In this article, we will explore a convenient feature that takes your show off sale automatically, whether it is through online or in the box office, including phone sales.
Setting your events to come off sale automatically
You determine the precise timing for your event to go off sale - depending on the needs of your event you may want it to come off sale hours or minutes beforehand or perhaps you want a show to remain available for sale for a time after it has started. Either way with this setting you won't have to remember to disable a show yourself. It can be applied as a general rule across all events at Account level or it can be changed at Event level for those unique situations.
The setting we will use is called the "Online sales guard time". This setting will automatically disable your event (To change the box office setting see the bottom of this article).
To set the "Online sales guard time" at Account level
Applying this setting at account level means it will affect all current and future shows setup (unless it is overridden by editing at a show or event level).
- Go to Settings > General settings.
- Find the setting called "Online sales guard time".
- Enter the time in seconds, for example 180 (3 minutes before show time).
- To set a show to come off sale after it has begun use minus "-", e.g. -180 for 3 minutes after event start. Leaving the guard time empty sets the event to come off sale at event start time.
Setting a value of "0" will mean that there is no guard time, so the event will be listed and bookable online after the event start time has passed, up until midnight (unless booking has been disabled manually on the event). Regardless of guard time, events will be removed from the online listings page once the date of the event ends (so at midnight).
To set the "Online sales guard time" at Show and Event level
Applying this setting at a show or event level will override the account level setting. Show and event level may suit for an atypical event where you want to take a show off sale earlier or keep on sale after the show has started.
- Go to Manage > Show.
- Search for your show name and click Settings for show level, this will affect all shows in a run.
- For event level select run (typically Default) and select specific show date/time, click Settings.
- Find the setting called "Online sales guard time".
- Enter the time in seconds, for example 180 (3 minutes before show time) or -180 (3 minutes after show time). Leaving the guard time empty sets the event to come off sale at event start time.
In the example below the setting has been changed at event level to be -300 (5 minutes after show start time of 7.30pm). This overrides the 180 second setting at Account level.
Example guard times
Example guard times to stop booking before the event start time:
| Guard time (seconds) | Minutes before event starts that booking is cut off | Hours before event starts that booking is cut off |
| 3 | n/a | n/a |
| 30 | 0.5 | n/a |
| 60 | 1 | n/a |
| 180 | 3 | n/a |
| 1200 | 20 | n/a |
| 3600 | 60 | 1 |
Example guard times to allow booking after the event start time:
| Guard time (seconds) | Minutes after event starts that booking is allowed | Hours after event starts that booking is allowed |
| -180 | 3 | n/a |
| -300 | 5 | n/a |
| -2700 | 45 | n/a |
| -7200 | 120 | 2 |
| -14400 | 240 | 4 |
Setting a show to come off sale from Box office at a set time
To set a show to come off sale automatically from Box office (including phone sales) we follow the steps above but with the setting "Boxoffice phone sales guard time". The show will no longer be visible in the box office tab on Ticketsolve.???
To set the "Boxoffice phone sales guard time" at Account level
- First go to Settings > General settings.
- Find the setting "Boxoffice phone sales guard time".
- Enter the time in seconds, for example 180 (3 minutes before show time) or -180 (3 minutes after show time). Leaving the guard time empty sets the event to come off sale at event start time.
To set the "Boxoffice phone sales guard time" at Show and Event level
- First go to Manage > Show.
- Search for your show name and click Settings for show level, this will affect all shows in a run.
- For event level select run (typically Default) and select specific show date/time, click Settings.
- Find the setting "Boxoffice_phone_sales_guard_time".
- Enter the time in seconds, for example 180 (3 minutes before show time) or -180 (3 minutes after show time). Leaving the guard time empty sets the event to come off sale at event start time.
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