Prices, discounts and codes

A form can charge for entries, sell shirts and campsites, take donations, add sales tax, and take money off with automatic discounts and coupon codes. Plantains adds it all up as people fill in the form, and charges the total when they register.

How a total adds up

Everything someone picks that has a price becomes a line on their order. The lines come in this order:

• Entry fees: the form's base entry fee, and choices that count as an entry fee (a category, a course).
• Items: merchandise, campsites, meals. They can be taxed.
• Other fees: anything else, like shipping or a late fee.
• Discounts: each one right under the charge it takes money off.
• Sales tax: on taxable items, worked out after discounts.
• Donations: on their own lines, never taxed or discounted.
• Service fee: Plantains' fee, only when you have registrants pay it (below).

Registrants see this as an Order summary under the form, updated as they answer, and the total is on the button they click to register. The same lines are on their confirmation email and on their registration page.

Prices are set in the builder, so like any change there, new prices reach the live form when you publish. Each registration keeps the prices it was made with.

Prices on a choice

A Dropdown, Multiple choice or Checkboxes field can have a price on each option: the category or course someone enters, a campsite type, a meal.

1. In your form's Build tab, select the field.
2. In the panel on the right, turn on Options have prices.
3. Under Counts as, choose what kind of charge it is: Entry fee, Item, Donation or Other fee.
4. Under Options, give each option its price.

• Multiplies entry (for entry fees): each option multiplies the entry fees instead of adding a price, like Tandem ×2. Use 1 for no change.
• Taxable (for items): tick it to charge sales tax on this field.
• Checkboxes: each option ticked is its own line on the order.
• Paste a list: one option per line, with its price after a bar: Long Course | 101.75 (or Label | stored value | price).

Registrants see each option's price beside it, like Solo $90.00, and Free for $0.00. In the builder, the field gets a Priced badge.

Items

The Item field (in the palette's Pricing group) sells things people may want more than one of: T-shirts in sizes, meals, parking passes. Each variant has its own price, and registrants choose how many of each.

• Variants: a name and a price each. A new Item field starts as a T-shirt in S, M and L at $25.00.
• Max of each: how many of one variant a person can take (5 to start).
• Max in total: how many in all, across the variants. Empty means no limit.
• Taxable: on to start, since merchandise usually is.

Donations

The Donation field (also in the Pricing group) asks for an amount to give, to your cause or a charity you support. It's shown on its own line on the order, and it's never taxed or discounted.

• Suggested amounts: buttons people tap ($10, $25 and $50 to start). Add or remove amounts as you like.
• Pre-selected: one of the suggested amounts already chosen when the form opens, or Nothing: they choose.
• Let them enter their own amount, between a Minimum and a Maximum ($1.00 and $10,000.00 to start).

A base entry fee

When every registration costs the same to start with, set a base entry fee instead of pricing a choice. It's charged once per registration, before any priced options. Leave it empty when a choice (like the course) sets the price.

1. In the Build tab, click an empty part of the canvas (or press Esc) to open the Form panel.
2. Under Pricing, enter the Base entry fee, and its name on the order if you like (Registration when you leave it empty).

Sales tax

Tax applies only to what you mark Taxable: Item fields, and choices that count as an Item. Entry fees, other fees and donations aren't taxed. It's worked out after discounts, rounded to the cent, and shown on the order as Sales tax (9%).

• Your account's rate: Settings → General → Sales tax rate, set by the account owner. Use 0 for no tax.
• A form's own rate: in the builder's Form panel, under Pricing, untick Use the account's tax rate and enter the Tax rate for this form.

Plantains' fee: who pays it

On a plan with a fee per registration, each form chooses who pays it. Open the form's Settings tab and, under Payments, choose:

• You pay it: it's taken from each payment before the money reaches your Stripe account. Registrants see your prices as they are.
• Registrants pay it: it's added to their total as a Service fee line (on their receipt too), so you receive your full prices. Stripe's card processing fee is still yours.

The service fee is worked out on the whole total, so that once Plantains takes its fee you're left with exactly your prices. Changing who pays needs permission to publish forms. Your plan's fee is in Billing.

Automatic discounts

An automatic discount takes money off by itself when someone's answers qualify: juniors pay half, club members get 15% off, military get $10 off. Nobody types a code. It lives on the field whose answer decides it: an Age Discount on the birthdate, a Military Discount on the Military service question.

1. In the Build tab, select the field that decides it (a birthdate, a Club member? question).
2. In the panel on the right, under Discounts, click Add a discount. It's named after the field (like Age Discount), the name registrants see on their order. Change it if you like.
3. Apply when: its conditions, set like show/hide rules. On a birthdate it starts as age is less than 18 years on event day. Add more with Add condition, and choose whether all or any of them must be true.
4. Take off: an amount (% off or $ off) and what it comes off: the registration fee, a priced question, or The entire order. To take off more than one thing (half the entry and a free shirt), click Take off something else.

