Our courses run on a termly basis, ie Sept – Dec, Jan – March, April – July, the specific term dates will be on the Finn’s Swim School website. Your booking is a full term or pro-rata’d term if joining after term commences.

When signing up to Finn’s Swim School for the first time, details of the courses you are booked into, the dates and times during the first term and the venue will have been agreed with you in advance.

To give existing Finn’s Swim School clients priority for courses each term, we use a re-booking system. This means that we will automatically hold you a space in the forthcoming term and ask us that you notify us as early as possible if you will not need that space, or by the 1^st of the month prior to the new term commencing. Eg for the January term commencing 5^th, we will need to know on or before the 1^st December.

You will receive email confirmation of your booking once your account has been debited or your payment has been received, together with a receipt of your payment. You are always welcome to phone us at the office should you be unsure of any details. Your statutory rights are not affected.

As time progresses your child will move up the levels and your class time, day or venue may need to change to develop your child. We try to keep class times as similar as possible but unfortunately cannot always guarantee this. When your childs progress necessitates a change of time or venue or day you will be notified at rebooking, should you need to change the given option we will do our best to accommodate you but unfortunately we cannot guarantee it.

When you pay for classes with your credit/debit card, your card details are stored on a secure online payments system. We will also take account details for a direct debit mandate. Your term booking will be paid for in 3 monthly payments unless you request to pay in full. Each payment will be taken automatically on the 1^st of the month or nearest working date, and you will have full visibility of these payments and any associated credits in your Swimphony Floaters parent portal.

By providing your card details and allowing them to be stored on a secure payment gateway operated by a third party, you grant us a continuous payment authority to enable us to debit the card when necessary, i.e. upon re-booking, purchasing products, swim kits, baby wetsuits from us, etc.

Whenever your card details change, or if you wish to change your card details for whatever reason, please access your account on your parent portal or telephone the office.

If the course is being paid for by someone other than you, you are responsible for informing that person of our payment policies, deadlines, etc., and relaying any communication with regard to re-booking or payments of any sort.

Although the right to cancel under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 does not apply to Finn’s Swim School, when you first become a Finn’s Swim School client, you may cancel your contract with us either (a) within seven ( 7 ) days of the date you received a copy of these Terms and Conditions, or (b) prior to 14 days before your first course begins, and we will refund your money. Should you cancel within 14 days prior to the commencement date (up to 5.30pm the evening before) we will issue a refund minus a maximum £20 administration charge.

If you are an existing client and do not wish to be re-booked onto a course for the next term, you must notify us before the specified re-booking date and in accordance with the “Booking” section above. If you cancel a booking for the next term at any time after the re-booking date has passed but prior to the course commencing, we will issue a refund minus a maximum £20 cancellation charge. Once the course has started we are under no obligation to provide a refund if you wish to cancel following the commencement of your first class.

We are under no obligation to refund or transfer your money in the event that you are unable to attend part of or the entire course, unless otherwise specified above. We regret that we are unable to offer an alternative for missed lessons. Unfortunately, what seems like one simple request is an impractical administrative task when spread across hundreds of clients.

If a pool cannot be used in the short term, we will endeavour, where possible, to re-schedule your lesson. In this instance we are not responsible for any travel expenses incurred. In the event of our having to cancel a lesson we will credit your card or issue a cheque within five ( 5 ) working days of the end of the term. It is a Finn’s Swim School policy that you should never have to chase a refund. If a credit is applied on a card transaction, normal banking procedures are for that credit to appear in your account after three ( 3 ) working days.

Where a pool is not available on a longer-term basis (in excess of one week), on public health or other grounds outside our control (not including operational issues with the pool), then we cannot be responsible for providing any further lessons to you during that time.

If this occurs, and in the event that it is not possible to reschedule the classes, we will either refund the unused balance of your course fees or  provide a discount on a future term’s fees at our discretion.

We are under no obligation to refund lessons that may be missed due to local adverse weather when the venue and environs are safe and accessible, and lessons are held. We regret that we are unable to offer automatic refunding or rescheduling of lessons in the event of adverse conditions local to you which prevent you from attending a scheduled class.

Regrettably we are unable to support photography of your child’s lesson for safeguarding reasons. In the event Finn’s Swim School are updating their marketing images you will be contacted in advance and may opt out of this.

Finn’s Swim School continually strives to improve the teaching standard of our workforce and we, on occasion, video record a lesson being taught by a teacher. The camera is focused on the teacher and the video recording will only be seen by the teacher and their assessor. The video will not be used for anything other than for the teacher to gain feedback from their assessor. Once the teacher has qualified, the video will be securely destroyed.

All property left in changing rooms or on poolside and all property (including prams) left in entrance halls or outside, is left at your own risk. Finn’s Swim School cannot accept any responsibility for the loss or damage of any personal possessions. Please remove all jewellery (except wedding rings) before entering the water.

