Two “Behind the Scenes Tour” programs both start at 10:00. One meets at the north gate and is for adults, the other is a family version that starts in the education building. In Altru Daily Sales, the cashier sees two lines that look identical and has to guess. Guess wrong and a family of four shows up at an adult tour, the capacity counts on both are off, and someone in guest services spends the afternoon on exchanges.
The underlying issue is simple: at the point of sale, staff mostly see a program’s name and its time. When those match, nothing else on screen reliably tells the two apart. Altru doesn’t give you an obvious way to add a second visible label to a scheduled program in the sales screen, so the fix is mostly about how you name and set up the programs, not about training cashiers to read tea leaves.
Start with the program name
The most dependable fix is also the least exciting: make the names different. The program name is the one field you can count on appearing in Daily Sales, on the order, and usually on the ticket and in reports. Put the distinguishing detail there.
- Audience: “Behind the Scenes Tour (Adults)” and “Behind the Scenes Tour (Families)”
- Location: “Garden Walk – Rose Garden” and “Garden Walk – Japanese Garden”
- Language or access: “Highlights Tour – Spanish,” “Highlights Tour – ASL,” “Highlights Tour – Sensory-Friendly”
Lead with the shared part of the name and put the difference at the end. That keeps the programs grouped together alphabetically in lists and reports while still making them distinct. Keep the suffix short; long names can get cut off on narrow screens and printed tickets, which defeats the purpose. Print a test ticket and look at a receipt after renaming so you know what guests actually see.
Before renaming anything, check where the old name is used outside Altru: website copy, confirmation emails, signage, and any queries or exports that filter on program name. A renamed program can quietly drop out of a query that matched on the exact old text.
When the programs really are the same experience
Sometimes there’s no meaningful difference to put in a name. You simply run two identical sessions at 10:00 because one guide can only take 15 people. In that case ask whether you need two programs at all. A single program with a larger capacity, split into groups after check-in, is often easier for everyone. Staff sell one line, the capacity count is one number, and the split happens at the meeting point where it belongs.
If you need separate capacity per guide for staffing or reporting, numbered names (“Tour Group A” and “Tour Group B”) still beat two identical lines. They at least let a cashier balance sales between the two on purpose.
The staggered start time workaround
Some organizations offset one of the programs by a few minutes, say 10:00 and 10:05. It works, because the time now differs in Daily Sales, and it can reflect reality if the groups really do leave a few minutes apart. But it only helps if staff know what the five minutes means. On its own, “10:00 vs. 10:05” tells a cashier nothing about which one is the family tour. Use it alongside clear names, not instead of them.
Other fields worth checking
Altru programs carry more information than the name, such as a description, a category, and location or resource details depending on how you’ve set things up. These are useful for reporting and for your website, but don’t assume any of them appears where a cashier makes the decision. Whether a given field shows in Daily Sales, on the ticket, or on the receipt depends on your configuration and Altru’s current behavior. Test it in a sandbox or on a low-stakes program before relying on it, and ask Blackbaud support if you’re unsure which fields are displayed where.
The same caution applies to individual program occurrences. If you’re hoping to give one specific date a different label without changing the whole program, confirm whether your version of Altru allows that before you plan around it.
Help the desk in the meantime
Renaming takes some coordination, so cover the gap:
- Post a short cheat sheet at each register listing the look-alike programs and how to tell them apart for today.
- If your sales screen layout lets you control the order programs appear in, keep paired programs in a consistent order (adults first, families second, for example) and tell staff what that order is.
- Run a quick query or report after each day for the affected programs. Compare sold counts to what the guides actually saw at check-in. A consistent mismatch means cashiers are still mixing them up.
Quick answers
Will renaming a program change tickets already sold?
Test this before you count on it. Past orders may keep the name that was current at the time of sale, or may show the new name, depending on where you look. Check an existing order and a reprinted ticket after a rename in a test environment.
Is there a setting that shows the program description in Daily Sales?
We wouldn’t assume so. Confirm with Blackbaud support or in a sandbox. The program name is the field you can rely on, so that’s where the distinguishing detail belongs.
