Punch Cards-What does your club/rink use?

[Skate@Delaware]

My club & rink are toying with the idea of using punch cards for attendance of different sessions. I was wondering what other people use? I've heard of books of tickets, actual cards that get punched, software programs that track attendance, etc.

We probably want something easy and cheap (the rink is only going into it's 4th year and not making money yet)....the club is only 2 years old, I don't know about the finances but it's probably the same.

[jenlyon60]

My rink used to use punch cards, then switched to a "debit card" system. The plastic debit card itself was free. You load money onto it (I believe they have minimum amounts to load if you're paying via credit card.) Then each time you sign in to skate, you either tell them your card number or give them your card, and they scan it and debit the amount of the session from your card.

It would be even nicer if we could use the debit card towards snack bar and/or pro-shop purchases, but alas, no.

[skaternum]

All the area rinks here use punch cards that are physically punched. They can be purchases in 5, 10, and 20 session varieties.

My club has recently switched to punch cards as well. We used to use monthly paper contracts. Each skater would preselect and prepay for the exact dates/times he wanted to skate. It was a real headache for the person in charge because she'd have a slew of them to go through at the beginning of each month. Skaters hated them because it required too much upfront commitment. And somebody had to track it at each session to see who was contracted vs. who was just a walk-on. Now we use punch cards that are good for the entire season.

[phoenix]

one of my rinks where I skate uses coupons, the other uses punch cards. If you use them, it gives you a discount on ice time. For example, at one if you just buy on it's 15.00/hr (ouch!! 8O ). If you use the pre-paid punch card it's $10.00/hr.

[luna_skater]

At my club, you buy ice one of two ways: (1) You register for a slot of ice for the season (Sept to March) or (2) You buy "pick-up passes" to skate drop-in sessions. You get an actual paper card, and the ice-chair writes your name down and crosses a session off your pass each time you use it.

[flying~camel]

My club still uses the monthly paper contracts, but I really wish they'd switch to some sort of debit program.

It's a pain to have to guess when you'll be able to skate a month in advance and if something happens and you miss a session you've paid for, you're out the $8.50/7.50/6.50 (the more sessions you contract during the month, the lower your cost per session). :??

[luna_skater]

So if you don't use up your card within in the month, you lose the balance? That sucks. Our cards don't expire. If I buy one in the summer, I can still use it through the fall/winter, even though the cost changes. They just do the math.

[Skate@Delaware]

Wow, what a variety! We currently use the paper method for club time (sign in and the secretary tracks usage-pain in the behind). Cash only-pay up front for freestyle session which is $7.00 per 1.5 hours. (However, walk-on time at club is $10/hour). Hmmm. This is all very interesting. I like the debit thing, but I wonder what kind of expense and complication factor that has?

We do have a punch-card for our off-ice exercise class. The card is kept at the counter and the exercise coach punches it while we are working out.

The rink was thinking about having a punch card/discount family ticket or a season pass type thing for public sessions, but I haven't heard any more about that. Of course, our prices aren't too bad (compared to some of yours 8O ).

[Mel On Ice]

My club still uses the monthly paper contracts, but I really wish they'd switch to some sort of debit program.

It's a pain to have to guess when you'll be able to skate a month in advance and if something happens and you miss a session you've paid for, you're out the $8.50/7.50/6.50 (the more sessions you contract during the month, the lower your cost per session). :??


Also, they mandate we turn the contracts in on the 20th of the month prior or we are screwed and have to pay walk-on fee for the month (I lost my contract, then the check book, but found them both a day after the deadline last month.). But if you do continually walk on, peole get pissy about that too.

Ok, rant over.

My former club had a two-part system since we skated on both city rink ice and club ice. City ice was on a ticket redemption form: you turned in hot pink "North" rink tickets or neon yellow "South" rink tickets for each freestyle you skate. South was a dollar cheaper than North because it is a smaller regulation rink than North and simply an awful experience skating out there - unheated rink in an airplane hanger with zamboni fumes that lingered. At one time, the more classes you signed up for, the more tickets you could buy at a cheaper rate through a special skate package rate. I was getting pink tickets as cheap as $4.25 an hour.

Club ice was contracted a month ahead of time for Thursdays. Again, felt like a waste, because if you contracted, you contracted for all Thursdays, and it was for a 2 hour block without an option of skating only one hour.

