Creating a Ticket Confirmation Form Letter

If you need to send an email (or printed) confirmation letter to the purchaser, there is an easy invoice function right in the BUY window (and on the patron record). But if you are using it as an internal email notification, you'll need to build a Form Letter.

There is an important difference between form letters and Invoices. Form Letters (with Row Field Data) look at several records, so it will list every ticket individually. There is a row for Ticket 1, because it is Seat A-101, then there is a row for Ticket 2, because it is a different seat; Seat A-102. So each ticket will come out as a separate row.

Invoices look at the order as a whole, and can summate the contents of the order in different ways - individual tickets (or donations/Gift Certificates), or grouping them by event, series, promotion and other options.

The two items are different for a reason - you have the best of both worlds. If you want to have a summary of the order, use the Invoice and choose the appropriate summary options when you generate it. If you want a line by line listing of the tickets, use a form letter.

In Form Letters, you can add row field data which will pull data from the database and insert it in your letter "table style."

You can accomplish this by using the following steps.

Build a new Form Letter

  1. Click on the icon, and choose from the icon bar in the search window.
  2. Give the letter a name, and a folder.
  3. Choose Ticket Data Per Performance as the Data file


  4. Click

    5. You may either copy and paste your letter in here, or begin writing it directly into the word processor.


Add a Row Field Table

  1. Right click in the location where you want the Row Field table to go
    2.

    Select Insert Document Object>>Row Field




    The insert Row Field window will appear.




  2. Click the green hooked-arrow on the right side and select the first field you wish to include.
  3. Change the Column Header to something appropriate for your table (as you would like it to appear) in the final document.

    4. To add additional columns to your table, click on the

    Be sure to edit the Column Header names.




  4. In the final column (PRICE), click the box. This will total this column in your table.
  5. Click , and the table will appear in your document

    6. Adjust the column width or height as you would in any word processing program by clicking between the columns and dragging the lines left/right, or up/down. This allows you to allot more space for Event Title, and less for Row and Seat, for example.


To edit the way data is displayed:

  1. Double click on the Data Cell (for example, TicketTotalPrice)
  2. Click on the CELL tab
  3. Click MODIFY
  4. Edit the Formatting to the desired display. In this case, Currency.

    		5.

    You can also edit the formula for the calculation right here in this window. For example, you may wish to display the ticket price plus fees. Edit the PS_TOTAL_COST like you would a ticket face calculation to (PS_TOTAL_COST+ORD_TIX_ORD_FEE)

  5. Click Apply
  6. Click Apply again on the Row Field Properties window
  7. You can also edit the format of the table itself.
  8. Highlight the cells you wish to format
  9. RIGHT click (Control Click) on the cells
  10. Select the item you wish to format (Style..., Font...., Paragraph..., etc.)

Complete and save your Form Letter