Holding Seats

You can place holds on seats based on performance or a group of performances. We recommend using this feature as an alternative to selling the seats to a specified house account. This process puts the tickets on hold and avoids creating transactions. Your revenue reports and ticket analysis reports will also reflect a truer status of the sales picture.

Rules for Holding Tickets

There are privileges in the employee record indicating which hold codes they can hold or release. An employee who has this privilege, can hold and release any seats with those hold codes at any time. For more information, refer to Employee Settings-Box office tab
There is a privilege which allows only releasing seats. If an employee has this privilege, they can release seats at any time from the Ticket Sales to Patron window or from the Plays Window.
There is also a default setting for auto release of tickets prior to a performance. For example if this is set to 15 minutes then 15 minutes before the play the held seats will be released for general sale.
There are three ways to hold seats for shows:
1. While Selling tickets:
2. While in Show setup on the Maps Tab
3. During subscription setup where you want to hold all seats in events that pertain to subscriber seats

Rules for releasing seats

The return to hold process is designed around protecting subscriptions seats, development and other special holds - by making sure they go back to the hold they were originally set at.

The following process is how Theatre Manager decides when to release a previously held seat:

All seats track what the original hold code for the ticket, (if any).
If a ticket is refunded, the seat is put back on the original hold (if there was one).
If there was no original hold, then tickets are returned to hold according to the return to hold map settings
If you manually remove the holds before selling a ticket:
- the ticket no longer has an original hold code and
- when refunded at the box office, it will be available for sale (subject to the return to hold on the pricing map)

Holding Seats for a Performance

There are several situations that may call for holding seats within a Performance.

there are promoter, artist, media or complimentary tickets negotiated within the contract
the venue requires house seats to assist with potential issues arising the night of the show
sight lines prevent seats from being sold
space is needed in the venue for a sound board, lighting board or video equipment
seats in a particular section will be held and released based on demand or audience size
social distancing is required

The steps for holding seats within a Performance are outlined below:

Holding Seats

Find the event / play you want to hold seats for.
Click here to learn how to find an event / play.
Open the event / play.
Select the Maps tab.
Highlight the Performance(s) on the left side of the window.
Should you need to hold seats for multiple performances at a time simply select multiple date/times from the list on the left side of the window.
Select the seats to be held.
Highlight the seats to be held by clicking and dragging the mouse over the seats. Multiple seats in different sections can be selected by holding down the Shift key on the keyboard. Selected seats will appear as a solid blue.
Click the Hold button above the map.
Clicking the hold button will provide a menu of hold letters to choose from.
Select the desired hold letter.

Once the hold letter is selected the seats will be held with that letter on the map for those performances selected on the left. All holds appear as lower case letters on the map. Changing the hold colour can be done in the Box Office tab of Systems Preferences by a Master User.

Held Seats On Map

Diataxis:

How To

Holding Seats in the Order Window

Create a Buy List
Click here to learn how to create a Buy List. Once the Buy List is complete click Seat Selection tab in the Orders window.

Click here for a detailed description of this window and it's functions.
Select the Hold option located below the map and above the basket were purchased seats appear.
Select the seats to be held.
Selected seats will appear as a solid blue. Multiple seats in different sections can be selected by holding down the Shift key on the keyboard.
Click the Hold button located to the right of the Hold option.
Clicking the hold button will provide a menu of hold letters to choose from.
Select the desired hold letter.

Held Seats in Order Window

Diataxis:

How To

Holding Seats for a Specific Patron

Holding and Releasing seats allows the user to mark seats as unavailable without actually selling the seats. No revenue is journalized when a seat is held, the seat is just marked as unavailable. This feature can be offered to a patron who needs additional time to make a final decision. The hold allows for a time-limit to be set before the seat is auto-released. The auto-release feature works in conjunction with the Web Sales Listener. The Web Sale Listener must be active in order for the timed release of seat holds to work properly.

Any seat held for a specific patron will appear in their patron window on the ticket list - and you can book the seats from there.

