What Is Calendar-Based Billing?
Calendar based billing charges families based on lessons that appear in your schedule. You set the billing period and lesson price, and the platform counts the lessons, generates the invoice, and tracks payment — all in
Overview
Calendar-based billing is an efficient billing model used by music and tutoring studios. Instead of charging a fixed monthly subscription or having to manually work out how many lessons might occur in a given time period, it works from your teaching schedule: the platform looks at what lessons are planned within a given period, counts them up, and generates an invoice for the correct amount.
This gives you flexibility — you can bill a week or a term in advance, invoice at the end of the month, or generate invoices on any schedule that suits your studio — while keeping the invoice amount always tied to real lesson data from your calendar.
As long as your lesson calendar is up to date in Octavia, the invoices will accurately reflect your schedule.
When Is Calendar-Based Billing the Right Choice?
Calendar-based billing works best when:
- You teach a consistent weekly or fortnightly schedule and want invoices to reflect your planned lessons.
- Lesson counts vary from period to period — for example, a month with 5 Mondays will be invoiced for 5 lessons, not 4.
- Your studio policy is that a booked lesson slot is a charged lesson slot, with missed lessons handled through your studio's makeup or cancellation policy.
- Your families pay per lesson (at a set price per lesson) rather than a flat monthly fee.
- You use the scheduler and calendar regularly to keep your lesson calendar up to date.
How It Differs from Other Billing Models
The platform supports several billing models. Here is how calendar-based billing compares:
| Billing Model | How It Works |
|---|---|
| Calendar-Based (this section) | Invoices are based on scheduled lessons within a billing period. The calendar drives the invoice amount. Attendance does not affect what is charged. |
| Pay As You Go (PAYG) | Families are only charged after attendance is marked. No lesson creates a charge until the teacher confirms it happened. (PAYG guide coming soon) |
| Lesson Packs | Families prepay a bundle of lessons. Credits are drawn down each time a lesson is attended. (Lesson Packs guide coming soon) |
| Flat Subscription | A fixed amount is charged each month regardless of how many lessons take place. |
| Term Manual | The teacher creates one invoice per school term, setting the lesson count and amount manually. |
For a full comparison to help you choose, see Which Billing Model Is Right for Your Studio?.
Key Concepts
The calendar is the source of truth
In calendar-based billing, attendance is not consulted when calculating what to charge. A lesson that is in the calendar for the billing period is a billable lesson — full stop. This keeps invoicing deterministic: the same schedule always produces the same invoice. How Lessons Are Counted explains this in detail, including how the system handles missed lessons fairly.
Billing periods
A billing period is the date range the invoice covers. You can choose how long each period is (for example, monthly, every two months) and which day of the month a new period begins. Lessons that fall within that date range are counted for the invoice.
Manual vs automatic collection
You can choose whether you create invoices manually before a teaching term, or at the end of a teaching term. Or you can have the system create them on a set schedule based on your calendar. Both options give you full control — the difference is in who initiates invoice creation. See Manual vs Automatic Invoice Collection.