If you sell tickets at the box office right before showtime, you can use the Walkup Sales page in order to record sales in a streamlined manner and serve patrons more quickly. Access the Walkup Sales page by logging into Audience1st with a privilege level of “Walkup Sales’” or higher, clicking the Front of House tab, and then clicking the Walkup Sales button.
The Walkup Sales page assumes that you do not have time to collect identifying information (such as names and email addresses) for walkup patrons. All purchases recorded through the Walkup Sales page are allocated to a patron named “Walkup Customer,” a fictitious placeholder user that cannot be deleted. Furthermore, walkup transactions are marked to distinguish them from advance sales transactions so that settlement reports based on night-of-show sales can be easily generated.
When Not to Use the Walkup Sales Page
Sometimes it is appropriate to briefly leave the Walkup Sales page even though you are processing a transaction for a walkup patron at the box office just before showtime.
If you specifically want to tie the walkup sale to a specific patron, then you should not use the Walkup Sales page. For example, suppose a patron comes to the theater throughout the season and buys tickets at the door each time. You may want the purchases to all be tied to the one patron so that in the future you might reach out to them about becoming a subscriber. In this case, you would leave the Front of House tab to record the transaction in the same way you would complete a sale for a patron by telephone. See this article.
If a patron arrives at the box office without a ticket or reservation, but they do have an unused subscription voucher or other open voucher such as a comp, you can apply that voucher and check them in if there are still seats available and your policy allows this. You will need to leave the Walkup Sales page to find the patron’s open voucher and redeem it. See this article.
How to Make Walkup Sales
Click the Front of House tab and then the Walkup Sales button to access the Walkup Sales page. Make sure the show and performance date are correct; use the dropdown list to change as necessary. Below the show and date you will see the front of house dashboard totals.
Below the dashboard totals, the Walkup Sales page is divided into two columns. In the left column you will see a list of all voucher types associated with this performance that can be sold through the Walkup Sales page. These can include different categories of seating and also nonticket items such as concessions. (When a voucher type is set up, the box office manager can indicate whether that voucher type is allowed to be sold to walkup patrons or not.)
To record a walkup purchase, simply select the correct performance date, then select the numbers of tickets or nonticket items of each type, and optionally add an additional donation.
Then, in the column on the right, you enter payment:
- To accept a cash payment, take the patron’s money, select “Cash or Zero-Revenue”, and then click the “Record Cash Payment or Zero Revenue Transaction” button. (“Zero revenue” is mentioned because the Walkup Sales page allows you to issue comps. This is not advised, however, because then you have no way to track who used the comp.)
- To accept a check, select Check as the payment method, optionally enter the check number or other details, and click the “Record Check Payment” button.
- To accept a credit card payment if you do not have a swipe reader, select Credit Card as the payment method, enter the credit card information (CVV code in the red field, followed by first and last name, card number, and expiration date), and click the “Charge Credit Card” button.
- To accept a credit card payment if you do have a a card swipe reader, you must still manually enter the CVV code in the red field (since this code number is not present on the magnetic stripe). Then swipe the credit card through the reader to record the charge.
The front of house dashboard, including walkup sales and available seats, is updated after every walkup sale.
Recovering From Errors
If you make an error on the Walkup Sales page, such as selling a ticket for the wrong performance or making a walkup sale when you meant to sell a ticket on behalf of a specific patron, you can click the “Whoops, I Made a Mistake” button to find the transaction with the mistake and fix it.
If the erroneous transaction did not include reserved seating tickets, you will be able to transfer the sale to the correct performance with just a few clicks. If reserved seating was involved, however, you will need to refund the sale and start over in order to transfer the sale to a different performance.
Walkup Sales Report
The Walkup Sales report shows the total walkup sales broken down by payment method, so you can reconcile the box office cash drawer at close of box office.