Waiting List for Full Meetings

Sections in this article:

• How the Waiting List Works
  • When the Waitlist Closes
• Waitlist Status Defined
  • Open Seat Expiration Calculation
• How to Join a Waiting List
  
  • How to Leave a Waiting List
• Waitlist Text Notification Options
  • Waitlist Registration Confirmation Text
  • Open-Seat Offer Text Notification
• Waitlist Email Notifications
  • Waitlist Registration Confirmation Email
  • Open-Seat Offer Email Notification
• Open-Seat Offer on Dashboard and My Meetings Page 
  • Open-Seat Offer on Member Dashboard
  • Open-Seat Offer on My Meetings Page
• Expired Open-Seat Offer
  • How to Rejoin a Waiting List

  • Conditional: Expired Open-Seat Offer May Still Register

How the Waiting List Works

To improve the overall waitlist reliability and usability, we have made many enhancements. When a meeting is full, and the waitlist function is enabled, a member may choose to be added to the waiting list. If a seat becomes available, the member will be notified, at which time we ask the member to accept or reject the seat.

• If they accept the seat, the member must first subscribe to the organization (if not done so already) and if applicable, pay for the meeting registration (or consider a donation). After these few steps, the member will be registered for the meeting.
• If they reject the seat, the seat is then offered to the next member on the waitlist.

When the Waitlist Closes

The waitlist functionality will be turned off 10 minutes before the start of the meeting. This means that no further seats will be offered to members when there is 10 minutes or less until to the meeting start time. There are two reasons for this:

1. The 10-minute cutoff time coincides with beginning of the Standby Room. Members remaining on the waitlist should utilize the Standby Room, where the chance of being offered a last-minute seat is high.
2. Members accepting seats and entering the meeting after the start time can be very disruptive to the other attendees. To prevent this issue, open-seats will stop being offered to waitlisted members at 10 minutes before the start of the meeting.

Waitlist Status Defined

Each waitlist record will have one of four statuses.

• Waiting - The member is waiting for an available seat.
• Offered - The member was offered a seat in the meeting. Each offered seat ("invitation”) is assigned an expiration date and time. Meaning the member has a set amount of time to accept or reject the seat offer. (See Open Seat Expiration Calculation section). An invitation with an “Offered” status means the user has not yet taken any action toward the invitation and the invitation has not yet expired.
• Expired - The expiration date and time listed on the invitation has passed without any user action. When the waitlist record changes to expired, the seat which had been offered to the user will then be offered to the next person in line. If there are no other members on the waitlist, the meeting registration will be re-opened to fill the meeting.
• Rejected - The member received an open seat invitation but chose to reject the seat. The seat is then automatically offered to the next member on the waitlist. If there are no other members on the waitlist, the meeting registration will be re-opened to fill the meeting.

Open Seat Expiration Calculation

Each time a seat is offered to a member, an expiration date and time is generated. This is the deadline for a user to take action on the offered seat - to either accept or reject the seat. The logic used to generate the expiration time of an open seat is as follows:

1. 33% of the remaining time before the meeting starts + 10 minutes
2. Maximum time the seat will be held open: 1 day (24 hours).
3. Minimum time the seat will be held open: 10 minutes.

How to Join a Waiting List

Once you find a meeting(s) you would like to attend, you will need to register for the meeting. If the meeting is full, some organizations offer the option to join a waitlist for the meeting. The button to register will read Join Waiting List instead of Register.

Once you click on the Join Waiting List button, a pop-up message will appear that says "Added to the waiting list." After you click OK and the pop-up message closes, you will see that the Join Waiting List button changed colors and the button now reads Leave Waiting List, indicating that you successfully joined the waitlist.

How to Leave a Waiting List

At any point, you can review your waitlisted meetings by clicking on the My Meetings tab, and then clicking the On Waiting List tab.

If you no longer want to be on the waiting list for that meeting, simply click the Leave Waiting List button. You will get a pop-up message that "You have been removed from the waiting list" and the register button for the meeting will again read Join Waiting List. When you refresh that page, the meeting will be removed from your My Meetings page. 

Waitlist Text Notification Options

Members can choose to receive waitlist announcements via text message. These include (1) a waitlist registration confirmation, and (2) an open seat announcement. Both of these options are turned off by default but may be managed and turned on in the member's Settings → Notification Center tab.

To manage notifications, click on the More button in the top right corner, select Settings, and then click on the Notification Center tab.

At the top of the Notification Center tab options, you will see the option to Allow text notifications. When this option is turned on, the toggle will be green. See Updating Email and Text Notifications for more about notification options. 

At the bottom of the text notification options, you will see two options specifically for the waitlist.

 

Waitlist Registration Confirmation Text

• When you add your name to a meeting waitlist - if this notification option is selected, members will receive the following text message when they join a waiting list:

Open-Seat Offer Text Notification

• When a seat is offered through the waitlist - if this text notification option is selected, members will receive the following text message when they are offered an available seat:

Waitlist Email Notifications

Waitlist Registration Confirmation Email

If members have email notifications turned on, they will receive the following confirmation email when signing up for a waitlist:

 

Open-Seat Offer Email Notification

If a member has email notifications turned on and a seat is offered to that person, the following notification email will be sent out. From the email, the member can click the button to Accept Seat and Register or click the button that says No, thanks. Give Seat to Someone Else.

Open-Seat Offer on Dashboard and My Meetings Page 

Open-Seat Offer on Member Dashboard

In addition to the open-seat notification email and/or text message, the member will also see the open-seat invitation on the Member Dashboard, displayed in the Your Next Meetings section.

The waitlisted open-seat offer is distinguished from other confirmed meeting registrations by the Waitlist Meeting tag and the Accept and Reject buttons.

Open-Seat Offer on My Meetings Page

Likewise, the open-seat invitation will be displayed on the On Waiting List tab on the My Meetings page. To accept the seat and register for the meeting, the member would click on Register on the left side of the meeting tile, or they could choose the Reject button on the right side of the meeting tile. 

Expired Open-Seat Offer

How to Rejoin a Waiting List

If a member misses the invitation to accept a seat, and the offer expires, members have two options for adding themselves back onto the waitlist. Both of these options will restore the member’s original place in line.

• If the member clicks on the Accept option in the open-seat notification email or text message, the user will be brought to an “Invitation Expired” page after they log into their HeyPeers account. On this page, the user will be provided the option to rejoin the waitlist

• The member may also simply select the “Join Waitlist” option for the meeting again on any of the meeting pages. This will add the member back to the waitlist.

Conditional: Expired Open-Seat Offer May Still Register

If a member responds to an open-seat notification email or text message but the invitation has already expired, the member may still be offered the seat if the following conditions exist:

1. There is no one else on the waitlist, AND
2. The seat has not yet been taken by another member (through meeting registration).

In this case, the waitlisted member will be presented with the following screen, giving the user the option to register for the meeting, despite the expired invitation.