Automatic payments for music lessons through Practice Pal

At Practice Pal we have created a simple, safe way to ensure you get paid for your music lessons on time and in one place. We’ve taken out the hassle of chasing up invoices, receiving payments on different dates, and administrating your different pupils on different platforms. Security is our priority, as we want to make sure that you can trust us to do the heavy lifting of your music teaching career.

We’ve partnered with Stripe to take your payments.

Stripe is one of the world’s leading and most trustworthy online payment processors. We use it to collect payments on your behalf and transfer money into your chosen bank account.

Practice Pal provides access to Stripe through our website. Stripe takes payments via all major credit and debit cards including Visa, American Express and Master Card.

In order to receive payments through Practice Pal, teachers must be connected to Stripe, and, by doing so, agree to Stripe’s terms of service and privacy policy. All payments made are governed solely by Stripe’s terms of service and privacy policy.

Your details are held securely with Stripe

Your full bank details are stored only in Stripe, who have stringent security measures in place to protect your data*. Practice Pal will store only a portion of your details, which is used to help you identify which details you have registered with us. When you add or amend your bank details, you are securely submitting through the Practice Pal dashboard.

*Further details on Stripe’s security measures can be found online, but we’ve summarised a few below for convenience:

  • Stripe is Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protected meaning that both the Teacher’s and the Guardian’s information is securely transmitted throughout the entire payment process
  • Stripe is PCI Level 1 compliant offering the highest possible level of payment processing security.
  • Stripe is encrypted ensuring that the security and integrity of all information including credit and debit card numbers.

We will never take a cut of your earnings

All monetary transactions, whether in a shop or online, come with fees. Practice Pal doesn’t take any fees for transactions – we only pass on the fees which are deducted from payments by Stripe. These in turn come from the central providers such as Visa and Mastercard.

These transaction fees are handled on a pay-as-you-go basis, per transaction. The fee rates are the same for all accepted credit and debit card payment methods in the UK. We display these fees clearly on the Payments section of your Teacher Dashboard.

The typical fee for a card payment through Stripe is 1.9%.

The exact total is comprised of 2 parts:

  • The card fee: For European cards, 1.4% + 20p per transaction (2.9% for non-European cards)
  • The bank transfer fee: 0.25%, plus a one-off £2 if you receive one or more transactions in a month

Getting your payment to you quickly and securely

Practice Pal issues a transfer to your bank account as soon as we receive the payment from the account holder, but it can take up to 7 days for this to appear in your account due to Stripe’s processes (which include fraud protection). The status of your payment can always be seen in the Payments section of the dashboard.

Issuing refunds

The best way of issuing a refund on Practice Pal is by making a correction to the following month’s bill. This can be easily done by viewing the Upcoming Payment section from the dashboard.

If you need to issue a refund (such as for a pupil who has since cancelled lessons), please contact us via the contact button on the Teacher Dashboard. Please note that the fees deducted from payments are non-refundable. Furthermore, refunds may take up to 2 weeks to process, so it is quicker and easier to make adjustments to future payments wherever possible.