• Only some answers: on a question with several answers, click Every answer · change to limit it, like 50% off the Solo category only.
• Items: choose how many it covers. For up to 1 item gives one free shirt, not every shirt they order.
• In the canvas: the field carrying a discount shows a Discounts badge, and the fields it takes money off show Discountable.

How discounts combine

• One per charge: when two automatic discounts take money off the same charge for the same person, only the bigger one applies. They don't add up.
• The entire order stands alone: a discount on the entire order doesn't combine with the others. Whichever saves the person more is used, never both.
• A coupon code replaces them: someone who uses a code gets the code's discounts instead of the automatic ones, not on top. The form tells them what the code replaces.
• Never below $0: a discount can't take a charge below $0, and donations are never discounted.
• Teams: a discount triggered by one participant's answers, on a charge the team shares (a team category), takes money off that participant's share of it. A junior on a team of 3 gets it on a third of the team entry. See Participants.
• Settled at registration: discounts are worked out when people register. Changes they make later are priced without them (see What registrants see).

The Discounts tab

Each form's Discounts tab shows all its discounts in plain words, as they are in the builder (unpublished changes included):

• Needs attention: discounts that can't work as they're set up (say the question they take money off was removed). They don't apply to anyone, and the form can't be published until they're fixed.
• Automatic discounts: each one's Applies when and Takes off, and who gets it on a team.
• How they combine: where discounts compete for the same charge, and which one wins.
• Charges and their discounts: each priced question, and everything that can take money off it.

To change a discount, click its name: it opens its field in the builder.

Coupon codes

A coupon code takes money off when someone types it into Coupon Code on the form: for a sponsor's riders, a club, or a few complimentary entries. Each form has a Codes tab with its own codes, and Codes in the sidebar lists every form's.

1. On the form's Codes tab, click New code. (From Codes in the sidebar, you also choose the Form it's for: each code works on one form.)
2. Enter the Code people will type: at least 3 letters, numbers or symbols (WENTE!, 25%OFF). Capitals and spaces don't matter, so wente! works too. The Note is only for you (like Acme Bikes, sponsor).
3. Under Take off, choose what it takes off, the same way as an automatic discount: 50% off the Racing Category and a free T-shirt, or $20 off the entire order.
4. If you like, set when it works (Works from and Until, in the form's time zone) and a Use limit: how many registrations can use it, in total.
5. Click Create code.

• A one-time code: set its Use limit to 1.
• Used: how many registrations used each code, and how many are paying with it right now. Click the number to see who used it and how much they saved. A use counts once the registration goes through.
• The switch on each code turns it on or off. A code that works right now is in bold green; an off one is grayed out, and nobody can use it. A code that's on but can't be used yet, or anymore, says why (Starts Oct 20, Ended Oct 1, Used up).
• A code nobody has used can be deleted; a used one stays on record (registrations say which code they used), so switch it off instead.
• Copy to… puts a code on another form. Its discounts are matched to that form's questions by name, and any without a match are left out.
• Managing codes needs the Manage coupon codes permission. Everyone on your team can see them.

The Coupon Code box shows on a form with prices while it has a code that's switched on and hasn't expired. Registrants type the code and click Apply, and their order summary updates. If a code can't be used, they're told why: it isn't valid for this form, it hasn't started, it expired, or it's been used up. One code per registration.

Limited quantities

When you only have so many of something (40 campsites, 100 shirts in Medium, 200 places in the Long Course), turn on Limited quantities on that field. Plantains counts what's taken and stops offering what runs out.

1. In the Build tab, select the choice or Item field.
2. Turn on Limited quantities.
3. Enter a Limit beside each option or variant (empty means unlimited). Limits save straight away and apply to the live form without publishing.

• Show how many are left: registrants see the count beside each option, either Always (42 left) or Only when a few are left (Only 3 left, from 5 to start). Turned off, they only see Sold out when something runs out.
• The Inventory tab lists every limited option on the form with its Limit, Taken and Left, and you can change limits there too (for when 20 more campsites turn up). Changing limits needs the Manage inventory permission.
• Taken counts registrations that went through, and ones paying right now. Cancelling or deleting a registration gives its stock back.
• If two people go for the last one at the same moment, the first gets it, and the other is told it just sold out and asked to choose another.
• When a required question that's always asked is sold out in every option, nobody can register, so the form shows as full with your Message when it's full (Settings → Accepting entries).

After someone registers

Each registration keeps the prices it was made with. What happens when a registrant changes an answer that changes the price (an upgrade they pay for, a cheaper option) is in What registrants see. Charging cards, refunds and balances still owed are in Payments and refunds.