You will be asked for any existing medical conditions for either yourself, another carer who may swim in the lessons, or the child booked into the lessons at the end of these Terms and Conditions. You agree to inform us of any changes, including pregnancy, as soon as you are aware of them. All information will be kept strictly confidential.

Should your child or the adult taking your child into the water have, or develop, any known or suspected medical condition, please consult your doctor before swimming. You must then inform our office either via the bottom section of this form or (if at a later date) in writing via email or post. In the event that your illness is contagious and may affect other swimmers, we may share basic information about this risk with other carers. All information received is treated in confidence and with sensitivity.

Never bring your child swimming if they have any illness such as an ear infection, diarrhoea, vomiting, chicken pox, impetigo, or a bad cold. Please wait until your doctor has given the all-clear before returning to classes.

Please ensure that any sickness/diarrhoea symptoms have completely cleared for at least 48 hours before your lesson; or 14 days if a gastrointestinal bug has been diagnosed by a medical professional.

Our teachers may refuse entry to the pool if they reasonably believe that your child is not well enough to participate.

All swimmers over the age of 4 should have long hair tied back and a swim hat on, and come along with goggles if needed. We would recommend that the hat is a cloth hat for their comfort, the rubber caps can be tricky!

All swimmers in our Parent and Baby classes and Parent and toddler classes should have their little one in our advised double nappy system:  either reusable cotton nappy or a disposable paper swim nappy with a Happy Nappy^® or Neo Nappy^® on top. We reserve the right to refuse entry to any child who is not suitably attired.

Babies wearing any other attire, including wetsuits or warmers, etc. must still wear a Happy Nappy^® or Neo Nappy^® and disposable paper swim nappy.

All adults and children 8 years & over must use their own gender changing room to change or access poolside.  Please let us or your teacher know immediately if you see this rule not being followed by anyone. At Woodlands Meed pool there is also a unisex changing room immediately as you enter the pool area, however pool access is still through gender specified changing rooms.

Please tidy your belongings away after changing to allow room for the next class to change.

Absolutely no food should be consumed in the changing rooms or poolside to prevent nasty tummy bugs.

For Babies: Always change your baby on the floor using a suitable changing mat. Do not use any raised areas such as benches, trolleys or tables. This is to prevent babies from rolling onto the floor from high surfaces which can easily happen and is extremely distressing for all concerned.

We may, at our own discretion, refuse a client entry to swim courses if it is felt that the client’s behaviour or the behaviour of those associated with the client is unreasonable or becomes an issue of health and safety.

No outer footwear or prams should be taken onto poolside or into changing rooms.

We ask that all swimmers shower prior to entering the pool wherever possible, this helps us maintain a clean learning environment.

Whilst you are waiting for your class, please keep poolside noise down to a minimum so that all lessons can take place in a calm and peaceful atmosphere. Do not enter the pool until the current class has finished; please always wait to be invited to do so by your teacher.

You are responsible for the safe supervision of any children you bring at all times: on poolside, in the changing rooms, and on the pool premises. They should always be under the direct supervision of an adult and never be left unattended. Children running on wet surfaces can very easily slip and hurt themselves. Finn’s Swim School reserves the right to ask anyone to leave the poolside at any time. Local age restrictions for spectators may apply and you will be informed of these when booking on to classes.

Always adhere to pool rules at individual venues.

Should a lesson already be in progress or about to start and have to be cleared on the grounds of health and safety then we are under no obligation to refund the lesson or part thereof.

Whilst it is our policy that we endeavour to ensure you always have the same teacher, we cannot guarantee this as teachers fall ill, leave, etc. Also, due to the extremely thorough nature of our recruitment and  training, we may occasionally need to have a new teacher teaching your class. They are always fully trained at this point but need to teach a series of ‘live classes’ in order to complete their assessment process. Unfortunately, we cannot give advance warning when this may happen and, whilst we always try to limit it, it is a necessary part of our commitment to quality.

Except in the case of death or personal injury arising as a result of negligence, lack of due diligence, breach of duty, or any other circumstance where liability cannot be excluded by law, your participation, or that of your spouse/partner, your child, or those in whose care you have placed your child at Finn’s Swim School swimming sessions is done so entirely at your and their own risk.

Finn’s Swim School is committed to providing good child safeguarding practice for all our swimmers and we have adopted the Swim England Safeguarding Policy – Wavepower, a copy of which is held by the Finn’s Swim School office or can be viewed and downloaded from www.swimming.org.  We believe that good safeguarding and fair play is paramount for all our swimmers.

If you have a question or concern regarding child welfare, the Finn’s Swim School Welfare Officer should be informed on 01444 246800.  Alternately, there is a dedicated helpline for anyone wishing to raise a safeguarding or welfare concern directly to the Swim England called Swimline on 0808 100 4001.

From time to time we may update these terms and conditions by sending you either an updated version or notification of minor changes. You are free to not accept these changes but we would ask you to notify us in writing of your non-acceptance within 14 days of your receipt, failing which we will be entitled to treat our agreement with you as being subject to the updated version.