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10:00 Little Acorns
One diary, for every room and every volunteer
The paper diary lives in one person's kitchen. This one lives online, so the chair, the treasurer and the caretaker are all looking at the same bookings, on a laptop or on their phone.
- Every room in one calendar, by day, week or month
- Clashes refused before they happen, with the booking already there shown
- Holidays, closures and maintenance days blocked out
- Weekly, fortnightly and monthly bookings for regular hirers
- The whole diary on the free phone app, iPhone and Android
How an online booking works
Hirers do the asking, the committee does the deciding, and nobody retypes anything.
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1
They check what is free
Your hall has its own booking page, showing when each room is available. No phone call to find out.
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2
They send a request
The hirer picks a date and time and sends their details. It lands in your diary as an enquiry and you get an email.
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3
You accept it
One click confirms it and the hirer gets a confirmation email. Nothing is booked until you say so.
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4
The invoice follows
The price comes from your rate card, and the invoice is raised from the booking itself.
Everything a hall booking involves
A booking is rarely just a date. It is a room, a price, sometimes a deposit, and a hirer the committee may want to remember next time.
Rooms and rate cards
Set a price for each room, with different rates for different kinds of hirer: local groups, parties, businesses. Seasonal prices too, if the winter heating costs more.
Deposits
Take a deposit when a booking is made, and record it coming back after the event, so the damage deposit is never forgotten either way.
Regular hirers
The Tuesday yoga class and the Thursday toddler group go in once and repeat weekly, fortnightly or monthly. Change one session, or every session from a date onwards.
A private booking stays private
Tick a booking as private and your public calendar shows the time as taken without saying what it is for.
A record of every hirer
Contact details, past bookings, what they paid and what was said, kept together so the next volunteer knows the history.
Embed it on your website
Put the live availability calendar on your own website with one line of code. It updates itself as bookings come in.
From the booking to the money
Because the booking already knows the room, the hours and the rate, the invoice writes itself. Regular hirers can be invoiced for a whole month of sessions at once, hirers can pay by card straight into the hall's own bank account, and reminders chase anybody who has not paid.
See how village hall invoicing works, from the first invoice to the treasurer's report.
For every kind of community building
Village halls were first, but anywhere with rooms to hire and volunteers running it works the same way.
Moving from a paper diary, a spreadsheet or another system
Nobody wants to type a year of bookings in again. Bring across your rooms, rate cards, hirers, bookings and invoices from a spreadsheet or another booking system. Your file can have any columns, named anything, because you match them up to ours on screen, and every import has an Undo button.
Still comparing? Read our honest comparison of UK hall booking software, what booking software really costs, and how we stop double bookings.
What it costs
Every plan has unlimited bookings, the public booking page, invoicing and the phone app. Free for 30 days, no card needed.
Community
£12.99 a month
Up to 2 rooms and 3 volunteers
Standard
£24.99 a month
Unlimited rooms, hirer portal, website calendar
Professional
£39.99 a month
Everything, plus the full accounts
Questions halls ask
What is a village hall booking system?
It is the hall diary, kept online. Every booking for every room sits in one calendar the whole committee can see, hirers can check availability for themselves, and the booking carries everything that follows it: the price, the deposit, the invoice and the payment. It replaces the paper diary, the spreadsheet and the phone calls to whoever holds them.
Can hirers book our hall online?
Yes. Your hall gets its own public booking page showing when each room is free. A hirer picks a date and sends a booking request with their details, and it arrives in your diary for you to accept or turn down. Nothing is confirmed until you say so, so the committee stays in charge of who uses the hall.
Will it stop double bookings?
Yes. When a booking would clash with another in the same room, it is refused with a warning showing what is already there. Holidays and closures can be blocked out the same way, so nobody books the hall for the day of the fete.
How does it handle regular hirers?
Set a booking to repeat weekly, fortnightly or monthly, or on chosen days, and every session goes into the diary at once. Regular hirers can then be invoiced for a whole month of sessions in one go, rather than one invoice per session.
Is there a free village hall booking system?
A shared spreadsheet or a free calendar will hold dates, but neither stops clashes, takes deposits or raises invoices, and they tend to live with one volunteer. Village Hall Hub is free for 30 days with no card needed, then from £12.99 a month. Many halls cover that from a single booking.
How much does it cost?
Three plans: Community at £12.99 a month, Standard at £24.99 and Professional at £39.99, or a year for the price of ten months. Every plan includes unlimited bookings, the public booking page, invoicing and the phone app. You can pay by card or by bank transfer from the committee account.
Can we move our bookings across from another system?
Yes. Import your rooms, rates, hirers, bookings and invoices from a spreadsheet or another booking system. You match your columns to ours on screen, and every import can be undone if it does not look right.
Does it work for church halls, community centres and scout huts?
Yes. It is built around rooms, hirers and a diary, which is what every community building has. Church halls, community centres, memorial halls, scout huts, sports pavilions and parish rooms all use it the same way.
Can we put the calendar on our own website?
Yes. On the Standard and Professional plans you can embed a live availability calendar on your existing website with one line of code, so it always matches your diary without anybody updating it.
Video guides
See a booking taken
Short guides, most under a minute, with the steps written out underneath.
