Selling More Than a Ticket

How Order Fields Work in Eventact

Most events offer more than just tickets. A conference may include early-bird and standard tickets, a gala dinner, workshop tracks, airport transfers, hotel accommodations, and a city tour. Attendees select and pay for these options, and expect them to appear on their confirmation.

In Eventact, this involves two steps: first, define your offerings in the pricelist, then configure an order field on the registration form to determine how attendees select them.

This article explains both steps and reviews the available order field options, so you can choose the most appropriate configuration for your event.

Part 1: The Pricelist Is Where You Describe What You Sell

The pricelist belongs to the event. It is where you define everything an attendee can order before anyone fills in a form.

Categories

Everything you sell is organized by category, and the category shapes the vocabulary and the behavior around it:

The Four Levels: Category, Group, Item, Part

The pricelist is structured in four levels. The first level is always used, while the fourth is optional and rarely needed.

• Category: The nine categories listed above. It sets the vocabulary and the behavior of everything beneath it.
• Group: Related items that attendees choose between. For accommodation, a group is typically a hotel; for other categories, it may be "Day tours," "Registration fees," or "Airport transfers." Groups are important because an order field usually references a single group, presenting its items for selection. Each group represents a distinct decision point.
• Item: The individual product or service inside the group. In a hotel group, the items are the rooms — "Double room", "Single room, city view". In a tours group, each tour is an item. This is the level an attendee normally picks from.
• Item Part: The sub-components that make up an item. Every item has at least one part. For simple items, there is only one part, which is not visible and does not require separate pricing.

An item with multiple parts is considered composite and is assembled from sub-components. The part type determines which sub-components can be ordered together:

A fifth type, Upgrade, behaves like a supplement at the item level but is mutually exclusive — it renders as a radio button, so at most one upgrade is allowed per ordered item.

The base is normally taken at quantity 1 and shown as a radio button. Only if the base part's own quantity limits allow a range does the form offer a quantity selector for it.

Optional is the part type the Suggested item for the Pax order type works with on the registrant's behalf: it takes a base and adds Optional parts until the group's adults, children, and infants are covered — which is how a room gets proposed for a family without anyone working out the occupancy by hand. In the sub-option order types, Optional parts are not hidden; they are listed among the extras alongside the supplements, and the registrant picks them like any other add-on.

The attendee chooses everything else. The base is mandatory, so the only choice is which base to select. An item with sub-options, its per-attendee and per-day variants, and a Suggested item for the Pax display the parts; a Standard item treats the item as a package without individual part selection.

For example, a room described as "double for two adults, plus a child, with a sea view" consists of one item and three parts: the base, one optional part, and one supplement.

Each part is individually priced and tracked:

• Its own price, per price plan and currency
• Its own block, and how many units of that block one order consumes
• Its own tax treatment, for cases where VAT does not apply to part of a service

What You Define in the Pricelist

This is where the commercial rules live. Some sit on the item, some on the item part — but all are decided here, not on the form:

• Price: Up to three price columns, plus net price so that you can hold a published price and an internal or net figure side by side.
• Price plans (tariffs): The same item at different prices across different periods (e.g., early-bird until March, standard after). The registration date automatically selects the right plan.
• Promo codes: Codes that unlock an item, discount it, or both.
• Blocks: How many units you actually have. A block is a named, sized pool of inventory (e.g., Bus A — 20 seats, Hotel Rex negotiated rate — 40 rooms). One block can feed several items, which is ideal when selling a single room allocation at three different rates. Eventact counts down as orders come in and stops selling when the block is exhausted. A block can hold one size for the whole event, a size per day, or a size per date range.
• Item parts: The sub-components of a composite item, each with its own price, block, availability, and tax treatment.
• Quantity limits: The minimum and maximum number of a part one person may take, set directly on the part.
• Availability rules: Who may see the item, governed by participant group or by a condition on their registration data.
• Capacity details: For items that hold people: how many adults, children, and infants each part covers. This defines the total occupancy of a composite item and feeds the group filtering logic on the form.
• Elements: The individual, assignable physical units behind an item: specific room numbers, flight seat numbers, or bus places. While an order reserves capacity from a block, elements represent the exact unit an attendee is placed into. For a full breakdown of how to configure units, manage assignments, and handle rooming lists, see our dedicated guide to Unit-Level Control.
• Sharing details: A flag that lets an order capture an extra text detail, most often the name of the person sharing a room.

Blocks control inventory, and price plans determine pricing and timing. Set both in the pricelist, not on the form. When the pricelist is configured correctly, the registration form only needs to collect attendee choices.

