How to create and manage waiting lists for events

Ticketsolve offers the functionality to have a waiting list available at the Box Office for staff to add customers. It can be made available online when an event is sold out or otherwise unavailable so that customers can add themselves to the list.

Activating the Waiting List

The waiting list function is mainly used for sold out events or events that have been marked as sold out. However, you might want to allow a waiting list at the Box Office to be created if you have some blocked seats on an event that you think might be released at a later date. 

Box Office

The waiting list is always active in the Box Office for every event, and cannot be turned off. Staff can add customers to the waiting list at Box Office at any point, even if an event is not yet sold out.

Online

Activating the online waiting list across the account

1. Navigate to Settings (Cog icon) > General Settings.

2. In the search field, type in 'waiting' and the "Public waiting list enabled" setting will appear.

3. Tick the tick box to activate the setting.

4. Click on Update.

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Activating the online waiting list for a specific Show or Event

1. Navigate to Manage (Spanner icon) > Shows.

2. Use the search field to locate the Show and select it so that you are taken to the Show Details page.

At this stage, if you want to activate the waiting list on a specific event within a Show, select the Show and click through to Run > Event so you are on the Event Details page.

3. Navigate to the Settings tab at the top.

4. In the search field, type in 'waiting' and the setting "Public waiting list enabled" will appear. 

5. Click into the setting and tick the box to activate.

6. Click Update.

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How the waiting list looks online

Once the waiting list setting has been activated for online, when an Event is sold out or has no tickets available in a Public Ticket Allocation there will be clickable text titled 'Join the waiting list?'

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When the customer clicks to Join the waiting list they will be presented with a box to enter their details and the number of tickets they require. They can either log into their existing online account or fill in their details to register.

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Adding a customer to the waiting list at Box Office

1. In the Box Office, search for the Event.

2. Hover over the Event Listing and icons will appear.

3. Underneath the View Tickets button, click on the Clock icon for the waiting list. The waiting list Clock icon in the Box Office view will show how many tickets have been requested on the waiting list for that event, and not the number of customers on the waiting list.

4. You'll now be taken to a the Waiting list tab within the Event Dashboard.

4. On the right hand side you'll see the Add to waiting list box.

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5. Complete the customer details and click Add to waiting list.

  • Add how many tickets the customer would like.
  • Assign an existing customer to the request, or add a new customer if they are not in your database already.
  • Ensure the Telephone Number and Email Address boxes are completed and correct; the system will pull these from the customer record.
  • Click Add to Waiting List.

6. The waiting list will update and add the record to the list.

7. You can now add a Comment at this time if there are any specific requests from the customer.

Managing the Waiting List

Customers will be listed on the waiting list in the order that they were added to it, with the most recent at the bottom. 

Below is a key to the different sections in the Waiting List area:

1. Open the Customer Record pop-up (blue clickable arrow).

2. Label for if a customer is a Benefit Product holder.

3. Copy the email address of a customer.

4. Number of tickets required.

5. Click to view comments.

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It's also possible to sort the list alphabetically (click the NAME column) or by ticket quantity (click the QTY column).

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Load a Customer Record to a Cart

To load a customer from the Waiting List into a new Cart at Box Office so you can process an order for them:

1. Locate the customer from the Waiting List.

2. Click the 3 dots (additional options) icon.

3. Click Load customer to cart.

4. You will now be taken to the Box Office view with the customer in the Cart.

Waiting list load customer to cart.png

 Important

Once a customer has been loaded to the Cart from the waiting list, they will be removed from the waiting list automatically. This means that if a customer is loaded in the Cart and the sale is then not completed, the customer will be still removed from the waiting list. The customer will not be added back to the waiting list automatically, you will need to do this manually.

Delete a customer from the Waiting List

To delete a customer from the list:

1. Locate the customer you want to delete from the Waiting List.

2. Select the desired record by selecting the tick box on the left hand side of the customer.

3. Click Remove selected.

Contacting customers on the Waiting List

It is now possible to send a plain text email to all, or selected, customers on an Event Waiting List.

1. To email all customers on the Waiting List add a tick to the top tick box in the Header section (next to Name).

2. To email select customers on the Waiting List Select the desired record by adding a tick to the tick box on the left hand side of the customer record(s).

3. Click Email selected

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4. In the pop-up add a Subject line and the Content that you want to send.

5. Click Send Email to send this to all selected customers on the Waiting List.

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Downloading the Waiting List to CSV

You may want to download a list of people off the waiting list so you can contact them in the future if the show is programmed in again.

To download a list of customers on the waiting list click on Download CSV and your browser will ask you where you want to save the file or will save it to Downloads, depending on your browser settings. You'll then have CSV of all the customers and their details who are on the waiting list (remember to save somewhere secure and delete when finished!).

You could then tag the customers in their customer records, so you can report on them in Your Reports and then send targeted marketing about future events.

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