- Sasha Chard, Marketing & Development Officer

Haydon School is a thriving academy and sixth form based in Pinner. We pride ourselves on helping our students to develop resilience and inspire others. The community, both in school, and beyond is very important to us, and we expect our students to be considerate and respectful members of both.

The ability to open up our facilities for use by local groups and clubs is therefore very important to us, particularly as many of our students benefit from and participate in additional activities and clubs outside of the school day - from learning Taekwondo to joining the Italia Conti Arts Academy.

Until six months ago we were using a basic and laborious booking system which included an outlook calendar and an excel spreadsheet, before introducing the online school lettings platform; BookingsPlus. Adopting this system and its integrated website, which we have the ability to tailor in-line with our own school branding, has transformed our bookings business. Not only has it delivered significant time efficiencies for staff involved in bookings, it has meant that we can be much more efficient with hiring space.

A surprising number of staff are involved in managing bookings, from the onsite team such as caretakers and receptionists, to the finance department. Prior to working with BookingsPlus, I had to spend time each day briefing these teams. Now, they can simply download each day’s booking schedule in one simple report. This has freed up a significant amount of my time which I can dedicate to other aspects of my role; including marketing and alumni engagement.

Previously I had to search retrospectively through the outlook calendar to identify booking dates and durations for invoicing purposes. Now, BookingsPlus’ automated, end-to-end booking and invoicing service means that invoicing is instant, accurate and efficient - freeing up both my time, and that of the finance department!

As well as staff time, BookingsPlus has helped us to use our space more efficiently. Our clients can now specify their exact requirement – for example, two badminton courts for one hour. This means that we are able to take back-to-back bookings, maximising the revenue potential of our facilities. And because the system is controlled via one central administrator, the potential for error is reduced. No more double bookings!

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, our clients are very happy with the system. They find it easy to use and are getting increased sign-ups thanks to adverting their clubs on the ‘what’s on’ tab. We, in turn, have seen an up-lift in booking enquiries. A win-win all round thanks to BookingsPlus!