How to price coaching classes in Australia

To price coaching classes, start with your true cost per class: venue hire, coach wages plus super, insurance, software and payment fees. Divide that by the number of students you actually expect, add a profit margin, then check the result against local competitors and the value families see. Price for real attendance, not a full roll.

It’s the second week of term and you’re working out why the bank balance looks thin, even though the Tuesday under-10s class is full. You charged $15 a class because the academy down the road does. Then the hall invoice lands, the coach’s super comes out, and you realise that class barely covered itself.

Key takeaways

• Work out your cost per class first. Most coaching businesses undercount coach time, super and payment fees.
• Price on the number of students who usually turn up and pay, not the number of spots in the class.
• Use competitor prices as a sense check, not a starting point.
• Term fees and memberships give you steadier cash flow than casual per-class fees.
• Raise prices once a year, with a term’s notice and a plain explanation. Most families accept that.

What are the three ways to price coaching classes?

There are three common methods: cost-plus, market-based and value-based pricing. Good pricing uses all three, in that order.

Cost-plus pricing

Add up what a class costs to run, divide by the number of students, and add a margin. It’s the floor. If you charge less than this, every class you run makes you poorer, and the more you grow, the worse it gets.

Market-based pricing

Look at what three to five similar programs nearby charge for a similar class length, group size and coach level. This tells you what families in your area are used to paying. It doesn’t tell you whether those businesses are profitable. Plenty of academies copy each other’s prices and all quietly lose money.

Value-based pricing

Ask what the class is worth to the family. Smaller groups, qualified coaches, regular progress updates, a clear pathway from beginner to squad, and easy make-ups are all things parents will pay more for. If your offer is clearly better than the cheapest option, you don’t have to match its price.

In practice: cost-plus sets your minimum, the market tells you the normal range, and value decides where in that range (or above it) you sit.

How do you work out your true cost per class?

List every cost that exists because the class runs, then convert each one to a per-class figure. These are the usual lines.

Venue hire

Use the hourly rate you actually pay, including any minimum booking, cleaning fee or setup time you’re charged for. If you own or lease your own space, divide the yearly rent and outgoings by the number of classes you run in a year.

Coach wages, including super

Count paid time, not class time. A 45-minute class often means an hour of paid time once you add setup, pack-down and a chat with parents at the gate. If your coaches are employees, add super on top of their wage. The ATO’s super guarantee table sets the rate at 12% for both 2025–26 and 2026–27. The ATO’s Payday Super changes also start from 1 July 2026, so super now leaves your account closer to each pay run. Budget for it per class, not as a quarterly surprise. If you use contractors, ask your accountant whether they count as employees for super.

Insurance, software and admin

Take your yearly public liability and professional indemnity premiums, your software subscriptions, your accountant’s fees and any registration or affiliation costs. Add them up and divide by the classes you run each year. This usually comes to a few dollars per class, which is easy to forget and adds up fast.

Payment processing fees

Card payments cost money. Stripe’s Australian pricing page lists 1.65% + A$0.30 for domestic cards and 3.5% + A$0.30 for international cards. Because of the fixed 30 cents, paying per class costs you more than paying once per term. Allowing about 2% in your sums is a sensible buffer.

Don’t forget your own time

If you coach a class yourself, pay yourself a coach’s rate in the sums. Otherwise your price only works while you’re working for free.

A worked example: one Saturday junior class

Here are example numbers for a single one-hour junior class. Swap in your own.

• Venue hire: $60 per class.
• Coach: 1.25 paid hours (class plus setup and pack-down) at $40 an hour = $50.
• Super at 12% on $50 = $6. Coach cost is $56.
• Insurance, software and admin, spread across the year: $8 per class.
• Total cost per class: $124.

The class holds 12, but on average 10 students are enrolled and paying. At 10 students, the cost per student is $12.40. Allow 2% for payment fees and the break-even fee is about $12.65 per student per class.

Now add a margin. If you want 30% of every fee left over as profit (to cover your own business time, quiet terms and growth), the fee becomes about $18.25 per student per class, or around $182 for a 10-week term before GST. If you’re registered for GST, that’s about $201 including GST.

If the local market charges $16 to $22 for a similar class, you’re in range. If it charges $13, you either need more students per class, cheaper venue time, or a clearly better offer that justifies the gap.

Per-class, term fees or memberships: which should you charge?

Most academies do best with term fees or memberships for regular students, and a higher per-class price for casual drop-ins.

Per-class (casual) fees

Easy for families to try and easy to stop. The downside is that income moves with attendance, and every payment carries its own card fee. If you offer casual spots, price them above the term rate per class, for example 15–25% higher, so committing to a term is the better deal.