I also skate at two other rinks here in MI on occasion. At Walker, the ice is complex operated, and you pay $8 for a 2 hour session during the summer. At the other rink, I buy a punch card for $72 (9 1-hour sessions?) without an expiration date.

[jazzpants]

My home rink just switched over from a punch card to a debit card system too. The great part of this is that I now only have to fish out that one debit card and not either my coffee club card, my freestyle card or my public session card... (At one point, I had all three!!!) :twisted:

My weekend rink uses different types of punch card depending on whether it's public session or freestyle sessions. Supposedly there is a 3-6 months period in which you must use your punch card.

[TaBalie]

In the summer, when there is skating school, there are punch-cards but you receive zero discount when you buy one (I guess people buy them for the convienience).

Now that summer skating school is over, there are punchcards for hockey, freestyle, and general sessions (on the outdoor rink). The freestyle punchcard is for 12 sessions, and works out to be around $6/session (a HUGE discount over the summer price of $12/session). The general session punchcard is also for 12 sessions, and works out to be $8 or so per session (vs the normal price of $9.50).

The general sessions on the outdoor rink are from 10am-8pm, so you could skate all day for $8. Of course, they don't let you leave and come back during the session, but sometimes I sit by the side and people watch for 20 minutes or so, so I split my practice into 2 sections. It is very quiet here so normally there are only 1-5 people on the rink at any given time.

[skate1965]

At Chelsea Piers in NY we buy tickets that must be given for each session. Since these tickets go up every year in September, many of us buy an entire years worth in August and save a lot of money.

[aussieskater]

Down here, we use a variety of systems: walk-on cash price is $15-18 (?) (it's been so long since I did this I don't know the price any more) for the session. There are also credit-card sized cardboard cards of various colours for each type of session with 10 squares marked on each. Each time you attend, the date is marked by the cashier into one of the squares. The card lasts for one year, and is a reasonable discount on walk-up rates (the red one I use equates to $11.50 per session).

(Skate@Delaware - this is a very cheap system to run from the rink's point of view - the rink gets the money up front and there is little administration cost at the cashier desk. When the rink sells the card, the cashier writes the details into an old-fashioned ledger book. Costs to the rink include printing off the cards - doing it 20 or 30 at a time onto a standard sized piece of coloured lightweight cardboard, then getting a rink rat to cut the separate cards out; plus the cost of an old-fashioned ledger book. That's all. On entry, the cashier either takes your money or marks off your card. No further work is needed.)

The rink also has quarterly tickets, but these are not good value. You can only buy them at the beginning of the nominated quarter (Jan, Apr, Jul and Oct), and the later you buy it the worse value it is. (There is no discount for buying it later in the quarter. You just lose the time.)

[coskater64]

You can use either a punch card or a contract at my rink. For every 9 contracted sessions you get a voucher for a free session. While it is tedious the contract seems to work well.

[Isk8NYC]

We use a small, pre-printed card that you pay for 10 sessions with, up-front. The card is good all season and you just buy a new one when it's used up. It's less expensive than paying the walk-in fee. When you go on the ice, you tuck your card into a binder that's on the ice. Someone records the information and writes off a box on the card.

We don't have a Club, but that's typically handled differently with Associate Memberships for frequent visitors, and Guest Fees paid in cash for the others. Money goes to the Club, not the Rink, since they pay for the ice time rental. Obviously, full members pay ice dues and membership fees.

[vesperholly]

My club does seasonal ice purchasing, all sessions are run through the club. Because sessions tend to max out (18 skaters on high/Juvenile+ sessions, 21 on low), we buy certain time/day sessions and that "reserves" our space on the ice. If we don't show up to use that session for whatever reason, we can "switch" to another session within the season instead, as long as it isn't full.

This seems an odd way of doing things compared to many clubs across the nation, but it's pretty standard in this area. I don't think of any clubs that do straight-up walk ons for regular, frequently-skating members unless every session is a public one/run by the rink, not a club.

I like the debit card idea! My club doesn't even take credit cards, even though I recommended it a zillion years ago. Decidedly old-school.

[Mrs Redboots]

We pay our teachers for use of the patch (teaching) ice, at the box office if we want to go on a public session, and the relevant Club official for club ice.

[Magz]

We pay for a certain number of days a week for the entire season (winter is Oct- March, then Spring is April - June etc). If you miss a day, you can make it up another day. My rink's pretty small so we all now when someone isn't there.

[froggy]

For regular sessions we buy a card worth 12 session and every time we come in someone up front just crosses an "x" over a session number on the card.