If you have been gifted with an intuitive or healing ability, you are likely someone who is deeply empathetic and connected to the feelings of others. This may cause an internal conflict for you, when it comes to charging clients for your services, putting your foot down in relation to cancellations and rescheduling, dealing with clients if they become aggressive, or other challenging issues.

While we acknowledge how hard it can be for any business owner to deal with client issues, the unpredictable nature and outcomes of intuitive, reading and healing work, makes it all the more important to take steps to ensure that you are paid. It is important for you to be on top of managing cancellations, creating boundaries, and finding out how you can minimise the risk of your services going unpaid. 

Below we set out ways to protect your boundaries and manage client relationships effectively.

What to do to make sure you are getting paid for your services

As an intuitive, reader or healer, we know that some of you feel as though it can sometimes feel wrong to ask a client to pay for a service that you are providing. Perhaps you offer full refunds to clients who are not 100% happy with their service (which, given the unpredictable nature of intuitive work, can be common), or perhaps you feel uncomfortable asking for money in the first place, for fear of being perceived as preying upon the vulnerable by a world riddled with sceptics. What is important to know is that it is never wrong to be paid for the gifts you share.

It is vital to remember that your services are business transactions, and whether the client's expectations are met or not, is outside the scope of your control. Your services will attract the type of people who are vulnerable as they seek answers or healing. Taking money for your services isn’t exploiting this. These clients may come to you to connect with a passed loved one, or to heal trauma in their life, amongst other things. This can mean that clients come to you already harbouring high expectations and can be disappointed if these are not met. 

What to do to minimise clients cancelling appointments

No-shows can be a headache. Imagine a client doesn’t show up for an appointment with you. Immediately, your time and income is lost from not being able to book another client in that particular time slot. 

The best way to minimise the aftermath of cancellations and clients who don’t turn up, is to ensure that booking and payment is required upfront, and communicate from the outset that you require being paid in advance. Not only does this demonstrate that your service is a business transaction, it also lends itself to the booking terms and expectations, where clients can be made aware of your boundaries. 

Having an online booking system is an easy way for a client to be clear about what you expect, to be reminded of the appointment, and to pay easily up front. This also provides you with the opportunity to be paid from anywhere, both online and offline. 

What happens if a client no-shows and has pre-paid, then shows up three years later wanting to book an appointment? This is where it is important that you have a cancellation policy. Is this something you have already, or does it need to be updated? Make sure you get paid up front before a client has a chance to cancel and avoid paying you, through having a clear terms and conditions policy visible to your clients at the point of booking. This cancellation policy should have a cut-off date, usually requiring 24 to 48 hrs notice before the appointment, after which they may forfeit a refund in full, for example. 

How to protect privacy, confidentiality & redistribution

Do you find that clients want to record your sessions? Whether in person or online, it is always important to be explicit that the client needs your consent to do so. Making it clear that your client requires your consent before recording your session allows you to have the knowledge that you are being recorded and also means that you can ignite a conversation around perhaps if or where the recording will be published, what it will be used for, and who will be seeing it.

Your consent is up to your discretion, and it can be a good idea to try to get a sense of the client's motives. Imagine if they were a journalist who was looking for recordings to compare predictions for a podcast or show. Being explicit about consent, means that you can protect yourself from issues that may arise down the line designed to discredit your work. And, if you don’t want to record, you can be clear on that.

What to do when you can’t guarantee outcomes of your session 

It doesn't take a psychic to realise that clients will be coming to you with high expectations. Not only are these expectations high in the sense that the client wants to get something out of your service, they are also very specific to their own lives and circumstances. 

For example, a client may come to you in the hopes of reaching out to a late grandmother. If this specific grandmother does not ‘come through’ in your session, and even though the client got all their questions answered in another way, they might be unhappy that it didn't come from this specific person they had in mind. Perhaps a client comes to you wanting to be instantly cured of chronic pain, which you know will be unachievable. 

It is important that you protect yourself from being liable for these clients' high, and often unrealistic, expectations not being met. It is almost impossible to predict how a client is going to react, and the people coming to you may even carry mental health issues or trauma that can be triggering during your sessions. 

