Automated billing for sports academies
Creating every family's charges by hand, calculating late fees and chasing payments one by one takes hours your academy doesn't have. Cantera Soccer includes a sports academy billing engine that generates charges automatically every night based on each parent's billing cadence, applies late fees under a configurable rule, and sends reminders and receipts over WhatsApp. This guide walks through how each piece works and what you can configure.
Why manual billing breaks as your sports academy grows
With 30 families you can run billing by hand: you know who pays weekly, who pays monthly, and who was promised a discount. With 80 or 150 families — each with its own cadence, siblings and amounts — manual math falls apart. Some charges get forgotten, others get duplicated, and late fees depend on whoever is collecting that day instead of one fair rule for everyone.
The fix isn't hiring more admin staff; it's a billing engine that generates charges for you. In Cantera Soccer you set each parent's billing cadence and your fee amounts once; from then on, the system calculates and creates every charge with no data entry. Your team stops producing charges and focuses on validating them and following up.
Weekly, biweekly and monthly billing cycles with no duplicates
Each parent has their own cadence: weekly, biweekly, or monthly with a billing day from the 1st to the 31st. Every night at 11:59 pm, the system reviews every cadence and generates the charges that are due: weekly charges are created Sunday or Monday and fall due on Friday; biweekly charges are created on days 12 to 15 and 27 to 30 and fall due on the 15th and 30th; monthly charges are created starting 3 days before the billing day.
Charges are never duplicated within the same period, and they arrive consolidated: one charge per family, itemized by child and by concept, even with siblings in different age groups. If a family has no cadence assigned, no automatic charges are generated for them — you decide who enters the billing engine and who is handled separately.
Automatic late fees with grace days and one-click waivers
You define one late-fee rule for the whole academy: a fixed amount or a percentage, plus however many grace days you want after the due date. The fee is applied only once per charge — it never stacks night after night — and it only reaches charges that fall due after you activate the rule, so no old debt is ever penalized retroactively.
Percentage fees are calculated on the outstanding balance, not the original total, so families who already made partial payments aren't over-charged. If a parent has reported a bank transfer that's pending validation, no fee is applied either. The fee shows as its own line on the receipt, and you can waive it when you reach an agreement: the charge returns to its original amount instantly.
Partial payments, scholarships and discounts that recalculate instantly
Does a family pay in installments? Record partial payments: the charge stays pending, shows the remaining balance until it's settled, and every installment is logged — the amount can never exceed what's left. The engine respects those payments too: if a percentage late fee applies later, it's calculated on what is actually owed, not the original total.
Discounts are assigned on the parent's profile as a fixed amount or a percentage, and pending charges recalculate the moment you save. A 100% discount works as a scholarship: charges are still generated and settle themselves at $0, so scholarship players keep a complete payment history without polluting your overdue reports.
WhatsApp billing reminders and payment receipts
On the Pro plan, the engine does the reminding for you: each family gets a WhatsApp payment reminder matched to their cadence — weekly, biweekly or monthly — before the due date, and when a charge remains unpaid, an overdue notice goes out on the schedule you define in the late-fee settings.
When a payment is recorded, the parent receives their receipt over WhatsApp with a link to the ticket (Pro plan, which includes 300 WhatsApp messages per cycle at $59.99 USD/month). Printable tickets and PDF receipts are available from the Amateur plan at $49.99 USD/month. Billing that reminds, charges and documents itself — without you typing a single message.