Event status change during online ticketing
(only in Peppered order process with integrated ticketing)
From available to sold-out
An event will automatically be set to "sold-out" when:
- the event has a box-office ID in Peppered
- during the order process the final tickets are booked by a visitor, or
- during the order process the number of available tickets is less than the "sold-out buffer" (more info at the bottom of the page).
The "Sold out status" can be set in de "Status updater" part of the control panel. Here you can choose which status an event will get when sold-out. Usually this will be "sold-out" but you could also use the status "Waiting list" here for all events that sell out):
Only the website order process will set events to a sold-out status usually.
From sold-out to available
By default, events that are set to status "Sold out" (or any other non-bookable status) in Peppered will never appear as available (in sales) again unless you change the status manually in the Peppered dashboard.
Updating event statuses with the Availability updater
(This also applies to non-integrated ticketing and hybrid ticketing, as long as there is an API available from the ticketing system and the events have a box-office ID in Peppered)
The Event availability updater can be found in the control panel. It is a mechanism to check predefined event statuses and change them when possible. This can be triggered manually, or periodically scheduled to run automatically.
In the Event availability updater you can define what event statuses should be checked when the updater is activated. The check can work both ways:
- Events with an on-sale status can be checked and set to sold-out when tickets are no longer available.
- Events with a sold-out status can be checked and set to on-sale when new tickets become available.
General settings
Go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Availability updater. The following options are available:
- Status IDs to check: This is a list of statuses that will be checked. All other statuses will be ignored in the check.
- Event IDs for testing: If you want to perform a small-scale test first, enter some Box-office ID's of events here, to run the updater only for those events. Delete these ID's after you're done testing.
- Availability updater button: This will enable the manual "Update availability" button at the right side in the event module:
From available to sold-out with the Availability updater
If you want the availability updater to check events with certain available statuses and change them to sold-out, first check if the default "Sold-out" status is defined in Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Status updater
The default sold-out status is usually 2 ("Sold-out") but can also be something else, like "waiting list"
After that's correctly configured, go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Availability updater
and enter all statuses you want to check. In this example all events with status On sale will be checked, and changed to sold-out if no seats appear to be available during the check:
From sold-out to available with the Event Availability updater
If you want the availability updater to check events with certain Unavailable statuses and change them to available, first check if the default "available" status is defined in Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Status updater
The default available status is usually "On sale"
After that's correctly configured, go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Availability updater
and enter all statuses you want to check. In this example all events with status "sold-out" will be checked, and changed to "On sale" (or to "last tickets" depending of the number of seats available during the check):
From sold-out to available and available to sold-out with the Availability updater
If you want to check both scenarios, make sure you implement the settings as stated above, and just add all Status ID's to check. Go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Availability updater and enter all statuses you want to check:
In this example
- all events with status "sold-out" will be checked, and changed to "On sale" if there appear to be some seats available during the check
- all events with status "On sale" will be checked, and changed to "Sold-out" if no seats appear to be available during the check
Scheduling the automated Event Availability updater
Go to: Dashboard > System > Timestamps and look for the "StatusUpdater"
In the "timestamps" module, make sure the initial start date of the task "StatusUpdater" is today or in the near future:
From now on your Status Updater will be up and running! The updater will run a couple of times a day.
Buffers
Using a "sold-out buffer"
Good to know: you can set up a sold out buffer yourself. This is useful in case you don't want to sell all tickets online, or in case there is just one ticket left, and usually your visitors order at least two tickets, so it's better to don't offer the possibility at all.
Example: you set the sold out buffer of the website to 2 tickets. If an event has only 2 tickets or less available in the ticketing system, the event will automatically change to sold-out on the website.
The Event Availability updater will also use this status, and change events to soldout when the number of tickets is equal to or lower than the sold-out buffer. (see "From available to sold-out with the Event Availability updater")
Go to: dashboard > System > Control Panel > Status updater
Look for "Sold out buffer". The buffer is a general buffer that is applicable to all events.
Using a "last tickets buffer"
An event status can automatically change form "on sale" to "last tickets" to create some urgency among your visitors. In order to activate this feature, a "last ticket buffer" needs to be set. If the number of available tickets drops below this buffer, the status will automatically change to "last tickets".
Go to: dashboard > System > Control Panel > Status updater and look for "Last ticket buffer".
In this example the buffer is set to 20. If there are 20 or less tickets available for an event, the status is changed to the "last tickets" status.
If you also activate "Last tickets buffer per hall", you can even set a different buffer for each hall (in the hall module). For a small hall, last tickets maybe means only 10 tickets left, while a big hall can still have 100 tickets left and still use the "last tickets" status.
The Availability updater will also use this status, and change events to "last tickets" when the number of tickets is equal to or lower than the last tickets buffer. (see "From sold-out to available with the Event Availability updater")
Last but not least:
Importing price types in the price type module and updating prices for events in the event module will not change an event status.
Updating Cross-sell event statuses with the Availability updater
Usually Cross sell event statuses are updated in the order process. However, this can also be updated manually and scheduled daily. This is especially useful when using a Hybrid ticketing connector.
General settings
Go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Status updater cross-sells to set default statuses for sold out and on sale.
Go to: Dashboard > System > Control Panel > Availability updater cross-sells to select which statuses need to be checked and updated.
Updating prices
Prices of events and cross-sells can be manually updated in their respective modules. Prices will also be automatically updated every night.