absences. It's what families expect, and saying so in your policy builds trust.