Selling Options, Not Obligations: Fixing the "No Refund" Problem
December 2024
You book a table for Saturday night. But on Friday afternoon, your kid gets ill. You can't go.
If you booked with a chain, or bought a rigid ticket, you're usually out the money. You get a polite but firm "sorry, no refunds." You feel ripped off, and you swear never to book ahead again.
This fear of commitment kills cash flow for small businesses. Customers wait until the last minute to buy because they're scared of losing their money.
We need to stop selling obligations and start selling options.
In the financial world, people buy "options" all the time. You pay a small amount today for the right to buy something later. If you don't use that right, you don't lose everything—you just lose the option fee.
On Indie Points, we apply this logic to your Saturday coffee or your Friday night dinner.
When you pre-purchase a £20 deal for the weekend, you are buying the option to turn up. The business gets the £20 immediately (which they need for stock and staff).
If you turn up? Great. You get your goods. If you don't turn up? You don't lose the money. You keep your loyalty points.
A refund is a hassle. It takes days to process, messes up the business's cash flow, and puts everyone back at square one.
Points are liquid. If you miss your Saturday lunch in the West End, you still have those points in your digital wallet. You can spend them at the bakery on Sunday, the bookshop on Monday, or the barber next week.
You haven't lost £20. You've just transferred that value into a currency that works across the whole independent network.
For a business owner, the hardest thing to manage is uncertainty. If you staff up for 300 people and only 100 show, you lose money.
When you sell options (pre-purchases), you get paid for certainty.
Scenario A: The customer arrives. You serve them. You made revenue.
Scenario B: The customer cancels. You keep the cash they paid. They keep the points to use elsewhere. You can now sell that empty table to a walk-in.
In Scenario B, the business got paid for providing the option, and the customer didn't lose out. The "No Show" stops being a disaster and becomes a manageable part of doing business.
We need to remove the risk from supporting local. Customers shouldn't be punished for having their plans change. By treating pre-purchases as flexible options backed by network-wide points, we give businesses the cash flow of a chain, and customers the flexibility they deserve.
Sell options. Fund tomorrow, today. Everyone wins.