Let me start off by saying that I love allowing my friends and peers from school to be in front of the camera and give modeling a shot. However, I am to the point now where multiple people - especially this week - have been cancelling on me despite already having plans for shoots. Mind you, they had cancelled the hours to a day before, but there was no way for me to reschedule someone else at that point for it would have been complete last minute.
Therefore, I have come to the thought of charging people for modeling for me. Not much - maybe $50 or so - but enough for it to be incentive not to cancel. They would pay me in advance to the shoot - since most of them I see in school - and we would schedule the date. For the first shoot, I would keep the money - or possibly half to be fair - whether they cancel or not. After the initial charge, so long as they would wish to do another shoot, they would still pay me the $50. This time, however, I would only keep $10 plus a dollar for every traveled mile and give them the rest of the money back, so long as they keep the date without cancellation. If cancelled, I would keep the money.
As I had said before, I hate to do this to people - especially friends of mine - but at this point it has become a waste of my time when I could have been working and making money, despite me not enjoying my job as much as I do photography.
Thanks for any input!