For paid services, members save a card when booking and the practitioner takes payment afterwards — an editable amount, plus a tip on a home visit. Nothing is ever charged automatically.
Prerequisites
For a paid service on a card-based studio, the member is asked to add a card before the booking is created. The card is saved securely with Stripe — no charge is taken at booking time. If they have not added one yet, they will see "Add a card to book" and are sent to Stripe's secure card-entry page, then returned to finish booking. Until you finish Stripe Connect there is nowhere to save a card, so members book paid services without one (the Payment line reads "Pay the studio directly") and you collect payment yourself.
After a session at your studio, mark the appointment as Completed (instructor portal, or the dashboard Appointments → Bookings tab). Only completed appointments can be charged. A home visit is different — see the next step.
On a completed paid appointment, click "Charge $X". The amount is prefilled to the booked price — edit it if you need to add extra services before charging. Click Charge to take the payment from the saved card. The row then shows "Paid $X".
A home visit does not wait to be marked Complete, and it is never charged on its own. Once you have checked in (or pressed Proceed after a first-visit consultation), a "Take payment" button appears on that appointment in your My Appointments list. It opens the amount, tip buttons showing real dollar figures, and the total the card is about to be asked for. Press it while you are still with the client: if the card is declined you find out there and then rather than the studio chasing it afterwards. Nothing is charged until you press it.
If the charge fails (card declined, expired, etc.), the appointment shows "Payment failed" and a "Retry charge" button. Ask the member to update their card, then retry. A successful charge is never taken twice — once an appointment is marked Paid it cannot be charged again. The owner, and managers who handle bookings or payments, are emailed "Payment not collected" with the client, the service and the amount; this notice is not one of the optional ones and cannot be switched off.