Hello friends,
My name is Chris and I am at Des Moines Performing Arts. We are a presenting organization/performing arts center. We recently had our TMS kick-off call and were made aware of some things we did not know about from our prior meetings with Tessitura about TMS. We are hoping that some of you fine people are at a presenting organization/performing arts center and can help us with these questions.
Here are some of the hurdles we need to overcome:
1. We learned that you cannot do a refund by credit card number, only by CCRef number and using the refund button. While this makes sense, we will also be having quite a few Broadway shows that tickets were sold through WorldPay that we may need to refund and we do not want to issue checks (because of the liability of waiting for guests to cash them and for the customer service that that is not). Have any of you found any ways to overcome this?
2. We learned it is recommended that all returns/refunds/exchanges are done in the original order. We do not currently do this (for a myriad of reason) and trying to wrap our head around how this would affect reporting (as it's already very difficult to report on refunds and exchanges). If you are like us, and have done exchanges, refunds, and returns in a new order, could you share your process for changing to everything in one order and any bumps and hurdles you experienced?
3. We currently have our credit cards setup (for controls and reporting) so that there is credit card payment method for each way to buy (phone, internet, window/in person). We do this because it is a very easy way to do settlements with our presenting organizations, especially touring Broadway. If you also had your credit card setup this way, what hurdles and bumps did you run into for reporting and settlement with this new behavior?
4. We learned that on one-page giving for TNEW, credit cards are not save automagically if the guest is signing up for sustaining giving. Instead, we have to call the guest to get that same credit card to enter into the payment plan that is the sustained giving. Have any of you found ways to overcome this? We don't see this as donor friendly and would definitely be more work for our Devo staff to make sure they call and get those credit cards.
Thank you everyone for any and all answers.
Hi Chris,
To speak a bit to #2 - Refunds in particular must be done in the original order because you are *refunding by reference*. It's a bit of a logic shift, as you are no longer refunding *to the card* but instead *refunding to the original payment*. Does the payment still hit the original card - yes - but TMS/Adyen isn't looking for the card to refund, but instead the payment (In Adyen, you search by PSP Ref No - you're searching for the *payment* - the card information is secondary). In this post: https://community.tessituranetwork.com/topical_groups/payments-transactions-tessitura-community/f/discussions/33674/tms-refund-flow-chart?_ga=2.137691447.648990084.1706620964-150994199.1705334633 I have linked to the refund flow charts I made for our consortia when we transitioned to TMS. This chart also touches a bit on what Allison described - this 90-day "unreferenced refund" window. Also to Allison's point - you can always refund via a non-credit card payment method. But in order to refund to the card, the refund has to be in the order with the original payment. Happy to help with any other questions! Also the Payments and Transactions Group is a great resource too!
Best,
Katina