Setup - Season setup - Holds

Holds

This feature allows you to put a hold on certain seats so they cannot be purchased by patrons on the public pages but can still be sold via the box office screen. You can place individual seats on hold on assigned seating, or apply general admission holds. Common hold uses include "house seats" that you save for ushers; "VIP seats" for important patrons, sponsors, etc.

Defining Your Three Hold Categories

The system has three different hold categories for assigned seating that you can specify according to your needs. These categories are universal for all shows, i.e. not specific to only a show or performance. (Categories do not apply for general admission seating.)

To establish your hold category names:

1. 1. navigate to Setup > Performances
   2. select a show with assigned seating
   3. click on the Holds link on any of the performances, the categories will appear on the top right
   4. click edit for one of the categories
   5. fill in the Name field
   6. save and repeat for other categories

Applying Holds

Applying General Admission Holds

Since General Admission seating is not specific, you can simply place a number of seats on hold on each individual performance. From the Performances setup screen, on each individual performance on a general admission show, there will be a "General Admission Holds" field where you can input the number of seats you wish to hold.

Applying Holds to an Assigned Seating Performance

1. navigate to Setup > Performances, select your show
2. click on the Holds link for the performance in question
3. select the category of holds you wish to apply
4. click the seats on the chart you wish to place on hold
5. Save at the bottom
6. Repeat for other hold categories as needed
7. You can place the same holds across all performances of that show by checking the boxes for "Entire run?" and "Yes I'm Sure", then clicking save. Be sure to check other performances for accuracy. Remember that doing this will clear any former holds placed on the other performances in favor of the new holds.

Applying Holds on the venue seating chart itself

Holds can be applied to seats on the seating chart on the venue's screen so that in the future when adding performances those seats will automatically be held. 

Please note - it is not advisable to edit a seating chart that has sales on it for upcoming performances. Please contact Client Support before making changes to an active venue.

1. Navigate to Setup > Venues
2. Click Edit Seating chart on the venue you wish to edit
3. Find the seat/cell you wish to add a hold to
4. Input an Exclamation point after the seat number in the cell, or after the period or period-number in a sequence - this will apply category A holds. You can input !B or !C to apply those hold categories instead.
5. Save the chart

Example: Holding seat A19 would look like [ A19! ] or [ A19!B ] in the seating chart cell (square brackets used to represent the cells, do not insert). In a sequence of seating you might have [ .! ] or [.-1!C], etc.

Note that if it is a wheelchair seat the exclamation and letter would be contained inside the parenthesis such as [ (A21!C) ].
Also note that if performances already exist with this venue, the holds will not automatically apply when added to the chart. They will only appear when you build NEW performances. So you will want to go manually add them to those performances, or use the "Copy holds from venue setup" button on the performances, if you wish these to replace any holds currently on the chart.

Selling Held Seats

Please note that users must have the proper permission enabled to sell held seats (see - Administrators).

Selling General Admission Holds

For a general admission show, the box office and door sales screens will include a check box to "use holds". You will check this box before you apply tickets to the order to pull the tickets from the held ticket inventory.

Selling Assigned Seating Holds

When you select seats from the seating chart for an order you will see any seats on hold as outlined by that hold category color (purple, orange, or grey). Make sure your box officers have been trained as to what each color means and how your own business rules apply.

The box officer can then select those held seats just like any other seat to sell them to a patron.

NOTE that if a held seat is selected and then released the hold is NOT restored to that seat. The system assumes that it is available to be sold to the public. If you wish it to be back on hold you will want to apply the hold again per the instructions above.