Available on Plus, Grow, and Enterprise plans.
With Automatic Late Fees and Automatic Cancellation, YouLi can automatically:
- 💰 Add a late fee when a Traveler misses an installment
- 📧 Notify Travelers before and after the late fee is applied
- ❌ Automatically cancel bookings after a configurable number of days (optional)
This feature works with any payment gateway (Stripe, Square, PayPal, Authorize.Net, manual payments, and more).
We recommend enabling AutoPay first so Travelers can easily avoid late fees. Learn how to enable AutoPay
Why Use This Feature?
If you find yourself:
- ⚠️ Seeing lots of orange overdue icons in Manage Payments
- 📤 Sending reminder emails that still don't result in payment
- 🕒 Manually adding late fees every month
- 😅 Feeling like the "bad guy" enforcing your payment policy
...Automatic Late Fees can do the work for you.
How It Works
Once enabled:
- Travelers receive the normal payment reminder emails.
- If they pay before your configured grace period expires, nothing happens.
- If they do not pay, YouLi automatically:
- Adds a late fee to their invoice.
- Sends a confirmation email explaining the fee.
- If Automatic Cancellation is enabled, YouLi will also cancel the booking after your configured number of days.
Late fees are automatically added as invoice line items, but you can always edit or remove them if you wish to make an exception.
Important
- Any payment made before the configured deadline prevents the late fee from being applied.
- Even a partial payment counts as payment for that installment.
- If you use Chip Away Payments, consider disabling it if you want late fees to apply only after the full installment is paid.
- Late fees can always be edited or removed manually if you wish to make an exception.
Paying Separately vs Paying Together
Travelers Paying Separately
Each Traveler is assessed individually.
A late fee is applied separately to each Traveler who misses an installment.
Travelers Paying Together
Only one payment is required to protect the entire invitation group for that installment.
- If any member of the group makes a payment (even a partial payment), no late fee is applied for that installment.
- If nobody pays, the late fee is applied only to the lead Traveler (the person who registered the group), and only they receive the notification email.
Before You Enable It
We recommend:
- Enabling AutoPay
- Testing on one or two trips first
- Updating your traveler communications to explain your policy
For example, include your late fee policy in:
- Terms & Conditions
- Package description
- Pricing explanation
- Announcement email
How to Set It Up
See loom video below to see exactly how and where to take these actions.
- Go to Account → Payments
- Scroll to Automatic Late Fees & Cancellation Settings
- Enable Automatic Late Fees
- Configure your policy
- (Optional) Enable Automatic Cancellation
- Save your changes
NOTE: By default, the feature is enabled for all Trips.
If you want to exclude a Trip:
Trip → Update Trip → Pricing → uncheck Automatic Late Fees
Configure Your Policy
Late fee amount
Choose the amount (typically $25–$50 in the Trip currency).
Reminder Message about late fees added to payment reminders
This message is automatically inserted into the Due Now and Overdue reminder emails (but not the early reminder).
Default:
If this installment is not paid within [AutomaticLateFeeNumDays] days of the due date, an automatic late fee will be applied per our Terms & Conditions.
Grace Period ie. Number of Days after Instalment Due to Automatically Apply Late Fee
Pick a number.
Late Fee Confirmation Message
This is the email sent after the fee has been applied.
You can include:
- formatting
- hyperlinks
- Terms & Conditions links
Supported placeholders and will be replaced in the [AutomaticLateFeeConfirmationMessageHtml]:
[AutomaticLateFeeNumDays][AutomaticCancellationWarningNumDays][AutomaticCancellationNumDays]
Automatic Cancellation (Optional)
You can also automatically cancel Travelers who remain unpaid after a specified number of days.
Configure:
- Enable Automatic Cancellation
- Number of days after the installment due date
- Warning message
- Cancellation confirmation message
Supported placeholders:
[AutomaticLateFeeNumDays][AutomaticCancellationWarningNumDays][AutomaticCancellationNumDays]
Cancellation Warning Email
Sent before cancellation.
Default subject:
Cancellation pending on [TripName]
Cancellation Confirmation Email
Sent after the Traveler has been automatically cancelled.
Default subject:
Automatic cancellation due to missed payment on [TripName]
What Travelers Will See
TripBoard
When a late fee is applied, it appears as an additional payment line item on the Traveler's TripBoard.
If Travelers are paying together, YouLi attempts to apply only one late fee per installment for the entire invitation group.
📷 Insert the TripBoard screenshot here.
Invoice
Late fees appear as a separate line item labelled Automatic Late Fee.
You may:
- change the amount
- waive the fee
- remove it entirely
The fee type itself cannot be changed.
📷 Insert the Invoice screenshot here.
Making Exceptions
Need to waive a late fee?
- Open the Traveler's TripBoard.
- If the fee was applied today, change the amount to $0.
- If it was applied on a previous day, simply delete the fee.
This prevents the automation from immediately recreating it.
📷 Insert the "Removing Automatic Late Fee" screenshots here.
Troubleshooting
Why are there multiple late fees on the same invoice?
This most commonly happens when Travelers originally paid separately but were later merged into a "Pay Together" invitation group.
Normally, YouLi attempts to apply only one late fee per installment for each invitation group.
If duplicate fees appear:
- Delete the duplicate fee (or change it to $0).
- If this happens repeatedly, contact YouLi Support.