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Lesson 46 of 56

Arrival windows — staggering when guests turn up

Venue Admin

An arrival window is a time slot a buyer picks at checkout — "5:30", "6:15", "7:00" — with a share of the house reserved for it. Use them when everybody cannot sensibly walk in at once: table service before a show, a kitchen that can only turn so many covers, or a door you want to stagger.

Set the venue's defaults once, and every new event inherits them.

Setting your venue defaults

Go to AdminVenues[venue]Edit and open the Arrival Windows (Optional) card.

  1. Decide whether to switch on Require buyers to choose an arrival time. On means a buyer cannot pay until they pick a slot.
  2. Click + Add Window.
  3. Fill in Time Slot — the label the buyer sees, e.g. 5:30. It is free text, so Early seating works too.
  4. Fill in % of Capacity — the share of the event's capacity this slot may take, 1 to 100.
  5. Repeat for each slot, then click Save Arrival Windows.

The card header keeps a running Total: N% of capacity as you type, and warns (should sum to 100%) until your percentages add up. You can still save a set that does not total 100 — the warning is there to catch the common slip of leaving a slot out.

Use the trash button on a row to remove a slot.

What buyers see

On the checkout page, under Choose Your Arrival Time, each slot is a radio button showing its label and how many places are left — "12 spots left", or a red Full once the slot's share of capacity is gone. A full slot cannot be selected.

If you required a choice, a buyer who has not picked one sees "Choose an arrival time to continue" and cannot pay.

The chosen window is stored on the order and printed on the ticket, so your door staff can see which seating a guest belongs to.

Per-event overrides

The venue list is a default, not a lock. New events copy it at creation, and each event's own Arrival windows card on its edit page can change the labels, the percentages, or whether a choice is required — for one show only, without touching your venue defaults.

Capacity is split by percentage, not by a fixed number, so the same venue defaults work for a 90-seat room and a 400-seat room. Change the event's capacity and the slots resize with it.

Percentages are of the event's capacity, not of tickets sold. If you give four slots 25% each on a 100-seat house, the fourth slot stops selling at 25 — even if the first three sold nothing.

Try it yourself

Add two windows at 50% each, save, then open a test event's checkout page and confirm both appear with their remaining counts. Buy into the first one and reload — the count should drop.

Open this topic in the help center

Try it

Add two windows at 50% each, save, then open a test event's checkout page and confirm both appear with their remaining counts. Buy into the first one and reload — the count should drop.

Checkpoint

Answer all 3 questions correctly to mark this lesson complete.

  1. 1. A venue sets four arrival windows at 25% each on a 100-seat house, but the first three slots sell nothing. What happens to the fourth slot?

  2. 2. A venue admin saves a set of arrival windows that total 92%, not 100%. What happens?

  3. 3. An event created today inherits its venue's arrival windows. Can that one event's windows be changed without touching the venue defaults?