Similarly, if someone has a pre-existing health or psychological conditions and the reading or healing stirs up some things for them, you need to ensure they know they must go and seek professional or medical help for those issues if they need to, and limit your liability. In order to protect yourself from these variables, a disclaimer is required. This can be as simple as making the client aware of the unpredictable and delicate nature of your work. This will protect you against the fall out of potentially revealing or saying something that is triggering to someone or perhaps was not what they were expecting. The disclaimer must form part of the terms and conditions that they agree to upon booking a session with you, agreed to before or at the time they pay, and before you work with the client. 

What to do if you can’t deliver at the appointment? 

So, what happens if a session just can’t happen? Sometimes, different factors may hinder your ability to be able to provide your service. I have had this happen with a kinesiologist once. The kinesiologist was unable to do body testing on my muscles, despite having successfully done it previously. That day we agreed I would come back to try again (and it worked on the next session). But what do you do in these cases? Do you rely on external factors to do your sessions with clients? Do you reschedule or do you refund?

Your online booking terms need to cover these situations and what may be organised in instances like these. This includes having a disclaimer and being clear and open from the outset. Perhaps you decide that if you know you can’t perform the service for a client within the first little while of their appointment, they will receive a full refund, or you decide to reschedule without a subsequent fee. 

What to do if someone is late to their appointment

If a client is running late, at what point do you call time and give up on them arriving for your session together? 

You should be explicit from the very beginning that you have the right to suspend or end the appointment without having to give a refund. Imagine a client books in for an hour appointment, and they are half an hour late for that appointment. When they arrive they want a refund for the half hour that was missed. Do you have disclaimers and terms and conditions in place that will protect you from this and make sure you don’t have to run into your next appointment or deliver that extra 30 minutes another time

What to do in the case of aggressive or inappropriate client behaviour

As discussed, sometimes your type of work can appeal to a class of vulnerable people who may be coming to you for your help in matters that stem from trauma, pain and other difficult emotions they are trying to make sense of. If a client, who is already feeling down, is given information that is triggering to them and not what they wanted to hear, this may elicit an aggressive response directed toward you. It is paramount that you set boundaries and establish your environment early on with your clients so that you can exercise your right to immediately cut off or suspend the session if a patient acts inappropriately toward you, despite their challenges.

A client may also become aggressive or inappropriate if your session runs over time, and you tell them that the session has ended. In this case, it can help to be clear about the timeline for the appointment and gently remind your client that they are able to rebook a subsequent session if they need. This ensures that you are being paid appropriately, and your time is valued. If you have back to back sessions, this could mean that a session running overtime means you are working into your personal time, for which you will most likely not be compensated for, and places unnecessary stress upon you.

Your safety is paramount, and just like any other person in a business, you deserve to be treated as a professional. You can elect to exercise discretion here, and perhaps you would prefer to offer that the client rebooks with you another time, rather than cut them off completely. The most important thing is that you are explicitly making clients aware of your boundaries from the outset through your terms and conditions. 

What to do from here

It is important to understand that you are providing a service and, as such, deserve to be treated just as any other professional. This also means putting things in place to protect yourself from being liable, given the unpredictable nature of intuitive reading and healing services

Setting up a booking system and a way for your clients to pre-pay is a great place to start. This process means you have the peace of mind that:

1. You are being paid for your services and compensated for late cancellations

2. You can easily handle your payments (rather than cash)

3. Clients are aware of their booking time, which can help to minimise lateness or no-shows

4. Clients can view your disclaimers and terms and conditions

5. Clients are aware of your boundaries

6. You are protected if you are unable to perform on the day 

7. You are protected from clients who are unhappy with expected outcomes.

The unpredictable nature of intuitive work can mean that managing cancellations, creating boundaries, terms and conditions, and disclaimers can mean the difference between being paid for your work. Ensuring that you have these methods in place can protect your business from the risks discussed above.

Related Articles:  How to protect your intellectual property in business: Trademarking online courses and programs

The art of getting paid: How to recover unpaid invoices

Disclaimers for businesses with an online presence - what they are and why you need them

Using our Intuitive and energy readers online booking terms and condition template, you can ensure that your clients are aware of your boundaries from the outset. This will ensure that you are paid just as any other business is, and are protected from the risks discussed above, such as cancellations and guaranteed outcomes. 

At The Remote Expert, we can also assist you in detailing customised terms and conditions if there are further specifics you wish to include. Just contact me or schedule a discovery call.