This question is for other coaches, or for parents of kids who take private lessons.

I have been teaching private lessons for four years. I charge $20.00 an hour, and have never raised it. I think in the past four years since I started coaching, have grown as a coach. Other coaches in at my club charge up to $28.00 an hour.
How often do you increase your lesson charges? I really think I deserve a raise, but don't know exactly what the "rules" are. I was thinking about going up to $22.00 an hour ($5.50 for a 15 minute lesson, up from $5.00). Does that sound fair? There are no rules or standards in our club as far as private lesson charges.
Most of my skaters are just skating for fun, doing local and state competitions. I teach basic skills - Preliminary level skaters. Some of the families have more money than others.
I know $20/hour is reasonable to begin with, so should I give myself a raise next season???

Thanks for your advice!

Wow that is incredibly cheap. The base rate for our coaches here is $12.50/15 minutes. That's for staff coaches. My coach is $60/hour. Do you have any credentials? Getting PSA ratings can allow you to give yourself a raise! When my coach got her Masters rating, she raised her rates.

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- Ashley

No, I don't have a PSA rating. Our club is fairly new and hasn't really done anything like that yet. I've looked into it, but I really don't have the time to committ to that right now, I work full time, and am having a baby in May. Coaching is what I do in my "free" time.
None of my skaters compete in the qualifying competitions anyway, so for now I really don't need it.
I myself am a Pre-Juv/Adult Silver level skater, so I have a good grasp of the basics.

When my coach increased rates it was usually in $2 to $4 increments per hour. So I think your $2 raise is most reasonable.

Whwnever my coaches have raised their rates they have never told me directly. I would continue to pay them at the old rate and then at some point someone would mention that they had raised their rates. I think they figured that they would keep their old students at the same old rate and then charge new students the new rate.

Whenever this has happened, I always start paying them their new rate and they have always accepted it without comment.

Hi Mel,

I'm in Milw. as you know--I'm charging $30 an hour, and will be raising my rates to $40 after I finish my pre-gold dances (in about a year). I know that I'm pretty low compared to other coaches in the city.

Hope that helps! I'd agree w/ the assesment that you are very low.

Do everyone a favor and up it to $ 24.00/hour.

$ 6.00 for 15 minutes.

Even dollars rather than counting quarters.

The average going rate for a coach in St. Louis is around $ 44.00 per hour. Some get $ 20.00, some get $ 60.00.

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Many go fishing all their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. - Henry David Thoreau

Gary, I see your point, but I thought a $4.00 per hour increase seemed like too much. I mean in my "real world" job I'd never get a $4.00 an hour raise all at one time. No one pays me one lesson at a time anyway, most of the parents just write out one check every month or so.

In that case, you could just up it the $ 2.00 without causing much trouble.

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Many go fishing all their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. - Henry David Thoreau

That is amazingly cheep! Wow! Around here its $1 a min at the LOWEST...well...for a senior pro. Junior pros are $0.50 a min, but they cant take you past sal and toe loop...

Well my coach charges over $40 and hour (Canadian), so that is incredibly cheap!
But do you really need the money?,If you are soo desperate then i would definetly suggest doing it but please realise that some of the skaters parents have a tight budget and maybe they can't cash out the extra $5-$10 a week for coaching.

Check out your skaters parents and maybe ask them.

I would agree with the rest here that $2 is perfectly fine. When I made my own rates, it was common practice to give yourself a $1 a year or sometimes $2. Parents were always fine with this. I also managed to send out a notice regarding the raise in my rates in a letter that was also about what was going on with lessons etc. Not just focusing on the money!

You are all in luck. Where I teach parents pay $90 for any coach. It is a very different system from others I have seen and we of course don't receive all of that. But $90 an hour is incredible! Good luck with the raise.

All my coaches charge 36 dollars an hour...$9/15 min..but one of my coaches charges $15/15mins

If you really feel like you need a raise and have grown as a coach, I definately say raise yourself. 20 bucks can barely get you through the candy section at safe way!

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You are really charging too little - even a beginner here in Canada charges $6.00 for a 15 minute lesson. My daughter's coach charges $8.50 for a 15 minute lesson. She is level 3 certified coach with 30 years experience.

I remember a former coach sending out a letter of Thanks at the end of spring session one year to all the skaters she coached, thanking them for their business and, at that time, she mentioned that she would be increasing her rates by $2 per hour starting the following Fall. It gave everyone about six months to decide to either keep her, or find a cheaper coach. I think everyone kept her anyway.

IMO, $20 an hour is unheard of here.

Granted, your rate would be low in my area (I'm currently paying over $60 an hour), but I have to ask, have you "earned" a raise? Have you attended seminars, learned new techniques you can pass on to your skaters?

If your rates are in line with what other coaches (of your experience) charge, as a parent of a skater, I would want to know that there is rationale behind the raise - rather than just "it's time for a raise".

Thanks for your advice everyone. I don't think I'm going to increase my lesson cost. It sounded like a good idea, but for many of the reasons you suggested, I'm going to leave it.
Like I said, most of my skaters are doing this just for fun, and I don't want it to get to be too much for the parents, especially since I have one family with six kids, two of which I coach, and a third daughter will probably be starting with me in fall.
My income from teaching learn to skate and coaching is my "fun money" anyway, so I think for now I'll leave it the same.

Thanks everyone!

The other thing to think about is what other coaches at your rink charge - you don't want to price yourself too differently from the others. At my rink, they all raise their rates together or not at all.

As for the family with six kids, and/or people who want more than a couple of lessons a week, at least two families I know pay the coach a fixed fee (quite hefty) each week, and for that they get ice time plus as many lessons as the coach can squeeze in for them - if one day this is only ten minutes because too many others have turned up, that's fine; they'll get an hour another day when there's no competition. You might want to think about coming to such an arrangement with the large family - and let them organise among themselves which child/ren have their lessons when.

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Mrs Redboots
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