Returning or exchanging tickets by the buyer
You can set the return and exchange policy on your site, so the buyer can manage their own tickets and return, exchange or upgrade their tickets in accordance to the policy that you determine and paying the potential fee that you set.
Having a good exchange policy is actually highly recommended as exchanges do not allow returns. The buyer can exchange their tickets, only with the same number or more tickets at the same price or higher price. If they exchange their tickets with less expensive tickets, they will lose money and won't get any refund.
The exchange and return policy can be set for each event by editing the event. The buyer can log in to their account and from the menu at the top exchange or return their tickets, in accordance and if allowed by your policy, in a fully self-service manner.
Returning tickets by the administrator or the sales staff
You as the administrator or any sales staff with the right permission can return or exchange tickets and refund money anytime regardless of your returns policy. Returning tickets will void the issued tickets, make them available for sell again, refunds customers money and send them a "Return confirmation" email.
The money can either be refunded to buyer's credit card or credited to their account as "Store credit". If "Store Credit" is chosen, the specified amount will be credited to the user account and they can use this credit to make purchases on your site. It is a good option when the buyer wants to exchange their tickets.
- To do so, login to your website as admin or a sales agent with "Return Permission" and find the invoice that you want to make a return for. Invoices can be found from different areas of the site or Control Panel > Box Office > Find Invoice / Ticket Pickup
- Find the "Invoice" you are looking for by using the filters. You may need to change the from/to date range and hit the Refresh button to see the invoice. Select the proper Invoice by clicking on the icon to see the invoice details.
- To make full refund and return all the tickets in an invoice, from the "Invoice Actions" menu, select "Void Invoice"
- To return some tickets or make partial refund, check the checkbox in the "Return" column for all the tickets that you want to return.
- Then click on the 'Return selected items' below the table.
- A pop up shows up with the return information. You can move the pop up around by dragging the header section of the pop up and check the return checkbox for more tickets to add them to the return list.
- Select the refund method. You can choose either "Store credit", or "Return to their credit card".
- The pop up will indicate the return amount.
- If you are granted the permission to "Give Discount", you will be able to modify the return amount at this point. You can make a "Full Refund" which will refund the ticket face price + the service charge, or you can just return the face price by selecting "Ticket price (not including service charge) " or "Ticket price minus return service charge" which will consider the non-refundable fees and return fees as you specified in the event return policy settings, or you can refund a custom amount just by editing the "Return Price" box.
- Click on the "Return" button
- A confirmation email will be sent to the customer confirming the return of tickets.
Exchanging tickets, switching seats, upgrading, changing to a different date
The easiest method to offer exchanges, is to set the proper exchange policy for your events and so the buyer can login to their account and exchange / upgrade the tickets from the "User menu > Tickets > Exchange Tickets". This method does not offer any refund or money-back and is fully self-service.
However, you as the administrator, can also help buyers with exchanges and potentially make exceptions to your exchange policy.
To exchange tickets for a buyer, you have 3 options.
Option 1 (The buyer will choose and purchase the new tickets): Return the tickets for full refund (make sure to include the service charges) to the buyer's store credit account and ask the buyer to purchase the tickets using the store credit. They will receive the store credit on the checkout page.
Option 2 (You will choose and purchase the new tickets): Similar to when you want to return tickets, find and open the invoice and check the box next to all the tickets that you want to exchange. Then click on the 'Exchange selected items' at the bottom of the table. The tickets will get added to the exchange list of your shopping cart. Then proceed to adding the replacement tickets to your shopping cart. You can either use the POS page or the regular purchase page. On the checkout page, the balance from the exchanged tickets will show up. If you are upgrading tickets or buying more tickets you will have to pay the remaining balance, otherwise simply click on the reserve button. When you checkout, the old tickets will get refunded and replaced with new tickets. In this method, no refund is issued and if you downgrade the tickets, the buyer will not receive any refunds for downgrade. Behind the scene, a 'Return Invoice' and a 'Sales Invoice' in generated.
Option 3: Return the original tickets for $0 and purchase the new tickets for them at 100% at $0.
Managing and reporting store credits
You can report each buyer's history and balance from Control Panel > Reports > User History or from Control Panel > Account and Settings > User Manager, by clicking on the 'History & Balance' icon in the table next to the user's name.
You can adjust a buyer's store credit balance by recording a payment to or from them. Go to Control Panel > Account and Settings > User Manager and click on the 'Make / Receive Payment' icon in the table next to the user's name.
You can report all users' balances from Control Panel > Reports > User Balances.
Notes:
Ticketor gives you credit for the fees when you refund the tickets back to the buyer's credit card, however most payment processors do not refund your fee. Some may even charge for the refund transactions.
You can also consider refunding the tickets for Store Credit so the buyer can use the credit to purchase tickets to your other events so you avoid all payment processor fees.
If you refund a ticket, the Ticketor fee will only get refunded as credit to your account which can be used toward your further bills. Ticketor does not refund the fees back to your credit card or PayPal and does not issue refund checks.
Notes about exchanging tickets:
When you exchange tickets, the new tickets are purchased using store credit. Meaning that if later you decide to return the new tickets, they can only be refunded toward store credit and not back to credit card. If you need to refund to credit card, first return the tickets for store-credit. Then refund the money from your payment processor dashboard. Then record the payment in the user manager so the user balance becomes zero.
Exchange is designed with certain restrictions to make sure the event organizer does not lose money or it cannot be used as partial refund. For example, if the buyer exchanges a $100 ticket for a $10 tickets, they lose the remaining $90 and do not receive any credit or refund. Similarly, if the buyer exchanges a $100 ticket with 2 * $50 tickets, the $100 only covers the cost of one ticket and the buyer has
