Policy on canceling due to weather

It's not outlined or mentioned .
Is it T's call to cancel all appts for the day?
Or if client notifies less than 24 hrs. They have to pay cancellation fee.
There's heavy rain storm, hail expected . I am not sure if I shud go or cancel.

Luckily I have never had to cancel due to weather but each summer I worry that I will have to due to fires. I think if I had to then T would be OK with me cancelling due to things out of my control and hence I wouldn't have to pay cancellation fee but like I said I have never had to cancel so far..

it's best to talk to your T though and see how they run...

Last winter, when we had snow, T contacted me to let me know if she'd be coming into the office and confirming whether I'd be able to make it in. I got the sense that if I couldn't make it in, she would not have charged me. But I agree that it's best to check with your T.

T wouldnt charge me if i couldnt make it bc of the weather. i live down a mountain from him and sometimes the drive can be pretty bad. weve had a session over skype bc of the weather, which was a first and a little funny.

i would contact the T and let them know i cant make it bc of the weather

We usually Skype if we need to cancel for the weather. My therapist would not want to put either of us in danger, so he's pretty quick to cancel if it looks bad. I would definitely ring your therapist.

I called and cancelled due to snow one morning last winter and he just said 'I thought you might not be coming' and there was no talk of payment. I would think it varies quite a lot from T to T.

I cancelled while driving in a bad storm. Mine doesn't charge for cancelled appointments regardless of the reason

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Interesting question. My therapist charges the fee for the session if it's cancelled by the client less than 24 hours in advance and offers a free session if he's the one to cancel less than 24 hours in advance (I didn't agree to this when he suddenly wanted to make this rule out of the blue after a year of me never canceling less than 24 hours before, so we don't do that, but I know that generally this is his policy). I don't know if weather is considered an exception, but unless it was extreme weather conditions with absolutely no way of going out, it should be no exception in my opinion. I wouldn't change this policy on account of cold or a storm, myself. Sure, it's inconvenient, but it's not impossible or dangerous to travel, and with all the weather forecasts it's also not impossible to know beforehand whether or not it will be okay for one to go to therapy that day. Now, if the temperatures were so low or hot that it would be a very serious risk to go out in any way, I would find it a different situation and it would be reasonable, I think, for any therapist to be understanding of that.

That said, all of my sessions were held no matter the weather. Neither my therapist nor I have ever canceled a session shortly before the scheduled time due to weather. There was only one time when I was visiting my parents in a different city and there was a lot of snow, the trains were greatly delayed (there was even a whole 24 hour delay in one particular case), and I canceled - but I was also dissatisfied with my therapy in general at the time, and I gave him a fair notice anyway, let him know two or three days before the session.

I'm very curious to read everyone's answers.

That sounds like a great idea!

I wouldn't see a t who charged cancellation fee. Not only due to the weather. People have lives. Jobs, kids, cars, health issues, schools , etc things happen. I in fact never had a t or a doctor who charged for cancellations for any reasons

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I've no idea what to policy on that is. We don't often have such bad weather. Though all the traffic gets in panic if there's only one falling snowflake.

The cancellation policy is that if you cancel within 24 hours, you get charged for your missed session.

It would have to be pretty bad weather to cancel an appointment: ice on the roads or something along that line. I doubt my T would cancel his schedule due to a potential thunderstorm (heck, he'd never have an appointment from March through May if that was the case). If I cancelled simply because of a potential storm, I suspect I'd be expected to pay for it. If a horrible storm with hail actually did crop up at the time I needed to get to an appointment and I decided not to risk the drive, he'd probably understand that not charge me.

T's only request was that I called BEFORE session to notify. Even 2 minutes before was better than not calling and not showing up. No call/no show was a pet peeve of hers.
Never a charge for a missed session. So, if weather was an issue, I just called ahead of time to cancel and reschedule.
Same with new T. T even said that if it's snowing and there is more than 2 inches of snow, she does not want her clients trying to get to an appointment.

I think my T and marriage counselor technically charge for missed appointments, but I think that's more for just not showing up and not calling. Or if someone is chronically cancelling at the last minute without a good reason. I know we had to cancel at the last minute on our marriage counselor once because our daughter was sick, and he confirmed he wouldn't charge us, like, "Of course I wouldn't charge you for that."

To add more in terms of weather, they both live considerably further from the office than me, so chances are, if I couldn't get there (like a bad snowstorm or ice storm), they couldn't either. And occasionally it's not so much that I wouldn't want to drive in the weather, but that the condo association hadn't plow our parking lot yet, so I literally couldn't get out.

My T and I will touch base by text or phone if there is bad snow or ice. Usually he is more likely to need to cancel because he lives further away. In general he is very understanding about waiving the cancellation fee for emergencies.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I had a similar situation. I get anxious driving in heavy rain winds. I decided to leave early and get in general vincinity of T's office (it's usually a 30 minute drive) and did some shopping while I waited...this kept me off the highway during worst of the storm. I would have expected to pay the cancellation fee otherwise because it's drivable to most people.

Huh, that sounds exactly like my city!

If you don't make a habit of canceling appointments last-minute. I would think 'bad weather' is like calling in sick, it happens. Once in a great while should be okay and things like tornado sirens, school closings, hurricane advisories, etc are obvious no-charge days.

If a T calls you to inquire about arriving during inclement weather, then they're most likely offering to cancel for you and should not charge you.

One time a bad storm was rolling by my T's office (there had been tornadoes in that exact spot the week before.) My T called me about an hour in advance, to see what I wanted to do because the sirens were going off around her office. Because I'm a midwest native, I knew to get there ahead of the storms and was already at a nearby coffee shop, watching the weather radar. I gave her the latest weather update and decided to stick around because it wasn't going to be to bad and would have passed by the scheduled appt. time.

I could have cancelled if I wanted that day but she wanted to give me the option.

My T's office is a little over an hour away from where I live. He told me he would never charge me if I couldn't make it due to weather issues.

My t has a 24 hour cancellation notice; however, she will make exceptions if you have a legitimate reason for cancelling and weather is one of them. She has called me to tell me she couldn't make it due to ice in her area. She also canceled when we had a tornado warning. I've canceled last minute bc my car wouldn't start (she didn't charge me). I"d definitely ask, but I'd think as long as it's reasonable, they wouldn't charge.

I wish me cancelling could be cuz of snow or hail.. but instead I get stuck with fires and so roads being blocked and the other year even the trains and buses had to stop running due to a really bad fire just outside of town and due to me living nearly 2hrs from my T fires and road blocks could be anywhere so I get fairly anxious some sessions wondering if I would even be able to get back home... luckily my T knows of my anxieties with fires and that so is very understanding