When it is near showtime, and you have a line of people waiting to buy tickets, every second matters each time you process a ticket order. 

I have worked with many box office software systems and have seen that many do not take this into consideration. Many systems require that you enter information (e.g. email address, zip code, address) that is not necessary for the task at hand (selling a ticket).

While it is useful for you to collect such information, processing a ticket order just prior to showtime is not the time to populate your patron management system database. It is not the time to ask ticket buyers questions that are unrelated to them just buying a ticket, getting out of the line and letting the next person purchase.

Think about it: Ticket buyers tend to not show up more than 30 minutes before showtime.

If you need to process 100 ticket orders thorough your event ticketing system and collecting nice-to-have, but not necessary information takes even just an extra 15 seconds per order, that is 1,500 seconds or 25 minutes of elapsed time.

You run the risk of infuriating patrons who miss the first few minutes of the show, or angering the entire audience by delaying the start.

What do we mean by 15% cost?

Frustrating your patrons at each show is likely to cost you at least 15% of your revenue over the long term. That is, patrons are more likely to return to see future shows if the entire experience is impeccable than if your box office software caused a delay in starting the show or caused some patrons who arrived prior to showtime to miss the first few minutes of the show.

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So, if you are selecting box office software, we recommend testing how long it takes to process a ticket sale. The ticketing system should come finely tuned, recognizing that every second matters.