Question: Hi, Micki. I've been tutoring a high school student who had been failing his French class. Although I was very clear with his parents that I could not guarantee that he would achieve the B grade the wanted him to get, but now that the class is over and he got a C, they don't want to pay me. What do I do?
Answer: Sorry to hear about the recent payment recent problems with your tutee. Unfortunately I had the same thing happen to me about 10 years ago, and this is how I handled it. I was contacted by a set of parents, to help their daughter, we'll call her Christine, in her Writing class. Much like your own tutee, she was failing, and she needed to pass in order to maintain her GPA and stay on the Volleyball team.
With only a month left in the semester, I knew I had my work cut out for me. Christine was an eager tutee, and we managed to bring her grade up to passing (she just missed getting a B). I was very happy for her, but when I sent the bill, her parents said that they would pay me half of my usual rate, since Christine had been put on probation with her Volleyball team.
I arranged to meet with them, and we talked through the problem in person. After a lot of negotiation, they agreed to pay the full amount, and agreed to take Christine on for tutoring the next semester, so she didn't fall behind so badly.
It was this experience that taught me to use tutoring contracts whenever I take on a new tutee, so that they have a very clear idea of what they can expect from our tutoring sessions, as well as the outcome they can expect.
Another quick tip for you - arrange a payment schedule with your tutee (or the responsible party), and be sure to get written confirmation of your hours each time you tutor. The tutoring log is a similar to what I've always used, since it has the tutee's initials on each line next to the date, start, and stop times. It didn't help in the situation I had with Christine, since her issue was about the grade, but it has helped in other cases, when tutees disputed the hours.
Good luck and, as always, happy tutoring!
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