A comp gives a whole box-office sale away: the tickets are issued as normal and nothing is charged — no ticket price, no fees, no sales tax, and no box office fee. Comps are off at every venue until you turn them on.
Go to AdminVenues[venue]Ticket delivery and scroll to the Box office comps card, below the box office fee. You need the Venue settings permission.
Who may issue a comp
The card has one setting, Who may issue a comp, with three choices:
| Choice | What it means |
|---|---|
| Nobody | The default. The box office has no Comp choice at all, and a comp is refused even if someone reaches the route another way. Every ticket is sold or discounted with a code |
| Venue admins only | Only your venue admins see Comp as a payment choice. Box-office staff do not |
| All box-office staff | Everyone who can sell at your box office can also give tickets away — with a reason |
Pick one and click Save. The change is live at the window immediately; nobody has to sign out.
"Venue admins only" is the usual starting point. It lets a manager hand a seat to a reviewer or fix a service problem on the spot, without putting free tickets in reach of every window shift.
What staff see, and what is always required
Once comps are on for them, Comp appears as a payment choice alongside Card, Cash, Check and Other on the box-office sale screen. A reason is always required — a comp is never recorded blank — and the reason is stored on the sale with the name of whoever issued it.
A comp is the whole sale and nothing else. It is refused, by name, if the sale also carries:
- a donation,
- add-ons or merchandise,
- a promo code,
- a gift certificate as payment,
- a membership's free tickets (use a regular sale so the membership covers them).
A comp still takes a delivery method, exactly like any other sale — the venue default unless staff pick another. If that method carries a fee, the fee is waived to $0.00 and recorded as waived with the comp's reason.
What a comp does to your money
- Revenue: nothing is collected, so a comp contributes $0 to ticket revenue, $0 in fees and $0 in tax. Your box office fee is not charged on it either.
- Attendance: the tickets are real. They are in your attendee list, they scan at the door, and they count toward capacity and sell-through.
- Reports: the order is recorded as a comp with the reason, the name of whoever issued it and the time. Reports count the tickets as issued and the money as zero; the ticket's price shows as its face value, fully discounted.
- Cash drawer and payout: a comp moves no money, so the drawer is untouched and nothing goes to the payout. If a show is heavily comped, the payout will be smaller than a full house suggests.
- Artist deals: a comp contributes nothing to gross, so a door deal or percentage split earns nothing on it. Agree comp allowances with the artist in the deal, not at the window.
Comps cannot be undone by refunding them — there is nothing to refund. To take a comped ticket back, invalidate it from the event's attendee list.
Related settings people confuse with this
- Promo codes that discount to $0 are a different thing: they are a priced sale at zero, they can be limited and tracked per code, and they work online as well as at the window. Use a code for a papering campaign; use a comp for a one-off at the desk.
- Waiving a delivery fee only removes the mail/handling fee, not the ticket price. See "Ticket Delivery Methods and the Mail Fee".
- Member free tickets are the membership paying for the seat, not you giving it away — never comp over a member's benefit.
Set the card to Venue admins only and save. Sign in at the box office as a box-office staff member and confirm Comp is not offered; sign in as a venue admin and confirm it is, and that the sale refuses to complete until you type a reason.