How to set up a no-show and cancellation policy for your trade business

A no-show fee is legal in Australia, but it must be disclosed before the customer books, proportionate to your genuine loss, and never structured as a penalty. Get those three elements right and you have a policy that protects your time without creating a consumer-law problem.

Updated 01/08/2026

Every tradie has had the morning where you drive 40 minutes to a job, knock on the door, and nobody is home. No call, no text, nothing. You have burned fuel, blocked out the time, and turned away other work for that slot. A written no-show policy does not stop every missed appointment, but it gives you a framework for recovering genuine costs and it signals to customers that your time has value.

What does Australian Consumer Law say about no-show fees?

There is no law that bans a trade business from charging a no-show or cancellation fee. What the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) governs is how the fee is structured, disclosed, and sized. The relevant provisions sit in the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, Schedule 2.

A lawful no-show fee passes four tests:

• Pre-booking disclosure. The fee must be communicated before the customer commits. Consumer Affairs Victoria states that cancellation fees should reflect reasonable costs, and that fees exceeding genuine loss may be seen as penalties which generally cannot be enforced. Disclosing conditions only after the booking is confirmed could itself be considered unfair.
• Proportionality. The fee must reflect your genuine cost for the missed appointment: travel already incurred, materials ordered, and revenue lost if the slot could not be resold. A fee that exceeds genuine loss looks like a penalty, and penalties are generally unenforceable.
• Unfair contract terms. Most service bookings are standard-form contracts (the customer cannot negotiate the terms). The ACL's unfair contract terms regime applies. From 09/11/2023, including or relying on an unfair term in a standard-form contract attracts civil penalties for the first time.
• Consumer guarantees preserved. The policy cannot override the customer's right to a remedy when the business fails to deliver the service. If you no-show on the customer, the clause cannot be turned against them.

How much can you charge for a no-show?

The short answer: only what you actually lost. If the question is whether a flat fee is legal, the answer depends entirely on whether the amount reflects your genuine cost for that specific missed appointment.

A graduated fee scaled by notice period is significantly more defensible than a flat charge. Here is a structure that aligns with the proportionality test:

Notice given	Suggested fee	Why it holds up
48+ hours	No fee (or a small admin fee only)	Enough time to rebook the slot. Genuine loss is near zero.
24 to 48 hours	20 to 25% of the quoted price	Partial loss. You may have turned away other work but still have time to fill part of the day.
Under 24 hours or same day	50% of the quoted price	Harder to fill. Materials may already be loaded. Travel may already be underway.
True no-show (no contact, not home)	A call-out fee covering travel and time	You drove there. Fuel, vehicle costs, and the blocked time are all genuine losses.

These ranges are illustrative. Your actual costs depend on your trade, your travel distances, and what you could have booked instead. The principle is simple: tie the fee to what you can demonstrate you lost.

What makes a cancellation fee unfair under the new rules?

The maximum penalty for a company is the greatest of $100 million (for conduct on or after 28/03/2026), three times the benefit obtained, or 30% of adjusted turnover during the breach period. These are statutory maxima for context, not a prediction for any individual business. This is general information, not legal advice. If you are uncertain whether your policy complies, speak with a qualified lawyer or your state's fair-trading authority. The point is that unfair contract terms now carry real consequences, and a one-person trade business writing a booking form is subject to the same regime as a large corporation.

A term is unfair if it:

• Creates a significant imbalance. The business can cancel freely but the customer faces a fee. Asymmetric clauses are a primary ACCC target.
• Is not reasonably necessary. A blanket fee that does not scale with notice or actual loss is harder to justify as necessary to protect a legitimate interest.
• Would cause detriment if enforced. A $300 fee on a $400 job where the slot was resold an hour later causes disproportionate detriment to the customer.

The ACCC named harmful cancellation terms, including those associated with automatic renewals, early termination fee clauses and non-cancellation clauses, as a 2025/26 compliance and enforcement priority. This is the first year cancellation terms have been explicitly named in the ACCC's priorities.

