Boost recurring donations this giving season with the upsell prompt!Most of the Auctions app can be set up as you go. A few things cannot, because they depend on how your site is configured or on decisions that are awkward to reverse once bidding has started. Check these first.
If you intend to charge cards
Three things have to be true before you can charge a bidder's saved card. Any one missing and the charge is unavailable rather than failing at settlement. A bidder who cannot have a saved card charged can still pay online from a checkout link you send them, with a new card or with Apple Pay or Google Pay where their device supports them, or in person by cash or check.
Your site must take payments through Stripe. Saved payment methods in the Auctions app are Stripe-only. On any other payment processor the feature is unavailable and no configuration will enable it. Confirm this well before the event.
Each bidder must be linked to a Soapbox user account. A payment method belongs to an account, so a bidder without one cannot save a card.
Each bidder needs a phone number.
Important: Bidders added at a registration desk as a standalone person, and attendees enrolled automatically from an event, arrive without a user account. Without one they cannot save a card, so you cannot charge a saved card for them on the night. Either link or create accounts for them before the event (see Linking and unlinking user accounts), or plan to send them a checkout link, which works without an account.
If your auction belongs to an event
Associate the auction with the event before registration opens. The association is what lets you build bidders from your attendee list, and automatic enrollment only applies to registrations completed after you turn it on — it does not go back over people who already registered.
See Associating an Auction with an Event and Auto-enrolling event attendees as bidders.
If you are using pre-printed paddles
Reserve those numbers on the auction's Details tab before any bidder is created, so automatic numbering does not hand them out. See Managing bidder numbers.
Decisions worth making early
| Decision | Why early |
|---|---|
| What's in this auction | Whether the auction includes People Bid on Items, Items Sold at a Set Price, Paddle Raise and Sponsors. It decides which tabs you see, which item types you can add, and which pages the auction site shows. Once the auction has bids, orders, paddle raise levels or pledges, or sponsors or sponsor levels, you can't turn off the matching part. See Choosing what's in an auction. |
| Time zone | Every date shown to bidders uses the auction's time zone. Getting it wrong shifts your closing time. |
| Settlement Mode | Whether your team charges saved cards in a reviewed batch (Batch review), or bidders pay and your team records payments (Manual). Nothing is ever charged automatically. |
| Cover Transaction Fees | Whether bidders are not asked (Off), offered (Opt-in) or required (Mandatory) to cover the card processing fee, and the Fee Percent. Bidders see it at the moment they pay. |
| Fundraising goal | Drives the progress shown on the Overview tab and on a Live Display. |
All five are on the auction's Details tab. What's in this auction has its own section, just below General. Settlement Mode and Cover Transaction Fees are under Settlement Configuration, and each one uses your app-wide default when set to Use global default. See Creating and managing an Auction and Configuring checkout and settlement settings.
What you can safely leave until later
Categories, sponsors, branding, and the pages in your auction's navigation can all be added or changed once the auction exists — including while it is in Preview. Do not let them hold up creating the auction record.
Categories need the auction to include People Bid on Items or Items Sold at a Set Price, and sponsors need Sponsors set to Yes. If you set Sponsors to No and later back to Yes, also set Show Sponsors Menu Item back to Yes on the Menu & Pages tab, because it is not turned back on for you.
Related articles: