Boost recurring donations this giving season with the upsell prompt!When an event is set to enroll its attendees as auction bidders and some or all of them are missing from the Bidders tab, it is almost always one of four causes. Work through them in order.
1. The event enrolls at check-in, and they have not been checked in yet
Check this first, because it looks exactly like a failure and is not one.
If Auto-Enroll Attendees as Bidders is set to At check-in, registering does not create a bidder. The bidder is created when the attendee is checked in at the event, so the Bidders tab stays empty until the doors open and fills as people arrive.
How to tell: open the event and look at Auto-Enroll Attendees as Bidders. If it reads At check-in, and the people missing have not yet been checked in, nothing is wrong.
What to do: nothing. They will be enrolled as they arrive. If you need someone in the list before the event, add them from the auction's Bidders tab using From event attendee.
2. The attendees registered before you turned enrollment on
This is the most common cause when the event enrolls at registration.
Under All attendees and Selected ticket type(s), a bidder is created as each registration is completed. Those two settings are not retroactive: anyone who registered before you switched it on stays an attendee only, however long the event runs afterwards. This does not apply to At check-in, which enrolls at the door regardless of when someone registered.
How to tell: the attendees who are missing all registered earlier than the ones that worked.
What to do: add them from the auction's Bidders tab using From event attendee. Search each one by name, email, company, order number or ticket number. Their bidder record is created with a number, and their ticket details come across.
If your event is large, it is usually faster to add the missing attendees before doors open than to work through them at a registration desk.
3. The auction is not associated with the event
Auto-enrollment needs to know which auction to create bidders in, and that comes from the association between the two.
How to tell: open the event, look at the Auction Bidder section, and check the Auction field. If it says None, nothing will be enrolled. You can also check from the auction's Details tab.
What to do: set the association, then add any attendees who already registered as described above.
4. The attendees hold a ticket type that is not selected
How to tell: open the event and check which ticket types are selected under Selected ticket type(s).
What to do: add the missing ticket type, or add those attendees by hand from the Bidders tab.
Related articles: