Garden Planner Frequently Asked Questions

Free Trial and Subscription

Q. Is it really free to use the Garden Planner?

A. Yes, for 7 days you get the fully working version of our Garden Planner. You can create one plan and all the advanced features such as crop spacing and scheduling are available. There is no obligation to subscribe at the end of your free trial and we do not require any financial details unless you decide to subscribe.

Q. Why should I subscribe if I can just sign up for the 7 day free trial?

A. Subscribing enables you to create up to five plans per year. You can continue accessing the garden plans that you have produced after your 7 day free trial has expired and you will receive the emails that remind you when to sow and plant. When you come to plan next year's garden the Garden Planner will remember your garden layout and where crops have been grown in previous years, enabling helpful crop rotation warnings as you plan. This enables you to quickly produce next year's plans without having to re-draw your layout.

Q. Can I share my account with others?

A. Our Terms and Conditions only allow people in the same household to share one Garden Planner account. We respectfully ask that you do not share your account details with others. Special accounts are available for educational establishments who need multiple-user access or more plans per year. Please Contact Us for more details.

You can publish your plan to our web servers if you wish to in order to share it with others without them being able to edit the plan. Please see our Garden Plans page for examples.

Emails and Privacy

Q. Will I receive junk email if I sign up for an account?

A. You will only receive emails you opt-in to, such as our newsletters (which contain the reminders of when to sow and plant the vegetables in your garden) and video tutorials once per week. For the first week we also send introductory emails to help you learn to use the Garden Planner and towards the end of your free trial or subscription you'll receive reminders before it expires. We never send junk mail or give your details to any third party except where required to by law or for the normal operation of our business. You can change your email preferences or unsubscribe at any time. Full details are set out in our Privacy Policy.

Subscription and Payment

Q. How do I subscribe?

A. Just click here to go to the subscription page or start the Garden Planner, then log in and click the 'Subscribe or View Account Status' button.

Q. How much does a subscription to the Garden Planner cost?

A. Your first 7 days are free and a subscription does not automatically start. After that it costs £19 ($29 / €27 / AU$39) for a one-year subscription to the Garden Planner or £29 ($45 / €39 / AU$59) for two years. Educational accounts are available for teachers who wish to use the Garden Planner with their students at a cost of £29 ($45 / €39 / AU$59) for up to five classes per year (each student can create their own plan). Please use our Contact Form for further details about school accounts.

Q. If I subscribe before my 7 day trial ends, will I lose my remaining 'free' days?

A. No, we add your subscription on to the remaining days of your free trial.

Q. How can I be sure that it's safe to use my credit card on This Site?

A. We use PayPal, the leading provider of secure credit card transactions on the Internet, for all our credit card processing. Our site is secured by industry standard technology and certified secure by Trustwave (see the padlock symbol and badge when you navigate to our Subscription pages.) We never store any credit card details on our servers. If you still have concerns then you have the option of using a PayPal account or even sending us a cheque.

Q. Will you continue to take subscription payments out of my bank account each year?

A. No, we simply send you a reminder by email asking you to re-subscribe via our website. We do not set up recurring payments.

Garden Planner

Q. Do I need to install any software?

A. No, the Garden Planner simply uses Adobe Flash Player, version 9 or above, which is installed on well over 95% of all internet-connected computers. Adobe Flash works with Windows PCs, Apple Macs and Linux, in all major browsers. If you need to update your version of Flash Player, then you will be notified when trying to launch the Garden Planner, with a link to the page for the free download.

If you are using a tablet or mobile device, you'll need to purchase and install one of our garden planning apps. Unfortuntely we're not able to offer a free trial on the apps (a restriction imposed by Apple and Google).

Q. When I click to start the Garden Planner it doesn't work

A. As long as you have tried waiting for the Garden Planner to load then you probably need to give your computer a bit of a helping hand. Our Technical Help page gives all the details you need with practical steps and details of how to contact us so that we can help you sort it out.

Q. Do you have a stand-alone version of the Garden Planner that I can install?

A. No, at the moment we only provide an online version so that all our customers are using our most up-to-date software and we can keep backups of the data.

Q. Can the Garden Planner adjust planting times for the Southern Hemisphere?

A. Yes, when you specify that you live in a country in the Southern Hemisphere the planting seasons are adjusted automatically.

Q. A vegetable I plant is not shown in the Garden Planner

A. In order to keep the loading speed of the Garden Planner to a minimum we can only include common vegetables, herbs and fruit into the Garden Planner. If one that you plant isn't there then you can:

Choose the closest vegetable to it and use that picture instead. You can then double-click it to specify a 'variety' of that vegetable.

Use one of the generic vegetables we have provided such as 'Other', 'Herb', 'Fruit Bush' or 'Tree' and give it a variety name for the new plant.

If we receive a lot of requests for a particular plant it may be added in the future so feel free to Contact Us giving details.

Q. What is the difference between 'Spacing' and 'Spacing in Rows'?

A. Our definition is:

Spacing: the distance between plants when planted individually or in blocks

Spacing in rows: (the distance between plants down the row) x (the gap between rows).

By spacing plants closer along rows but keeping the rows further apart it means that the plants still get the root space they need but you get more access to them and they're easier to weed and harvest due to the gap between the rows. This only applies to crops commonly grown in rows.

Q. I want to grow more than one crop in the same space. Is that possible?

A. Yes, just view the Succession Planting video on the start page of the Garden Planner for details of how to do this.

Q. Why am I getting no sow/plant/harvest times for a plant I have added to my plan?

A. Based on the frost dates you have chosen, our system has calculated that you do not have a long enough growing season to grow this crop. Please note that with protection such as cloches, a greenhouse, glasshouse or polytunnel you may still be able to grow it.

Problems

Q. My garden plan won't save. What should I do?

A. Please take a look at our Technical Help page.

Q. The Garden Planner is running slowly on my computer

A. Try restarting your computer and making sure that other demanding programs are not running at the same time. The Garden Planner may slow down with very large garden plans but speed can be increased by using the Settings button on the toolbar and selecting to 'Only show end plants in rows'. Alternatively a large garden or plot can be split into separate smaller plans which will be easier to scroll around.

Q. Scrolling is very slow on my garden plan

A. Again, try the steps mentioned above. Also, click and drag the scroll bar itself, rather than the end arrows.