Meet Setup: Entry Fees

Meet entry fees are added as Host Fees and Athlete Fees.

>>Note: This setting will calculate meet entry fees as people sign up, but does not enable online payment or collection of entry fees at this time. See below for where to find detailed reports to track fees owed, and ideas for using other SwimTopia features to collect fees online. 

Entry Fees are managed within a specific meet (under Meet Setup) or in a Meet Template. Both options are located under Schedule.

Covered in this Article:

• Setting Entry Fees within a Meet Template (suggested)
• Managing Entry Fees in a Meet
• Entry Fees - Configuration Options
• Meet Entry Fee Reports
• Options for Collecting Fees Online

Setting Entry Fees within a Meet Template (suggested)

If you have meets that always require a fee, you can set these fees one time by creating Meet Templates specific to each meet. This is done from the Schedule > Meet Templates area, and then apply these templates to your meets.

 ➞ See the Meet Templates article for additional details on creating your Meet Templates and applying them to your meets.

>>Note: Updates to these fees (along with any settings in a Meet Template) will be automatically applied to any meet that has not yet occurred.

>>Note: If your Meet Templates have been shared by your league, you will not be able to edit these settings. If you see a setting you need changed and it is grayed out, contact your league to determine if they will update the shared template, or obtain approval to copy the template to create your own with the settings changed.

Details for each configuration option are listed below.

Managing Entry Fees in a Meet

You can also set or update your team's entry fees directly from within your meet. This will only affect the meet you are working on but allows you to override to create specific athlete fees as needed. More on this below.

This is done from Schedule > Select Meet Name > Meet Setup >Entry Fees

Details for each configuration option is listed below.

Entry Fees - Configuration Options

>>Note: Hover over the ? next to each configuration to see a popup of the definitions provided below:

• The Meet Host Fees are the fees the meet host charges the team when they submit their entries.

• The Athlete Fees are the fees the team charges the athletes.

• By default, the meet host fees will be passed through to the athlete fees if unchanged, but the team has the option of overriding those charges, either to increase the fees to cover coaching and travel costs, or to discount or eliminate fees the team will cover, such as relay entry fees. Click Override next to the Athlete Surcharge, Individual Event Entry Fee or Relay Event Entry Fee to change what is charged to individual athletes by the team.

• Calculate athlete relay event fees using meet results instead of meet entries: Because relays are subject to last-minute changes, athlete relay fees are often more accurately calculated based on actual results, so you can charge athletes for relays based on meet results instead of meet entries. 

• Apply athlete surcharge to relay alternates: Decide if a relay alternate should be charged the per-athlete surcharge

Meet Entry Fee Reports

➧ Your Team

We provide a detailed report you can use to track and charge your members offline (Reports > Swim Meets > Meet Entry Fees). You can generate this report, print it, and/or save the report as a PDF to send out as needed.

➧ Visiting Teams

For meets where you need to invoice members outside of your team, you can use the Meet Summary report in Meet Maestro to know how many athletes/events to charge for and then create your own invoice.

You could use the "Pay Now" Paypal option listed in the next section if you want visiting members to pay online, but payments are not tracked in SwimTopia.

Options for Collecting Fees Online

➧ During Registration - For Members of your Team

You could include a conditional fee as an acknowledgement on your registration form, and just capture the fee for anyone that ends up going to the meet at a later date. You have 8 months before the approval to capture the funds expires.

➞ See Conditional Fees: Pre-Approve, Capture & Release

➧ Post-Registration - For Members of your Team

For your members, create a meet entry fee as a Merchandise item to collect during registration and/or on the online store (or any web page using the Merchandise Snippet)

➞ See our Merchandise and Setting up the Online Store articles 

➧ Post-Registration - For Non-Members of your Team

(i.e., your team is hosting a "champs" meet and guests pay you directly)

We do not support "guest" purchasing, but you could use a PayPal "Pay Now" Button on any page of your website. This option is useful if you need to collect entry fees from non-members of your team. When people select options and click Pay Now, they will be taken to the PayPal website to complete payment. They will be redirected back to your site according to the settings you set up (described in the help article link above) Any inventory or financial reports can be done via PayPal - SwimTopia does not keep track of any of these payments, and we've heard PayPal charges 3.5% processing fee (you'll need to confirm on their site).

➧ Other External Options

Collect fees via check or Venmo etc. outside of SwimTopia.

➞ Next Topic - Meet Setup: Eligibility/Participation Requirements

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