Basic concepts

To charge properly in TrainerStudio, it helps to keep three things apart: what you sell, how it is paid and who bought it. That separation is the foundation of the whole payments section.

Product

The product is what you sell. It can be monthly coaching, an 8-week challenge, a personalized routine, premium follow-up or a fixed-length program.

Give it a name you will understand when you review transactions later. Premium monthly coaching or 8-week shred challenge work better than internal names like Plan A, Premium 2 or General payment.

Billing plan

The billing plan defines how that product is paid. The same product can have several plans: 149 EUR per month, 399 EUR every quarter, 79 EUR as a one-time payment or 149 EUR every 3 months for 2 charges.

This is where you choose the amount, the currency and the charge type. If it is a subscription, you also decide the frequency, the trial days and whether it ends after a specific number of charges.

Transaction

A transaction is any money coming in that you record in TrainerStudio. It can be linked to a catalog product (the usual case when a client buys coaching or a challenge from you) or it can be a standalone entry with no product (a gift voucher, a one-off charge, a past payment, a partial refund).

Mark can buy a routine and pay by Bizum. Laura can buy a challenge through a Stripe link. Anna can sign up for monthly coaching and end up with an active subscription. You can also record the 50 EUR a friend gave you for a one-off assessment as a standalone transaction, even if it is not in your catalog.

All transactions are reviewed in Business -> Transactions, sorted by date and time, even when the money came in through different channels.

Subscription

A subscription is a transaction that is charged on a recurring basis and is linked to a catalog product. It can come from Stripe, if the client pays by card and you want future charges to be automatic. It can also be manual, if the client pays every month by Bizum, bank transfer, cash or an external platform.

Subscriptions have their own view in Business -> Subscriptions so you can quickly see which clients have an active fee, what the current charge is and who needs follow-up. The associated transaction still exists under Transactions, but the subscriptions view is designed for reviewing recurring clients without mixing them up with one-time payments.