Issuing gift certificates as event credit to your ticket buyers

Whilst ticket buyers who purchased tickets to events that have been cancelled or postponed are entitled to a refund under consumer law, you may wish to offer a credit for future performances as an alternative.

TryBooking offers the ability to issue gift certificates to ticket buyers, who are then able to use this credit for future performances. You will then issue the gift certificate to the ticket buyer using a 100% Gift Certificate Promotion Code.

This article takes you through:

1. Create gift certificates for store credit
2. Create a gift certificate promotion code
3. Using a gift certificate promotion code to issue credit to your customer

Create Gift Certificates for store credit

There is no limit to the number of gift certificates you can set up on your account, allowing to you have a range of values for your patrons to choose from. You may wish to set up gift certificate per customer that you are issuing credit to, per ticket type or for common credit amounts.

To create gift certificates:

1. From the left menu, click Dashboard
2. From the left menu, click Gift certificates then click Manage gift certificates
3. Click ADD. Enter a name for your gift certificate and a value, then click OK. 
   
4. Enter or adjust the following fields:
   • Description: Suitable for providing an explanation of what the gift certificate can be redeemed against eg. Event credit for cancelled event. Redeemable on all 'Name of Your Organisation' events
   • Months of validity: By default, this is set to 12 months. You will be able to use the drop-down menu to select from 1 month up to 3 years 
   • Gift Certificate Style: The system default style will be automatically applied. Should you wish to customise your own style please see the article Gift certificate styles
   • Terms and Conditions: Add your own terms and conditions for use eg. stipulate conditions around name changes, changes around validity periods, refunds etc
     
5. Click Save and Close
6. Repeat for any additional gift certificates you wish to create

Create a Gift Certificate Promotion Code 

Gift certificate promotion codes allow you to issue a gift certificate at a reduced price but retain the value of the gift certificate to be used against events.

In this case, we'll use promotion codes to issue credits for future events without the ticket buyer needing to pay again.

To set up a promotion code for gift certificates:

1. From the left menu, click Dashboard
2. From the left menu, click Gift certificates then click Gift certificate promotion code
3. Click Add
   
4. Give the promotion code a unique name. This will appear on your reports
5. Enter in the code that is to be used on checkout to apply the discount
6. Select Yes to Percentage. 
7. Set the Value to 100%
8. Indicate the date period that the code can be used in (this is optional)
9. Set Auto apply to your preferred option. Set this field to NO. If you select YES, your customers will automatically receive the discount without needing to enter the code on checkout.
10. Set Inclusive to other promotion (discount)?  to NO
11. Click Save and close

Issue the Gift Certificate for store credit using the Gift Certificate Promotion Code

With your Gift Certificate and Gift Certificate Promotion Code created, to issue store credit, you will now purchase the Gift Certificate using the promotion code:

1. From the left menu, click Dashboard
2. From the left menu, click Gift certificates then click Buy Gift Certificate
3. Enter 1 in the Quantity field of the Gift Certificates you wish to issue to the customer, click press Next
4. No need to enter a To or From information, click Next to proceed to checkout
5. Add the Promotion Code to the shopping cart on the right hand side of the page (at the top of the page on mobile) and click Apply
6. Fill in the booking details using the ticket buyers details, and click Purchase to complete the transaction and issue the customer with their Gift Certificate