Les, I know it's "horses for courses" and perhaps it's different for you in more of a rural community but we found the 'reservation' system didn't work for us at Twickenham. People who'd reserved were regular 'no-shows'. Which wouldn't have been a problem if they were regulars...when as you say you could black-list them. Based in sprawling suburbia we get many more 'irregulars' and we found the only way we could pretty much guarantee them keeping their word was to have their money upfront. Even then we still get quite a few 'no-shows'!

The final straw for us was after we took 85 reservations for Eliza Gilkyson a few years back and (with a week to go) declared the gig a sell-out and turning away all further enquiries. About 30 of the 85 didn't show and we only had about 10 turn up on spec. As a result the turnover wasn't quite what I'd predicted to the agent and we got in some hot water. We decided from then on we had to go with the "bird in the hand" (and it's worked well for us).

So the money for our gig with Vin is 100% banked and he'll get paid accordingly.......even if nobody turns up (imagine that!)

Gerry