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Booking statuses explained

Definition of complete booking, checkout booking and cancelled booking

Anni avatar
Written by Anni
Updated yesterday

A booking can hold one of three statuses - Complete, Checkout and Cancelled. For the "Attendance status" from your bookings tab, there's also Owes.

This article covers:


Complete

Attendance status screen showing a ticked 'checkout' checkbox

A booking is marked as complete once the customer finishes the following within the checkout period:

For free events: The customer completes any required fields in the booking form and selects Continue.

For paid events: The customer completes any required fields in the booking form, and either pays online or agrees to pay later, then selects Complete Booking.

Once completed, the customer can view the Booking Complete page and will receive a confirmation email.

💡 To note: The system will send the confirmation email, which includes the booking reference number, to the customer, attendees, and admins only once the booking is complete.

In your Bookings tab overview, any bookings with the "Complete" status will show additional payment details:

Bookings list with the payment information highlighted

Here’s how the details next to the booking reference are shown:

Paid offline + amount: The total is above zero, the checkout is via offline payment, and the payment is recorded to mark the booking as paid.

Owes + amount: The total is above zero, checkout is via offline payment, but no payment is recorded, indicating an outstanding payment from the booker.

Paid + amount: The total is above zero, and checkout is via online payment.

No additional information: The total is zero, which may indicate:


Checkout

When a customer selects the Book now button on the public pages, the booking enters the checkout phase. During this phase, we hold the spot(s) for the customer. The reservation lasts for the 'checkout reservation period,' which you can adjust in your Booking preferences. If the booking is abandoned, it will still show as 'checkout.

💡 Important: If a customer completes the booking form but hasn't paid or agreed to manual payment, the booking will show as checkout on your overview page. These bookings are considered incomplete, don't count towards available spots, and Bookwhen won't send any emails at this stage.

Dashboard screen with an arrow pointing at the 'Checkout' tab


Completing a booking on behalf of a customer

You can 'force complete' a checkout booking by selecting Complete this booking under Options within the booking:

Screenshot of booking with an arrow pointing at the 'Complete this booking' option under 'Options', highlighting to users where to click to complete the booking on behalf of the customer.

This forces the booking into a "Completed" status. If payment is required, it will be marked as 'Pay later.'

However, this may not be possible if:

  • The event password hasn't been entered,

  • The booking form isn't filled out, or

  • The ticket allocation form is incomplete.

In these cases, the customer must complete the booking again.


Cancelled

A booking can be cancelled by the customer, attendee, or you (the admin) according to the cancellation rules as defined in the booking preferences. We will send a cancellation email to the customer, attendees, and admin users.

Once you or the customer cancels a booking, the places will be released to people on the waiting list and then the public (if you have this enabled).​

Similar to "Completed", there are different information for bookings with the attendance status "Cancelled" on your bookings overview, as in the example below:

Status underneath the booking reference:

  • Cancelled: All tickets within the booking or the entire booking was cancelled (only possible for admins).

  • Complete: Some tickets within the booking were either cancelled or transferred.

    • To note: transferred tickets will show "cancelled" for the original ticket.

Details next to the booking reference:

  • Amount + refund: Cancelled ticket(s) and "overpaid" amount from the booker. Potential approaches:

  • Owes + amount: Typically indicates a booking with at least one transferred ticket to one of a higher value, showing the difference as "to pay" within the booking.


Owes

From your bookings overview, bookings with the attendance status "Owes" typically indicate either bookings completed via offline payment and no payment recorded yet or where at least one ticket was transferred to one of a higher value.

In the case of bookings with offline payment, the booking total would show as "to pay", whereas if a transfer to a ticket of a higher value was involved, it would be the difference.


💬 Any questions or feedback? There are two ways to get in touch:

Thank you! 🕺

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