Part 2: The Order Field Is How Attendees Choose

To enable attendees to place orders, add the appropriate order field for each category to the registration form. Match each field to its corresponding category to ensure accurate wording, defaults, and item selection. For example, a Ticket order field presents ticket options, while a Hotel order field presents room options.

The Category Fields

You can include as many order fields as needed. For example, a conference form may have separate fields for registration fees, workshops, dinners, and hotel accommodations, each linked to a specific pricelist group and placed on the appropriate page.

The Other Order Fields

Four additional order fields serve specialized functions. Default order, Seat select, and Special price order have their own settings; Membership order follows standard configuration except where noted:

The legacy Basic order field contains only three settings: category, pricelist group, and price column. The category fields above fully supersede it.

Part 3: Every Option on an Order Field, and What It Actually Does

Pricelist Source

Select the group containing the items you wish to offer. If set to "All," attendees will first select a group and then an item, which is useful when offering multiple hotels or tour days within a single field.

The advanced filter lets you narrow groups by folder using registration tokens, so cohorts like delegates and speakers can see tailored groups within the same field.

Order Type

This setting determines the structure of the question asked on the form. Labels adopt the category vocabulary automatically (e.g., Standard room on a Hotel field vs. Standard ticket on a Ticket field); the generic wording is used below:

Begin with Standard item. Adopt complex types only when required by your operational workflows.

Selection Limit

Controls how many different items a registrant may select:

• Single item (radio): Restricts selection to one item from the group, rendered as radio buttons. Common for registration tiers, hotel rooms, or transfers.
• Multiple different items (checkboxes): Allows selecting multiple distinct items, rendered as checkboxes. Ideal for optional workshops or excursion tracks.

The limit applies to how many different items, not to how many units. A registrant restricted to a single item may still order several units of it — three copies of the same workshop ticket, say — whenever the order type and the quantity limits on the item part permit it. Use the item part's minimum and maximum, or the field's total unit limits below, if you need to cap the units as well.

Quantity

Determines how unit quantities are established:

• Within price list limits for each item: The attendee selects the quantity. The system enforces minimum and maximum limits configured on the item parts.
• Calculated based on group composition: Derived automatically from the party, with checkboxes to include Adults, Children, and Infants. Registering two adults and one child automatically books three dinner covers from a single selection, preventing under-ordering. Available for Standard item and Item with sub-options — the per-person and per-day order types already work through the group.

Total unit limits enforce a field-level minimum and maximum cap across all selected items combined. This cap appears only under attendee-selected quantity mode, and only for the order types that enforce it: Standard item, Item per attendee, Item with sub-options per attendee, and Daily item per attendee. Switching to group composition clears it. Per-item, per-unit limits remain on the item part.

Conditional quantity settings appear only when relevant:

• Quantity per day: Daily ceiling for Daily item per attendee.
• Maximum penalty: Caps cumulative penalty scores assigned to item parts in the pricelist, limiting less-than-ideal suggestions. Shown only for Suggested item for the Pax.
• Maximum options: Limits the total number of suggested room/item packages displayed by Suggested item for the Pax.

Sharing

For items flagged for sharing in the pricelist (such as twin rooms shared by colleagues), this setting controls attendee data collection:

• Optional as defined in the price list: The sharing text field appears for flagged items; attendees may leave it empty.
• Required as defined in the price list: The text field must be completed before the registrant can proceed.
• Off: Disables sharing input across all items in the field.

The pricelist flag is the gate, and this setting only narrows it. If an item is not flagged for sharing, no text input ever appears for it — setting the field to Required will not produce one. When an expected sharing box is missing, fix it on the item in the pricelist, not here.

Information to Show

Controls contextual metadata displayed alongside items:

• Group description / Item description: Renders descriptive copy entered in the pricelist.
• Available quantity: Shows remaining block capacity to drive booking urgency. Visible only under Standard item.
• Group and price plan selection: Allows attendees to toggle between groups and price plans. Visible under Suggested item for the Pax.
• Assigned seat / Assigned room: Displays assigned physical element labels (e.g., "Room 304", "Seat 12B") on attendee summaries and confirmations once allocated.
• Price: Toggles price visibility and selects the source column: Price, Price 2, Price 3, Net Price, or Total Price.

Options

• Enable promotion codes: Adds a promo code entry box directly to the field.
• Allow users to add notes: Adds an open free-text input to the order line. For structured data collection that requires reporting, use dedicated form fields instead.

Order Dates: Where a Field Gets Its Calendar Dates

Every order line carries date parameters. The Order dates setting specifies where these dates originate:

Referencing dates from other fields ensures registration integrity. For example, tying an airport transfer to Use accommodation check-in automatically matches pickup to hotel arrival. On a Hotel field, the three accommodation options are greyed out, so a hotel order cannot reference itself, and Form default dates is not offered.

