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Nick
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June 3, 2020 at 6:17 am
Hi,
I run a weekly online group. Participants can sign up to join one for one meeting at a time, so I have different datetimes set up for this, with different tickets associated with each datetime.
I have installed the Wait Lists plugin and would like to set a separate wait list for each datetime. Is this possible?
Thanks,
Nick
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Tony
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June 3, 2020 at 6:23 am
Hi Nick,
No, not currently.
The waitlist add-on displays per event rather than per datetime and one of the reasons used the event itself is due to the jump in the number of queries for it to work per datetime when loading the ticket selector.
If you want a separate waitlist per DateTime you’ll need to separate those out into individual events as it stands.
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Nick
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June 3, 2020 at 7:26 am
Thanks for your response Tony. I think I can still make it work with a waitlist per event, because I can clear the waitlist each week.
Can I just check though, it’s my understanding that there is a separate ‘sold out’ status for each datetime for an event. Is that correct?
As I understand it, this means that, if tickets for the next upcoming datetime are sold out, a wait list option will show (if I have the wait list feature activated for the event as a whole), but when this datetime passes, the waitlist option will disappear if spaces are available for the next datetime. Is this correct?
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Tony
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June 3, 2020 at 7:41 am
Can I just check though, it’s my understanding that there is a separate ‘sold out’ status for each datetime for an event. Is that correct?
Yes, datetimes have their statuses.
As I understand it, this means that, if tickets for the next upcoming datetime are sold out, a wait list option will show (if I have the wait list feature activated for the event as a whole), but when this datetime passes, the waitlist option will disappear if spaces are available for the next datetime. Is this correct?
As mentioned, the waitlist feature uses the event status.
If you have upcoming datetimes within an event the event status will not switch to sold out when the current ‘active’ datetime is sold out, so no, the waitlist will not appear and then disappear in that situation.
Waitlist registrations are also assigned to a specific ticket and the calculations are based on the event as a whole. So, in the above situation the it would allow waitlist registrations on a sold out datetime and then when the event ‘switched’ to not being sold out again it would trigger waitlist promotions on the sold out datetime.
All of that means that as it stands, the waitlist add-on does not work with waitlist per datetimes.
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Nick
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June 3, 2020 at 9:40 am
Thanks again Tony. Sorry, if I am being slow on the uptake!
I have one more question that I think will help me to understand the behaviour I saw this morning. When you say:
If you have upcoming datetimes within an event the event status will not switch to sold out when the current ‘active’ datetime is sold out
Is this the case even if the sale of tickets for other datetimes hasn’t yet started? In other words, if the next upcoming datetime has sold out and ticket sales haven’t started for any datetimes after this (because the ‘Sale Starts’ date is in the future, will a waiting list appear?
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Tony
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June 3, 2020 at 11:08 am
Sorry, I don’t follow.
You’re asking if an event can have a status of sold out without having a status of sold out?
The waitlist will show if your event status is sold out (the status shown in the sidebar of the event editor under ‘Event Registration Options’) and you have waitlist spaces available. So it is all based on the event status of sold out.
Can you post a screenshot of your ticket set up for the above, please? I’ll test it to confirm.
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Nick
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June 3, 2020 at 11:39 am
I am asking if an event would have a status of sold out if both of the following were true:
- All tickets that are currently on sale have been sold.
- Additional tickets have been added in the admin page for an event, but have not yet gone on sale (as the ‘Sale Starts’ date for these tickets is in the future).
I hope that’s clearer! Not sure that a screenshot would help in answering this.
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Tony
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June 3, 2020 at 11:43 am
No, because an event with upcoming ticket sales is not sold out.
The ‘current’ datetimes in the event may be sold out, but you’ve added additional sales that are upcoming, the event is not sold out, it’s upcoming.
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Nick
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June 3, 2020 at 11:56 am
OK, thanks for confirming Tony.
I think what happened today was that, even though I had added extra future datetimes, I hadn’t yet added tickets for these datetimes, and so the waitlist appeared because all tickets had sold out for the only datetime with tickets allocated.
Now that I understand more on how this works, I can see that the waitlist would never show if I set things up how I would like to (i.e. adding several future datetimes and future tickets). As I would like there to be a way of having a waiting list show when the next upcoming datetime is sold out, it sounds like I have one of two options available to me:
1. Not add tickets for the next datetime until the current datetime has passed.
2. Create a different event for each weekly group and maybe but in place a dynamic URL forwarder so that I can have a static URL which will always point to the next upcoming event.
In relation to point 1, can I just ask, if I create future dated tickets, but don’t associate these to a future datetime, will they still prevent an event from having a sold out status, or will they only do so if they are associated with a datetime?
Nick
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Tony
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June 5, 2020 at 4:44 am
I think what happened today was that, even though I had added extra future datetimes, I hadn’t yet added tickets for these datetimes, and so the waitlist appeared because all tickets had sold out for the only datetime with tickets allocated.
Yeah that sounds correct.
When you add a datetime it will be allocated to the current tickets in the editor, if all of those are sold out already there are no spaces on those additional datetimes.
As I would like there to be a way of having a waiting list show when the next upcoming datetime is sold out, it sounds like I have one of two options available to me
The problem with trying to work around this is the waitlist registrations are event based… so if you have a sold out event and the user joins the waitlist for ticket 9 on datetime 9 and you then add spaces to the event with datetime and ticket 10, then use the auto promotion feature to let waitist registration now, they are gong to be assigned to datetime and ticket 9. If they continue the registration and finalize they will not be finalizing on ticket 10 but ‘overselling’ ticket 9.
In relation to point 1, can I just ask, if I create future dated tickets, but don’t associate these to a future datetime, will they still prevent an event from having a sold out status, or will they only do so if they are associated with a datetime?
You can’t create tickets that are not allocated to a datetime so may I ask what those tickets would be assigned to?
It they are assigned to a current datetime and have spaces on them, they’ll open the event again.
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Nick
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June 12, 2020 at 5:26 am
Thanks for the further clarification Tony. I think that, for now, I will stick to manually adding a new datetime and new tickets associated with this new datetime after each meeting. I will also disable the auto promote feature on the waiting list, and should people join the waiting list I will manually contact them if a place becomes available.
As waiting list places are per event, it sounds like I will also have to clear the waiting list after each datetime has passed, thus freeing up the two places I want to have per sold out event.
Would setting wait list places per datetime be a good feature to introduce to EE4 in the future, or is this not feasible/advisable?
If not, I think that in time it will be simpler to create new events for each meeting and set up a dynamic url forwarder, but the above method is I think workable for now.
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