Date Ranges and Early Bird Pricing

Date ranges on your registration form are usually used to control pricing based on the date, but can also be used to control when a field option appears on the form.

 

There are two parts:

1.  Define the required date ranges you need.

2.  Apply the date ranges to one or more fields.

 

Part 1 - Define the Date Ranges

1. Click into a form, go to the General Settings > Options 
   
   
2. In the Special Date Ranges area, click "Add Date Range"
   
3. Enter a name for the date range, eg: "Early Rate"
4. Enter Start Date and End Dates that define the date range - The times are in Pacific time zone.
   
5. When adding the first Date Range, the Start Date can be any date prior to the current date (unless you want it to only apply as of the specified date).
6. Click on 'Save'.
   
7. Repeat steps 2 - 5 for each range you need to set up.
   
   
   

IMPORTANT NOTES:

• It is important that the date ranges do not overlap.
• It is also important to have NO gaps between sequential date ranges.  If there is a gap between the two, then the field option being defined will not appear during that period, and that can cause the option to not be available at all.
  • For example, if the Early Bird Date ends at midnight on July 1, 2010, and then the Regular rate begins, use the exact same date for both Early Bird END DATE and regular rate START DATE.  eg:
    • Early Bird END DATE = 7/1/2010 11:59 PM
    • Regular rate START DATE = 7/1/2010 11:59 PM

TIP: Remember that 7/1/2010 12:00 AM is actually the first thing in the morning on July 1st (or midnight of June 30).  Often people mistake that as midnight on July 1st, causing the date range to change a day early.  For that reason, using 11:59 PM might cause less confusion.

 TIP: For the last Date Range, it is often best to set the End Date to some period (6 months or more) beyond the end of your event.  That way, if there is any post-event registration processing you need to do, the options will not mysteriously disappear from your form.

TIP: If you need to convert the time in the event city/country to PST, the World Time Converter is a useful tool - http://www.worldtimeserver.com

  

Part 2 - Applying  a Date Range to a field

Date ranges can be applied in one of 2 places: on the 'Field Option' of a field, and/or on a 'Logic' item against a field.  You can think of the specific 'Field Option' or 'Logic' only applying during the specific Date Range assigned. 

For this example, assume we have a radio button with an Early rate of $100 and a regular rate of $125.  The same principle can be applied to drop-down lists and check boxes.

 

NOTE: If you are only using the Date Range to control whether a field displays on the form, ignore the Price option below.

1. Click into the field that you will apply the date range to.
2. Go to the field options area and add a new field option.
3. Set the attributes for that option during the first time period.  For example:
1. Label = Full Conference
2. Value = Full Conference
3. Price = $100 (optional)
4. Selected = false
5. Date Range = Early Bird (assuming that is what is was defined as in 'Adding New Date Ranges'
   
   
4. Add another field option for Full Conference but this time set it up using the next date range and new price if applicable.
1. Label = Full Conference
2. Value = Full Conference - Regular    (NOTE: The 'Value' of each Field Option with the same Label must be different for each Date Range.)
3. Price = $125 (optional)
4. Selected = false
5. Date Range = Regular Rate (assuming that is what is was defined as in 'Adding New Date Ranges'
   
6. Click on 'Update'.
   
   
   
5. Click on 'Update'.
6. Add any other field options that you need for this field.