Quick answer: A prepaid laundry subscription is a plan the customer buys up front — for example a credit balance that is valid for a set number of days — and then spends order by order. It brings in cash early, keeps customers coming back to you rather than the shop next door, and cuts the counter time spent on payments. It only works if your system tracks every customer's balance and books the money correctly.
Why laundries sell prepaid plans
- Cash before the work. You are paid when the plan is sold, not when the clothes are collected.
- Loyalty you can see. A customer with credit left does not try a competitor.
- Faster counter. No change to count — the order is deducted from the balance.
- Some credit is never used. When a plan expires, the unused balance becomes income. That is legitimate, but it has to be booked properly.
Designing your plans
Keep it to two or three plans. Each needs:
- A price and a credit value. Many laundries give more credit than the price — pay 20, get 22 of service — so the plan feels worth it.
- A validity period. 30 or 60 days is common. Too long and the liability sits on your books for months; too short and customers feel cheated.
- Rules for running low. Decide whether an order that costs more than the remaining balance is refused, paid with the difference in cash, or allowed to go slightly negative.
Running subscriptions at the counter
- Selling a plan: pick the customer, pick the plan, take payment. The credit is available immediately.
- Using it: at checkout, choose subscription credit as the payment method. The remaining balance should be visible to the cashier — and on the receipt, so the customer sees it too.
- Topping up or switching: when a customer moves to a bigger plan, carry their remaining credit forward rather than making them use it up first.
- Expiry: every plan carries an expiry date. Decide in advance what happens to unused credit when it lapses, write it on the receipt, and apply the same rule to every customer.
The accounting most laundries get wrong
When you sell a plan, the money is not yet income — you still owe the customer the service. It sits as a liability. Each order paid from the plan moves part of that liability into revenue. When a plan expires with credit left, that remainder is recognised as income (accountants call it breakage).
Booked by hand, this is where small laundries lose track: the bank looks healthy, but much of it is owed in future washes. WoBooks posts these entries automatically on every plan sale, top-up and redemption, so the liability you still owe in future washes is always a real number.
A worked example
A customer buys a plan for 20 that carries 22 of credit, valid for 30 days.
- Day 1 — plan sold: cash goes up by 20, and 20 is recorded as owed to the customer (subscription liability). Your income has not changed yet.
- Day 5 — order of 6.60: the balance drops to 15.40. Because 22 of credit was bought for 20, each unit of credit is worth about 0.91 of real money, so about 6.00 moves from the liability into laundry revenue.
- Day 18 — order of 11.00: the balance drops to 4.40; about 10.00 more becomes revenue.
- Day 31 — plan expires: the remaining 4.40 of credit (about 4.00 of the cash paid) is released from the liability and booked as breakage income.
After 30 days the full 20 has become income, but it arrived on your profit and loss as the work was done, not all on day one. That is the difference between a month that looks good and a month that is good.
FAQ
Should prepaid plans have an expiry date?
Yes. An expiry keeps the liability on your books from growing forever and gives customers a reason to come back. Make it long enough to be fair — a customer who feels their credit was taken will not buy again.
Can a customer have a plan and still pay cash?
Yes. A single order can be split: part from subscription credit, the rest in cash or card. That is the normal case when a balance runs low.
Is a wash & fold membership different from a prepaid plan?
Only in name. Whether you call it a membership, a subscription or a package, it works the same way: money in first, credit used order by order, and an expiry for what is left.
Moving existing customers onto the system
If you already sell plans on paper cards or in a notebook, move each regular onto a plan in the system the next time they come in, and keep the notebook only until the last paper card is used up. From then on, the counter works from one place.
Mistakes to avoid
- Too many plans — staff mis-sell them and customers cannot compare.
- No visible balance — customers who cannot see their credit assume you are overcharging.
- Forgetting expiry — liability piles up and your profit is understated.
- Treating the plan sale as revenue — your month looks great until the washes come due.
Where WoBooks fits
WoBooks' laundry POS has prepaid subscriptions built in: configurable credit values and validity, top-ups and plan switches that carry credit forward, overdraft rules, an expiry date on every subscription, and the double-entry accounting for every sale and redemption. It sits alongside the rest of the counter — see the laundry POS buyer's checklist and the laundry POS software page. Every account starts with a free 7-day trial.