Request for alternativ waiting list workflow and handling

[Anonymous]

Hello,

i’d like to have some thoughts on the waiting list and a alternative workflow for that.

Our Situation: We have an event, that requires a waiting list because of high attention but limited seats. Problem is, that some number of people register to the event, but do not pay. So this seats are blocked for people on the waiting list. So we decided:

Before we decided to work with EME, our manual workflow was the following – who pays first got the place (not the order of registration):
1. People register to an event and were set to the waiting list
2. People pay and get moved of the waiting list.
3. If event is full, people could move up from waiting list in order of incoming payments

After kick off our event registration with EME (which makes it much easier to track with payment gateways) we noticed, that waiting list may need some improvement to that behavior. Because registered but unpayed user block seats for users on the waiting list who already have payed.

So it may be usefull to give the possibility to use the workflow i describet above, until seats are full. If payed seats get canceled, people can move off the waiting list in order of incoming payments. This also needs to know the point in time of payment – for automatic or manual move off.

Also important for our attendees on the waiting list (if seats are full) to know is, on which position they are (which is dependent on the point of payment). May there be a placeholder for emailing or sorting for [eme_bookings]? (In generell we like to sort on _FIELD{XX}, because we have participants of different groups which we like to lign out – but i can open a separate request for that^^).

So far, thanks for the great tool. 🙂

Kind regards!

[Franky]

Waiting list is not meant for that, it is for “overbookings”.
You describe exactly what EME is doing using “pending bookings”. So go in your RSVP settings for an event and require approval for bookings. After payment, you can approve them. And the waiting list kicks in if all seats are taken and you can move people of the waiting list as you see fit.

[Anonymous]

Yes we handled that so far. But if people are on waiting list we can not decide which one to move off the list first, because we cannot see the payment time/date. We must look up manually the transaction and find out who was first. Maybe this could be implemented to show up/sort somewhere in the backend?

Thanks!

[Franky]

You can show/hide the booking date/time in the registration table overview … is that not what you’re looking for?

[Anonymous]

No that’s not what we’re looking for. This only shows the sign-up date, not the pay date. Mention this:

A signs up on 1st. B signs up on 3rd and pay on 3rd and get booked. A pays on 5th and get booked on 5th. If B’s seat was the last, A has to be placed on the waiting list. C will book on 4th and pay on 4th. C is placed on the waiting list, also.

Later, B cancel its booking. We need to decide, who on waiting list will move off first. This is determind by time of pay (at least for us). So C will get the seat, not A, which signed up earlier.

This handling may be unusual, but we and our community define this more fair than decide by registration date. (Background: we are a non profit club and must assure, that we get payed first. This avoids misuse of sign-ups and blocking seats).

Thanks and kind regards 🙂

[Franky]

Well, what I *can* do is indicate also the time of payment in the columns, that should help for everyone …
While I’m at it, I’ll add the option to send a mail after payment has been received or booking has been set to paid.

[Anonymous]

That would be nice and will help us!
Thanks so far 🙂

[Author]

Posts