Automatic Seat Buffering

To support social distancing guidelines, RTS has added dynamic seat buffering for reserved seating. When enabled, a configurable amount of seats will be blocked off around a customer's purchased seats, creating a buffer.

Note: If you have a 3rd Party Website using our API, your web developers will need to adjust their code to support buffered seats. You can send them our API guide for more information.

Setup

To set this feature up:

1. Navigate to Setup -> Tickets -> Options
   
   
   
   
2. Check the Enabled Radio button in the Seat Buffering section.
3. Select the desired buffering type from the Type dropdown menu.
   1. Radius will buffer out all seats whose center point is within the radius of a purchased seat
   2. Row will buffer out a specified amount of seats horizontally only.
4. Optionally, when using the Row buffer type, adjust the number of buffer seats added to either side of a selection with the Length box
   1. (The Length property is only available for the Row type. For information about setting the radius for the Radius type please see Setting Buffer Radius.)
5. Optionally, you can set the text for the pop-up message that will appear online when a customer attempts to select a buffer seat with the Warn Message box.
6. Optionally, you can enable the Skip Group when Calculating Buffer option.
   1. Using this option will not buffer grouped seats that must be purchased in the same transaction. For example, some sites may have seating for a couple, with walls or other means of blocking views from the right and/or left. In this case, you may not want to buffer these seats, as there is already isolation of sort in place.
7. Press Save

Setting Buffer Radius

For the Radius buffer type, you will need to configure the buffer radius for each seating chart. This is necessary as each chart may have small differences in the size or spacing of the seats.

1. Navigate to Setup -> Reserved Seats -> Graphical.
   (The following steps will need to be repeated for each layout you are currently using.)
2. From the Layout dropdown, in the top-left, select which layout to edit. (If you are unsure of what layout is being used for which auditorium, you can check in Setup -> Auditoriums)
   
   
   
   
3. Right-click the background and select Set Seat Buffering Distance.
4. Enter the desired radius to check for broken seats. (The entire layout is 10,000 x 10,000. By default this is set to 2,000).
5. Press OK
6. Press Save in the bottom left-hand corner to save the change.

You can test to see what seats are going to be buffered using the currently set radius by checking the Test Seat Buffering Mode option in the upper right-hand corner. When you select a seat while this mode is enabled, you will see a blue oval representing the buffer radius. Any seats that will be buffered will have a Red X on the seat.

Note: While in the Seat Buffering Test mode, you cannot make any changes to the seating chart. This includes changing the buffer radius.

Ensuring Seat Buffering Appears

After enabling this feature you will need to restart your internet server, restart RTS on any self serve kiosks you may have, as well as your selling stations. If you update your buffer length, you will also need to restart everything.

To Restart the Internet Server

This must be done on the RTS Server

1. Navigate to File -> Other -> Switch To -> Internet Server
2. Press the Restart Internet Server button

In a minute, your internet ticketing page will come back up, and the seat buffer will be enabled

To Restart RTS on your Kiosk

1. Plug a keyboard into your Kiosk
2. Press the Alt and F4 at the same time, to take you to the standard RTS logon screen
3. Login to RTS
4. Naviagte to File -> Other -> Restart Software
5. Press the Yes button in the window that pops up

When your Kiosk comes back up the seat buffer will be enabled.

To Restart RTS on your Selling Staions

1. Naviagte to File -> Other -> Restart Software
2. Press the Yes button in the window that pops up

When your Selling station comes back up the seat buffer will be enabled.

Using Seat Buffers

Employee Selling Screen

On the selling screen, when a seat is selected within the buffer length from an existing seat, the employee will get a message "Not enough buffer seats. Do you wish to continue?". The Employee can either press No to select another seat or Yes, to continue purchasing the seat, even though it's within the buffer. Buffered Seats will appear with a Red B on them.

When the payment is being processed, your employee may receive another warning that says "Transaction failed due to seat buffer conflict. Would you like to override", in case a seat had been purchased between when the seat was selected and the payment began. This means that if an employee overrides a seat warning during seat selection, they will need to press Yes again to complete the transaction.

Note: You will also receive this warning if selected a seat that originally wasn't in violation of a seat buffer, but a seat was purchased in between when this seat was selected and when payment began.

Online

When a customer selects a seat online which is within the buffer length from an existing seat, the customer will receive a popup with the message configure in the Warn Message box above. They will not be given the option to override this. Any buffered seats will appear with a Red X on them.