What a deposit is
A deposit is part of the price, or the full price, that your client pays online while booking. The appointment is confirmed only once the deposit has been paid. The money goes straight from your client to your own Mollie account; pbw.life never holds it.
You set this up in the studio portal under Deposit policy. The same page holds your Cancellation policy, which decides what happens to a deposit when a client cancels.
Before you start: connect Mollie
Deposits are paid through Mollie, a Dutch payment provider. You need your own Mollie account, connected to pbw.life. Until that connection is ready, pbw.life does not ask your clients for a deposit: bookings still come in, just without a deposit, whatever your policy says.
- Open Deposit policy in the studio portal.
- Click Connect Mollie. You go to Mollie, where you log in or create a Mollie account and allow pbw.life to create payments for you.
- Before you can receive payments, Mollie checks your business. This is Mollie's own check; it usually asks for your KvK details, your bank account and your ID. While it runs, the page shows Mollie is verifying your business.
- As soon as the page shows Mollie connected, your deposit policy takes effect. You don't have to do anything else.
If the page ever shows Mollie connection needs renewal, click Reconnect Mollie. Until you do, bookings come in without a deposit.
Choose when to ask for a deposit
Under When to require a deposit you pick one of three options:
- Never - deposits are off: no client pays a deposit.
- Always - every client: every online booking asks for a deposit.
- Conditional - based on no-show history: pbw.life decides per client, with the rules below.
For Always and Conditional you also set the amount on the same page, see How the amount is calculated.
The rules for Conditional:
- Minimum completed bookings before judging (default 3). A client with fewer bookings on record than this number counts as a new client.
- First-time / under-history clients: No deposit or Always deposit (default: Always deposit).
- No-show threshold (default 30%). For a client with enough history, pbw.life works out which share of their appointments were no-shows. A deposit is asked only when that share is above your threshold; exactly at the threshold means no deposit. The share is rounded down to a whole percent: 1 no-show in 6 appointments is 16%.
- Count late cancellations like no-shows (default off). When on, late cancellations count towards that share as if they were no-shows.
The history pbw.life looks at is the client's record across all studios on pbw.life, recognised by email address. You never see another studio's details and other studios never see yours: only the decision "deposit or no deposit" is used. The Live preview on the page shows what your rules decide for a sample client before you save.
How the amount is calculated
A deposit is either a fixed amount (for example €15, whatever the booking costs) or a percentage of the booking total. 100% means your client pays the full price upfront.
For a percentage, the booking total is:
service price + at-client surcharge + travel fee
The at-client surcharge (set per service on the Services page) and the travel fee (from your travel fee zones) only apply to services you do at the client's address. For a service at your studio, the total is simply the service price. pbw.life calculates in cents and rounds a half cent up: 25% of €52.50 is €13.13.
You set the amount yourself on the Deposit policy page. As soon as you choose Always - every client or Conditional - based on no-show history, the Deposit amount section appears: pick Fixed amount (between €1 and €500) or Percentage of the price (between 1% and 100%), fill in the number and click Save. You can't save Always or Conditional without an amount. With Conditional, this is the amount a client pays when your rules ask them for a deposit. If you switch back to Never - deposits are off, the amount is cleared: set it again when you turn deposits back on.
When the deposit is charged
- Your client chooses a service and a time, fills in their details and confirms with the code sent to their email.
- If you have a cancellation policy, the client ticks I accept the cancellation policy; without it they can't continue.
- The client sees the deposit screen and pays on Mollie's payment page. The booking page says Pay deposit with iDEAL; on Mollie's page the client sees the payment methods you have switched on in your Mollie account.
- Until the payment arrives, the appointment shows as Pending deposit in your schedule and the time slot is held for that client, for about 15 minutes.
- Once Mollie confirms the payment, the appointment is confirmed and your client gets the confirmation email. If the client doesn't pay in time, the appointment is cancelled automatically and the slot opens up again.
Appointments you add yourself in the schedule (walk-ins, phone bookings) never ask for a deposit. When a client books several services, or several people, in one go, they pay one deposit for the whole group, calculated over the group total.
Cancellations and refunds
At the bottom of the Deposit policy page you set your Cancellation policy:
- Cancellation window: how many hours before the appointment a client can still cancel on time. Choose 12, 24, 48 or 72 hours, or your own number between 1 and 720.
- What happens to the deposit: Always refund the deposit, or Retain the deposit on late cancellation.