When the date source is Fixed or Let the user choose dates, the field displays start and end dates — check-in and check-out on a Hotel field, which also offers Earliest check-in and Latest check-out so bookings stay within contracted periods.

How daily order types get their days: This setting also supplies the calendar for Daily item with sub-options and Daily item per attendee, and it is the only setting that does — there is no separate day list to maintain. Once the field resolves its date range (whether from event dates, fixed dates, an attendee date picker, or another field), it renders one row per day across that span, endpoints included. A workshop field using event dates of June 3–6 will display four daily rows. Each resulting order line is stamped with its specific calendar date, allowing meal passes or shuttles to be counted and reported day by day.

Regardless of the date source, Show date in summary determines whether these dates appear in the attendee's order summary.

Customize Prompts

Eventact automatically labels selectors using the category vocabulary:

Default labels are localized automatically on multilingual forms. Custom text overrides must be translated manually across all active event languages.

Filtering for Groups

For multi-attendee registrations, group filtering controls which items appear based on party headcount:

• Group composition source: Select Off, Use Pax data (from form Group fields), or Use numeric fields.
• Capacity details implication:
  • Not applicable: Ignores capacity limits.
  • Information: Displays item capacity without restricting choice.
  • Item must match group: Restricts options strictly to items whose capacity equals the headcount.
  • Item must contain group: Offers items that can accommodate the party size or larger.

The same source feeds the Calculated based on group composition quantity mode described above.

Showing the Field to the Right People

Order fields support conditional display rules:

• Visible rule: Evaluated on page render against participant type, role, previous responses, or contact records (e.g., showing gala fields exclusively to VIPs).
• Same page show/hide: Dynamically exposes or hides the field in real time based on another field selection on the same page.
• Validation rule: Enforces mandatory conditions before form progression.

Rule scope note: Visibility rules govern the entire field. To filter individual items within a shared field, configure participant availability rules directly in the pricelist.

How Does Eventact Price Accommodation Across Dates?

Dates establish the order duration. Cost calculations are governed at the item part level via two configuration flags: Multiply the price by the quantity ordered and Multiply the price by the number of days:

Because the flags sit on the part, one item can combine several pricing structures: a room at 120 per night for three nights, an extra bed at 25 per night, and a one-time 30 late checkout totals:

(3 × 120) + (3 × 25) + 30 = 465

Each component is itemized separately.

Duration is calculated as check-out minus check-in (3rd to 6th = 3 nights). The duration includes last day flag adds 1 day, turning 3rd to 6th into 4 days. Accommodation parts default to the nights behavior (flag off); parts created under other categories — tickets, attractions, transportation, activities, other — have the flag turned on by default, because a conference ticket valid from the 3rd to the 6th covers four full days.

Inventory consumption remains separate from financial calculations: each part explicitly declares how many inventory units it deducts from its assigned block.

Invoices, Confirmations, and Downstream Reporting

Composite items are billed with each part as an independent line item, each with its own unit rate, total amount, and VAT classification. Lines remain grouped under the parent order item:

• Duration is reflected in the line total, not the quantity: A room booked for three nights at 120 per night renders with quantity 1 and amount 360.
• Document labeling: Confirmation summaries, payment summaries, and the back-office order view identify rows by part name (Double room, Extra bed). Standard system invoices list group, item, price plan, and dates.

This separation is deliberate. Keeping room and breakfast on separate rows lets them carry different VAT rates, draw from different inventory blocks, and report independently — all of which a single merged price would forfeit.

Three Recipes

• Conference registration fee: Ticket order field → registration group → Standard ticket, single selection limit, display as Total Price, promo codes enabled. Date-driven price plans automatically handle early-bird transitions. The registrant ends up with one line on the confirmation — the fee at whichever tariff their registration date fell into, with no early-bird bookkeeping on your side.
• Gala dinner for family registrations: Ticket order field → dinner group → Standard ticket, quantity set to Calculated based on group composition with adults and children enabled. Guarantees headcounts match total party size in a single click. The confirmation shows a single dinner line whose quantity already equals the party headcount — three covers for two adults and a child.
• Conference hotel accommodations: Hotel order field → hotel group → Suggested room for the Pax, group composition set to Use Pax data, capacity implication set to Room must contain group, maximum options set to 3, sharing marked Required. Generates optimal room combinations fitting party size while securing rooming list details. The confirmation itemizes the room and each chosen supplement as separate rows, with the night count already folded into every row amount — so a three-night stay reads as quantity 1 at 360, not 3 at 120.