"We have long highlighted the adverse consequences of unfair contract terms on consumers and small business."

Gina Cass-Gottlieb, ACCC Chair, 01/11/2022

What should you put in the policy document?

A compliant no-show policy is short and plain. It does not need legal jargon. It needs five elements:

• The fee amount or calculation method. Be specific. "A cancellation fee may apply" is too vague. "Cancellations with less than 24 hours notice incur a fee of $[amount] to cover travel and time costs" is clear.
• A graduated scale. Tie the fee to the notice period, not a flat amount regardless of when the customer cancels.
• Exceptions. Medical emergency, family bereavement, declared natural disaster. Listing exceptions demonstrates fairness and strengthens your position if the policy is ever tested.
• A mitigation statement. State that you will make reasonable efforts to fill the slot before charging the fee, and that the fee reduces if the slot is resold.
• Consent capture. A tick-box on the booking form, or a written confirmation referencing the policy, before the booking is confirmed. Consent after the fact does not count.

Where should you disclose the policy?

The policy must appear where the customer actually books, not buried in a linked PDF they will not read. Three disclosure points cover the requirement:

• At booking. On the booking confirmation page or in the booking SMS/email, beside the confirm button. Keep it to one or two sentences: "If you need to cancel, please let us know at least 24 hours before your appointment. Cancellations with less than 24 hours notice may incur a fee of $[X] to cover our travel and time costs."
• In the reminder. Repeat the key fee and notice window in your day-before reminder message. Automated reminders cut no-shows significantly on their own (see our guide on cutting down no-shows with automated reminders).
• On your website. A short terms or booking-policy section. Not a 12-page document. One paragraph that covers the fee, the scale, and the exceptions.

How do you collect the fee?

Three options, in order of enforceability:

• Deposit at booking. A small deposit held against the appointment, with forfeiture conditions stated upfront. Strongest position because the money is already held and the terms were agreed before the service.
• Card pre-authorisation. Explicit consent required, with the amount and trigger conditions stated. Common in allied health but less used in trades.
• Invoice after the event. Weakest. You are relying on the customer to pay voluntarily, or pursuing it through a tribunal, which rarely makes commercial sense for a small fee.

For most trade businesses, the deposit model is simplest. Your job-management app (ServiceM8, Tradify, simPRO, AroFlo or Fergus) can collect a deposit at booking and apply it against the invoice on completion (see how automated invoicing works with your job app).

What should you never do?

These are the practices that attract regulatory attention:

• Charge the full fee and rebook the slot. If you fill the time with another job, your genuine loss drops. Charging 100% while records show the slot was resold is legally problematic.
• Use the word penalty. Australian courts distinguish between a legitimate fee for genuine loss and a penalty designed to punish. Call it a cancellation fee or call-out fee and tie it to costs incurred.
• Apply the policy one way. A clause that lets you cancel at any time without consequence while holding customers to strict fees is a textbook unfair term.
• Disclose after booking. A fee sprung on the customer after they have committed is not disclosed, and may be misleading under ACL s18.
• Set a flat fee regardless of notice. A blanket charge that does not change with how much warning the customer gives is harder to defend as proportionate.

How does a no-show policy work alongside automated reminders?

The policy is the backstop. Automated reminders are the front line. Most no-shows happen because the customer forgot, not because they intended to cancel. A same-day confirmation text and an on-my-way message when you leave for the site give the customer two natural moments to reschedule early.

Wired into your job-management app, these reminders fire automatically from your job schedule with no manual texting (how to set up automated job reminders). The policy then covers the cases that slip through: the customers who genuinely do not respond to any contact.

Every automated message must be consent-first and honour STOP and opt-out under the Spam Act 2003. Job reminders to a customer who booked with you are transactional messages relating to the service they requested, but any marketing layered on top needs separate consent.

If you are looking for a way to stop losing leads while you are on the tools, a 15-minute discovery call can map where your current workflow is leaking time and money, including the no-show gap (how AI receptionists handle bookings).