When deposits are on and you have a cancellation policy, your client accepts it while booking. The policy that applied at that moment stays with the appointment, even if you change or remove your policy later.
What happens to a paid deposit:
| Situation | The deposit |
|---|---|
| The client cancels on time: at least the window before the appointment | Refunded in full, automatically |
| The client cancels late, your rule is Always refund the deposit | Refunded in full, automatically |
| The client cancels late, your rule is Retain the deposit on late cancellation | You keep it |
| You or your specialist cancel the appointment | Refunded in full, automatically |
| The client doesn't show up and you use Mark as no-show | You keep it |
| There was no cancellation policy when the client booked, and the client cancels | Nothing happens automatically: you decide |
Clients cancel through the link in their confirmation email. An automatic refund is always the full deposit; Mollie pays it back from your Mollie balance. If you want to refund in a case where nothing happens automatically, for example a deposit you kept after a no-show or a paid deposit on an appointment that still stands, open the appointment in Schedule and choose Refund deposit. pbw.life refunds the full deposit through Mollie, the client gets an email about the refund, and the refund shows up in Reports.
Don't refund in your Mollie dashboard: pbw.life doesn't see a refund made there, so the appointment keeps showing the deposit as paid, your Reports still count it, and the client gets no email from pbw.life.
What it costs
pbw.life adds nothing on top. There is no pbw.life fee per deposit, no percentage and no surcharge, not on deposits and not on refunds. You pay pbw.life only your subscription. The deposit goes straight from your client to your own Mollie account.
Mollie charges its own transaction fee on every deposit, just like on any other payment you receive through Mollie. That is Mollie's standard price for the payment method your client uses, and Mollie takes it from your Mollie balance. On 3 October 2026, Mollie's standard prices in the Netherlands were:
- iDEAL: €0.32 per payment
- European consumer cards (Visa, Mastercard): 1.80% + €0.25 per payment
Mollie can change its prices, and your own Mollie contract may differ. The current prices are on mollie.com/nl/pricing and in your Mollie dashboard. Whether Mollie charges anything for a refund is also up to Mollie.
Example: a deposit of €28.75 paid with iDEAL leaves €28.43 in your Mollie balance (€28.75 minus €0.32). Paid with a Visa card it leaves €27.98: Mollie's fee is 1.80% of €28.75 (€0.52) plus €0.25, so €0.77.
pbw.life is a Mollie partner. Mollie may share part of the fees it earns with pbw.life; that comes out of Mollie's own revenue and never changes what you or your clients pay.
Worked examples
1. A service at the client's home, 50% deposit
Your settings: Always - every client, 50% of the booking total. The service "Gel manicure" costs €45.00 and you do it at the client's address, with an at-client surcharge of €5.00. The client lives in a zone with a travel fee of €7.50.
On the confirm screen your client sees:
- Service Price
- €45.00
- At-client surcharge
- €5.00
- Travel fee
- €7.50
- Total Price
- €57.50
Then the deposit screen:
- Booking total
- €57.50
- Deposit (50% of total)
- €28.75
- Amount due now
- €28.75
Your client pays €28.75 through Mollie. With iDEAL, €28.43 lands in your Mollie balance. The remaining €28.75 is between you and your client at the appointment; pbw.life does not collect it.
2. A service at your studio, fixed deposit
Your settings: Always - every client, fixed amount €15. "Lash lift" at your studio costs €60.00. There is no address, no surcharge and no travel fee.
- Booking total
- €60.00
- Deposit
- €15.00
- Amount due now
- €15.00
3. Conditional: three different clients
Your settings: Conditional with the defaults: minimum 3 bookings, first-time clients Always deposit, no-show threshold 30%, late cancellations not counted.
- Anna books on pbw.life for the first time: fewer than 3 bookings, so the first-time rule applies. Deposit.
- Bram had 5 completed appointments and 1 no-show: 1 in 6 is 16%, not above 30%. No deposit.
- Chloé had 3 completed appointments and 2 no-shows: 2 in 5 is 40%, above 30%. Deposit.
4. Rounding
Your settings: 25% deposit. A €45.00 service at the client's home with a €7.50 travel fee and no surcharge: 25% of €52.50 is €13.125, which becomes €13.13.
The booking page shows amounts in the format of your client's language, for example €28.75 or € 28,75.
Still stuck?
Email info@pbw.life with your question. Mention the name of your studio so we can look at your settings.