How to set your attendance settings
Attendance types are the choices your teachers pick from when they mark a lesson, such as present, absent or cancelled. Each one also tells Octavia what should happen next: whether it counts toward a student’s prepaid lessons, whether it’s charged for, and whether the student is owed a make-up.
There’s no single right answer. These settings should match your studio’s policies. The pictures in this guide use example settings, so check each setting against your own policy rather than copying them.
Step 1 — Open School Settings
In the sidebar on the left, find the Setup section and click School Settings.
Step 2 — Choose Lesson Settings
Choose Lesson Settings from the list of sections.
Settings
Sections
Choose an area to manage school, teacher, and account configuration.
Step 3 — Find the Attendance card
Scroll down, past Lesson Types and Instruments, to the Attendance card. Its table lists your Attendance Types, which are the options your teachers see when they mark attendance.
Each row shows the type’s Label and Code, its Outcome, whether it Counts Toward Quota, whether it’s Billable (per-event), whether it Allows Make-up and how long that Make-up Expiry lasts, whether it’s Active, and its Order in the list.
Everyone can see this card, but only school admins can change it.
Attendance
Configure attendance status types and their behavior
Confirm these rules match how you run lessons and make-ups.
Attendance Types
Set your attendance and makeup policies here. These are the options that will appear for your teachers when marking their attendance.
Step 4 — Click the pencil to edit a type
Click the pencil at the end of the row you want to change. A form opens with that type’s settings.
Attendance
Configure attendance status types and their behavior
Attendance Types
Set your attendance and makeup policies here. These are the options that will appear for your teachers when marking their attendance.
Step 5 — Check the name and choose its outcome
Give the type a clear Label your teachers will recognise, and a short Code if you want one.
Choose its Outcome: present, absent or cancelled. This says what kind of result the type records, and it’s required.
Display order sets where the type appears in the list. A lower number comes first.
Edit attendance settings
Update how this attendance option behaves for quota, billing, and make-up rules.
Step 6 — Decide how it affects quota and billing
Answer both questions, because both are required.
Counts toward quota is for prepaid or lesson-credit models: should this outcome use up one of the student’s prepaid lessons?
Billable (per-event) is for extra charges: should this outcome count as a lesson that’s charged for? For billing that follows the calendar (such as monthly or term billing), lessons are charged by the schedule, so this setting doesn’t change those invoices.
For students on lesson packs, a pack credit is used only when a type is both billable and counts toward quota.
Quota and billing defaults
Use this for prepaid or lesson-credit models.
Use this for extra charge scenarios.
Step 7 — Decide whether a make-up is owed
Turn on Allows make-up if this outcome should give the student a make-up credit. If your policy is that the lesson is forfeited, leave it off. Make-up credits are only created for individual lessons, and not for students on lesson packs.
When it’s on, set the make-up expiry. Leave Expiry days blank if the credit should never expire. Otherwise enter a number of days, and choose the Expiry rule: either the make-up must be booked by the expiry, or the lesson must actually take place by the expiry.
The Active switch controls whether the type shows up for new attendance marking. Turning it off hides the type but keeps it in past records.
Availability
Turn this on if this attendance status can create a makeup credit.
Hidden statuses stay in history but no longer show for new attendance marking.
Make-up expiry settings
Choose whether the credit never expires or whether it must be booked or taken by a deadline.
Leave expiry days blank if this make-up should never expire.
Step 8 — Save your changes
Click Save attendance settings. If a red message appears at the top of the form, one of the required fields is missing. Fill it in and save again.
Changing a type doesn’t rewrite past attendance. Lessons already marked keep the result they were given at the time.
Step 9 — Add a new attendance type
To add an option, click Add Attendance Type above the table. The same form opens, titled New attendance setting.
If you want different rules for different situations, for example one “absent” type that earns a make-up and one that doesn’t, create two separate types with different labels.
Attendance
Configure attendance status types and their behavior
Attendance Types
Set your attendance and makeup policies here. These are the options that will appear for your teachers when marking their attendance.
Step 10 — Hide or delete a type you don’t use
The safest way to retire a type is to edit it and turn Active off. It disappears from the options your teachers see, and your history stays intact.
You can also click the bin to delete it, then confirm. Octavia won’t let you delete a type that has already been used on a lesson, so hide it instead.
Attendance
Configure attendance status types and their behavior
Attendance Types
Set your attendance and makeup policies here. These are the options that will appear for your teachers when marking their attendance.
Step 11 — Mark your settings as reviewed
Until you’ve confirmed your settings, admins see an amber Review your attendance settings message at the top of the card. Once you’re happy that the rules match how you run lessons and make-ups, click Mark as reviewed.
This ticks off the attendance step in your setup guide. If your policies change later, you can come back and edit the types at any time.
Attendance
Configure attendance status types and their behavior
Confirm these rules match how you run lessons and make-ups.
Attendance Types
Set your attendance and makeup policies here. These are the options that will appear for your teachers when marking their attendance.