Managing Bookings
Create and update bookings, understand holds and confirms, move slots, and record attendance.
Overview
A booking reserves a member into an event at a selected price (and optionally a resource and time slot).
Staff can book on behalf of members from the admin dashboard. Members can book themselves through the member website and app when the event is member-visible and there is an eligible price for them. API users can create and manage bookings using the Bookings API.
Booking confirmation will create an invoice and consume benefits, like a credit pack. See Pricing and eligibility for how benefits are consumed when the booking confirms.
How a booking moves through Members
- Create an event (and optional hosts, location, resources, and cancellation policy).
- Define price rules. Essentially, these are the different ticket options for the event. For a given member, Members evaluates which options are available based on their entitlements.
- Create a booking for a member, slot, and price rule. The booking starts as held while payment or confirmation completes, and the selected price rule is locked on the booking.
- If the event is free, the booking is confirmed immediately. If the event is paid, the booking is held for a short time to allow payment to complete.
- When the booking is confirmed, an invoice is created, and benefit deductions consume benefit balances.
- At the time of the event, staff can record attendance.
- Staff or the member can cancel their booking. Depending on the cancellation policy, this may refund or charge a fee.
Booking statuses
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Held | Temporary reservation (10 minutes by default) to allow payment to complete. Counts toward active capacity to avoid overbooking. Held bookings are released if payment does not complete before the hold expires. |
| Confirmed | Firm place. Attendance can be recorded. |
| Cancelled | Cancelled under policy or by staff override. |
| Expired | Held booking that timed out without confirmation. |
Active capacity (event, slot, and resource) counts held and confirmed bookings. Held bookings only temporarily count towards capacity to avoid overbooking.
Create a booking
Open the event or the booking sheet
Pick the event from the calendar and Add a booking. In the list view, a quick book 'Add a booking' button is shown.
Choose the time slot (and resource if needed)
If the event has time slots, choose a start time from the list. Each time slot shows how many places are left and whether it is still bookable.
On events with capacity set by resources, you can also explicitly choose a resource from the list, or leave it blank to auto-allocate the first available linked resource.
Staff can override capacity restrictions by toggling the Override switch.
Choose the ticket/price
Select a price option from the list. Price options which are not available for the selected member will be greyed out. There may be multiple price options available to the member for the same event, for example a regular price and a discounted price that consumes a benefit.
We make an effort to streamline the booking process to optimize conversions. If there is only one price option avaialble, it will be selected automatically.
See Pricing and eligibility for more information on how price options are evaluated. Staff can override pricing restrictions by toggling the Override switch.
Confirm the booking
Click Confirm booking to create the booking. The booking typically starts as held while payment or confirmation completes, then moves to confirmed (or expired / cancelled). The booking will be confirmed immediately if monetary payment is not required.
If the booking is held, you will have 10 minutes to complete the payment. If the payment is not completed before the hold expires, the booking will be cancelled and the capacity will be released.
Find and filter bookings
You can see bookings in multiple places:
- In the event page, on the Bookings tab.
- On a member profile, on the Bookings tab.
- On a resource page, on the Bookings tab.
Manage a booking
Move or reassign
You can move or reassign a booking to another event or resource. This is useful for schedule changes without cancelling and rebooking from scratch.
- Move to another time slot during the same event
- Move to a different resource during the same event
- Move to a different occurrence of the same event in the series
You cannot move a booking to a completely different event. For this, cancel the booking, issuing a credit note if necessary, and creating a new booking in the new event.
For API users, you can move or reassign a booking using the Update Booking endpoint.
Cancel a booking
Staff can cancel a booking at any time, including after the event has started. Cancel usually follows the cancellation policy. Staff can override the policy when an exception is needed, for example a full refund after the usual deadline.
If the event has already started, mark the booking as a no-show instead of cancelling. That keeps attendance accurate and still applies the relevant policy for fees or refunds.
Members can only cancel their own bookings within the policy rules. They cannot override cancellation fees or refunds.
Record attendance
For a confirmed booking, mark attendance as attended or no-show from the booking details. You can clear a mark later if it was set by mistake.
Use no-show when the member did not attend. For no-show fees and how settlement works, see Cancellation policies. If you bill a no-show fee on a separate invoice, you can link that invoice on the booking so it stays visible next to the original booking invoice.
Member self-serve
When an event is member-visible, members can browse eligible events and manage their own bookings in the member website and app. They use the same booking flow as staff, but without override: they cannot book over capacity, skip price eligibility, or settle a cancel outside the policy.
Staff override
When creating or updating a booking in the admin dashboard, turn on Override to:
- Book when the slot or resource is already at capacity
- Offer a price option the member would not normally qualify for
Override does not allow booking on a cancelled event, using an unknown price, or booking a resource outside its open hours. On events with linked resources, choose a resource when override is on (unless the booking already has one assigned).
Members booking themselves in the member website and app never get staff override.