Term fees

Families pay up front for a set number of weeks. You get cash before costs hit, a clear roll, and fewer payments to chase. The common sticking points are late joiners (prorate the fee for the weeks left) and missed classes (have a written make-up class policy so you're not refunding by default).

Memberships and subscriptions

A monthly or weekly direct debit smooths out the feast-and-famine pattern of term fees. It suits year-round programs such as squads, gyms, martial arts and music lessons. Outcoach's memberships and subscriptions feature runs fixed-term memberships and rolling subscription plans, billed weekly, monthly or yearly through Stripe. To convert a term price to monthly, multiply the per-class fee by classes per year and divide by 12, so families aren't paying for school holidays you don't run without knowing it.

How should you handle sibling discounts and trial classes?

Keep both small, simple and written down, and check them against your break-even fee.

Sibling discounts

Offer one if you can afford it, because siblings are cheap to keep and they make leaving harder. Keep the discount small and simple: 5–10% off the second child, and sometimes a bit more for a third. Apply it to the lower-priced enrolment, and put it in writing on your fee schedule.

Remember the discount comes straight out of your margin, not your costs. In the example above, 10% off an $18.25 class leaves $16.43, still well above the $12.65 break-even. A 25% discount would leave $13.69, which is close to the line once a couple of students drop out mid-term.

Trial class pricing

A free or low-cost trial lowers the barrier, but a small fee usually brings better-qualified families who actually turn up. Many academies charge a discounted first session and credit it against the term fee if the family enrols that week. That gives the parent a reason to decide quickly. We cover the rest of the process in how to run a trial class that converts.

Whatever you charge, cap trial spots per class so paying students still get the coach's attention.

How do you raise prices without losing families?

Give a term's notice, explain why in one or two sentences, and keep it modest. A regular small rise each year is easier for families than a big jump every few years.

• Timing: announce the new fee at least four to six weeks before re-enrolment opens, so families can plan. The re-enrolment guide covers how to time that window.
• Reason: name real costs, such as higher venue hire, coach pay and super. Families respect honesty more than spin.
• Value: remind them what they get, and add something if you can: a progress report, an extra holiday clinic, a better ratio.
• Existing families: consider holding the old price for one more term for current students, or applying the rise only to new enrolments first.
• Help: tell families who to contact if the change is hard for them. A quiet payment plan keeps a student you'd otherwise lose.

Here's a message you can adapt:

Hi [Parent name],

Thanks for being part of [Academy name] this year. We've loved watching [Child name] grow in confidence, especially [one specific thing].

From Term [X] our class fee will move from $[old] to $[new] per class ($[term price] for a [10]-week term). Venue hire and coach wages, including super, have gone up, and we want to keep paying our coaches fairly and keep our groups small.

Nothing changes for the rest of this term. Re-enrolment for Term [X] opens on [date].

If the new fee is a problem for your family, please reply to this message or call me on [number]. We'll work something out.

Thanks,
[Your name]

Do you need to add GST to your class fees?

Only if you're registered for GST, or required to be. If you are, most sport, music and dance coaching is a taxable sale, so your fee needs to include 10% GST. If you set a price without allowing for GST and then register, a $200 term fee gives you about $181.82 and the other $18.18 goes to the ATO. Our guide to coaching business invoicing and GST explains the registration threshold, which courses can be GST-free and what your invoices need to show. This is general information only, so check your situation with your accountant.

Your pricing checklist for this week

1. Pull last term's venue invoices and payroll, and work out the cost of your three busiest classes.
2. Count paid coach time per class, including setup and pack-down, and add super at 12%.
3. Divide yearly insurance, software and admin costs by the number of classes you run.
4. Check your average paying students per class over the last term, not the class capacity.
5. Run the numbers through the calculator above and note the break-even fee for each class.
6. Look up three to five local competitors' prices for a similar class.
7. Decide your term, casual, sibling and trial prices, and write them on one fee schedule.
8. If a rise is needed, draft your notice now and send it at least four weeks before re-enrolment opens.

How does software help with pricing?

Software won't choose your price, but it makes the price easier to charge consistently. In Outcoach, payments and invoicing lets you invoice a whole class at once, set up recurring invoices, prorate invoices for late joiners and send reminders that include a pay link, so you're not chasing fees by text. The online booking page can offer a discounted trial session and shows your terms and cancellation policy at booking. The dance studio and music school pages also list sibling discounts. Revenue reports show collected and outstanding fees by month and by program, which is the data you need when you next review prices.

If you want to try it with your own classes, you can start a free 30-day trial. Pricing for Outcoach itself is per student per month; see the pricing page for what each plan includes.

Frequently asked questions