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Offline payments

How to set up offline payments and mark them as paid

Anni avatar
Written by Anni
Updated today

✨ Please note: Payments are available on the Lite plan or above.

You can offer customers the option of paying using an offline method, such as cash, bank transfer, or childcare vouchers.

This article covers:


What is an offline payment?

An offline payment is any payment made outside of an online payment provider.

For example, customers might pay using:

  • Cash on arrival

  • Bank transfer

  • Cheque

  • Childcare voucher


Setting up offline payments

To set up an offline payment option:

  1. Select Settings, then Payments from the left-hand menu on your account.

  2. Select Edit under the Payment options section, next to Offline payments:

    Payments screen with arrow pointing at an 'Edit' button

  3. Add your offline payment terms in the Instructions for offline payments field:

    Payments screen with the 'instructions for offline payments' box highlighted

    • You can use "markdown" to format your text, such as adding bold, italics, or creating lists.

  4. Tick Require payment details response from the booker? if you need customers to provide details to complete their booking.

    • For example, they might need to enter a bank transfer reference or a purchase order (PO) number for an invoice.

    • The customer then must submit some information in a mandatory field to complete the booking.

    For example:

    • To complete the booking, customers must check the box to Agree to your offline payment terms and add the additional information.

  5. Once you've finished editing your settings, select Save payment details to save them.


Option for offline and online payments

If you only accept offline payments, your payment instructions will automatically appear at checkout. However, if you add an online payment method, Bookwhen will prioritise online payments instead unless you customise this setting for individual entries.

To do this:

  1. Open your Scheduling page.

  2. Select your entry from your schedule list, then Edit entry:

    Scheduling setup with an arrow pointing to the 'Edit Entry' button.

  3. Select the Tickets & Costs tab and scroll down to the Payment options section:

    Tickets & Costs tab within the entry setup with the 'Payment options' section highlighted

  4. You can choose between:

    • Enforce online payment: Customers must pay online to complete their booking.

    • Online/offline choice: Customers can choose to pay online or offline, but not both.

    • Offline only: Customers can only pay using an offline method.

  5. Once set, select Save or Save & Exit to save your changes.

💡 Please note: If a booking includes both tickets with Enforce online payment and Offline only, customers will be given the option to choose how to pay—either online or offline. This also applies to checkouts that include tickets with the pricing set to no cost, Free ticket, or pass/membership tickets.


Recording an offline payment

Since offline payments are processed outside of Bookwhen, you’ll need to manually record the payment in your account or follow up with your customer for any outstanding payments.

As an admin user, there are two ways you can record an offline payment:


After a completed booking

Once you've received payment from a customer, you can record it on the booking. To do this:

  1. Select Bookings from the left-hand menu on your account.

  2. Use the search filters at the top and select Search to generate the search, or scroll through the list to find the booking.

  3. Once found, select the hyperlinked booking reference to open the booking:

    Bookings tab with an arrow pointing at a booking reference hyperlink.

  4. Select Record payment within the booking:

    Booking screen with the 'Record payment' section highlighted

  5. In the record payment screen, you can:

    • Enter the Paid amount

    • The date it was Received on

    • The Payment type (cash, cheque, transfer, card machine or other)

    • Any additional Notes

    Booking screen with the record payment screen highlighted

  6. Select Save once finished.

💡 If you select the Owes box in the Bookings page search bar, you can filter to display only bookings with outstanding, unrecorded payments:

Bookings page with the 'Attendance status' section highlighted


During a booking

At the final stage of the checkout, when manually booking attendees for an event, admin users can choose whether to record the payment immediately, select the payment method, and add any relevant payment notes.

💡 Even if you’ve set Enforce online payment for the entry, we’ll always show you (the admin) the option to record an offline payment during checkout.

For example:

Payment screen within the checkout process with the offline payment section highlighted

To do this:

  1. Select Yes under Record payment now?

  2. Select the Payment method, i.e.:

    • Cash

    • Cheque

    • Transfer

    • Card machine

    • Online payment

    • Other

  3. Add any notes you wish to include in the Admin note field.

    Payment screen of the checkout with the 'record payment now' section highlighted

  4. Once complete, select Complete booking.


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

Thank you! 🕺

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