Holding Seats While Selling Tickets

To hold seats for a specific patron, while you are selling tickets, you perform the following steps:

Create a Buy List
Click here to learn how to create a Buy List. Once the Buy List is complete click Seat Selection tab in the Orders window.

Click here for a detailed description of this window and it's functions.
Select the Hold Option.
Select the seats to be held.
Press the Hold <image hold button> button and select "Hold Seat for Patron."

This will open an additional window letting the user set the parameters of the hold.
Step 1 - Enter information about the hold.
A choice between a generic hold and a hold for a specfic patron can be entered.
Step 2 - Choose a hold letter to use.
Often the Box Office will have a predetermined hold letter used for all patron holds for users to be able to quickly reference the graphic map.
Step 3 - Set the criteria in regards to the release of the hold.
A date and time can be set to auto-release the hold.
Step 4 - Assign any comments to the hold.
Comments will appear in the tooltip when the mouse is hovered over the held seat.

Freeing Seats While Selling Tickets

Create a Buy List.
Click here to learn how to create a Buy List. Once the Buy List is complete click Seat Selection tab in the Orders window.

Click here for a detailed description of this window and it's functions.
Select the held seats to free.

To sell the held seats, hold <CTRL> (Windows) or <OPTION> (Mac) and select the seats to sell them directly.
The seats will now appear in the shopping cart.
The seats are now available to be sold. If the seats are released, the seats will not return to their previous hold status.

Diataxis:

How To

Festival Seating - Holding and Releasing Seats

Seats can be held on a performance basis (or group of performances). We recommend using this feature as an alternative to selling the seats to a specified house account.

To hold seats for festival seating, you perform the following steps:

Open the Play Setup Window.
Find the play you wish to release tickets for.
Select the Performance Tab.
Select the performance(s) you wish to hold tickets for and Add the setup window.
On the right side, enter the number of seats that you wish to hold.
Click the Save button at the top of the window and then close the window.

Releasing Held Seats in a Festival Seating Performance

Open the Play Setup Window.
Find the play you wish to release tickets for.
Select the Performance Tab.
Select the performance(s) you wish to release tickets for and Add the setup window.
On the right side, reduce the number of seats that are held by the amount that you wish to release.
Click the Save Button at the top of the window and then close the window.

Diataxis:

How To

Holding Seats in a Venue Map

Holding seats allows for placing a restriction on the seats within the venue without having to assign or sell the seat to a patron. Often seats need to be held for a reserved seating performance prior to tickets going on sale to the general public. Examples of holds would be:

there are promoter, artist, media or complimentary tickets negotiated within the contract
the venue requires house seats to assist with potential issues arising the night of the show
sight lines prevent seats from being sold
space is needed in the venue for a sound board, lighting board or video equipment
accessible seating for patrons who require such seating
seats in a particular section will be held and released based on demand or audience size
social distancing is required

Seats can be held in venue map and are applied to events built using that map. The steps below outline how to hold seats in a venue map:

Locate and open the Venue.
For details on how to locate a venue please click here. To open a venue select it from the list and click the Open button at the top of the window or double click on the venue in the list.
Open the desired Map.
Locate the map in the right column. Select the map and click the Open button at the bottom of the list or double click on it to open the map.
Select the Graphic Map tab.
Highlight the seats to be held.
Highlight the seats to be held by clicking and dragging the mouse over the seats. Multiple seats in different sections can be selected by holding down the Shift key on the keyboard. Selected seats will appear as a solid blue.
Click the Lock to hold the seats.
The hold seats lock is located on the left side of the Graphic Map tab. The button may be below the default window size. Resize the window to see this option.
Choose the desired hold letter.
Pick a hold letter to be applied to the selected seats.

Once the hold letter is selected the seats will be held with that letter on the map. All holds appear as lower case letters on the map. Changing the hold colour can be done in the Box Office tab of Systems Preferences by a Master User.

Held Seats in the Graphic Map Tab