Need help with QR scanning of RSVPs, not working yet

[Jack]

I bought the Tickets Plus plugin after some pre-purchase questions. I installed it on my site and everything is working, but I can’t get the scanning to work.

I installed a QR code scanner app on my Android phone (QuickMark, but what do you suggest is the best scanner for this purpose?), scanned the QR code in the mail while being logged into WordPress as admin in the Chrome browser on the same phone, but nothing is happening. The scanner says it scanned the code and I can hear and see that on the screen of my phone, but when looking in WordPress the attendee is not checked in.

[Cliff]

Hi Jack.

I haven’t heard of this issue before. Could you please try this for me on your Android:

Visit your event’s Attendees page: /wp-admin/edit.php?post_type=tribe_events&page=tickets-attendees&event_id={EVENT_ID} and see if you can manually click to check someone in and see if that works.

[Jack]

When I click to check in nothing happens. When I refresh the page, then the status has changed from not checked in ot checked in or visa verca. But nothing happens bby using the QR code scanner. I have no idea what settings to use in the QR scanner and of logging in into WP admin on my Android phone is enough or that I need to go the the specific page with attendees. In both cases nothing happes after I scan the code, although the scanner app shows the scans I made, but the list in WP is not updated.

[Cliff]

In that case, it sounds like the issue is with the check-ins, not with the QR code’s link itself. It sounds like you’re doing everything correctly with QR code scanning (being logged in and scanning the QR codes to visit specific URLs).

Therefore, I’d suggest following our recommended troubleshooting steps:

There might be some new updates available. Could you please make sure all your Modern Tribe plugins (and WordPress core) are at their latest versions?

• Downloads / Version Numbers
• TEC Automatic Updates
• or TEC Manual Updates
• WordPress core updates

Once you verify you’re on the latest versions, please test to see if the issue is still happening for you.

If it is, please follow our Testing for Conflicts Guide (basically switch to TwentySixteen theme and deactivate all plugins and custom code other than Modern Tribe plugins) and see if that helps narrow down the cause of this.

If it doesn’t, please enable WP_DEBUG and WP_DEBUG_LOG and share any PHP errors you see while changing tickets quantity, navigating your site’s home page, events page, single-event pages, and any other of your site’s pages relevant to this ticket.

Then, please share your System Information (while in Testing for Conflicts mode).

You might also see if you can spot any console errors at your site. (If needed, you may reference our KB article Using Google Chrome Developer Tools.)

Let us know what you find out.

Thanks.

[Jack]

I tried disabling plugins but that didn’t work. But then I disabled ‘continued scanning’ in the QR app which opens the browser after each scan. The browser on my phone showed ‘checked in’, and when I refreshed the browserpage of my pc it also said Checked in. So it seems to be working, but… I need some kind of continued scanning because if there is a row of visitors checking in at the entrance, the current method means 1. scanning 2. opening browser and making contact with the site 3. message Checked in 4. Going back to the QR app and made the next scan. That takes much too long. The person at the entrance should only need to keep on scanning without any further action.

How can I do that? Do I need another app? If so, which one would provide continued scanning?

[Cliff]

Jack, thanks for detailing your experience here.

What you said is working (but taking too long) is what’s required to check someone in.

Basically, you have to visit a special URL to check someone in (QR code scan or manually clicking the “Check In” button); that’s the only way to do it. If your site’s wp-admin area loads slowly or your mobile device is on a slow internet connection, these will slow down your process. If we didn’t require the visit to the wp-admin area, anyone with any QR code reader could scan it to get to the link and accidentally or maliciously check themselves in (which could cause issues at the door’s check-in with you).

Understanding this, do you have any specific suggestions / requests for this process?

[Jack]

That’s not how I expected the plugin/apps to work 🙁 I tried it with a series of tickets, which means scanning, browser opens, quickly push the ‘back’ button on my phone to return to the QR app, scan another barcode, etc. etc. etc. That seems to work but is not user friendly. I’m sure that people at the entrance of a zoo or concert don’t have to do this. So it works, but only one at a time.

It would be helpful if the connection to the web page would be made in the background and people can continue to scan. That would mean finding a QR app that does this, but I haven’t found one. The only alternative I can see with the Quickmark app is that it offers bulk scanning, but without connecting to a webpage. It stores all scans and afterwards you can email all the history in a csv file. I did that, and an option would be if that csv file could be imported into the attendees list in WordPress. Then the check in can be done afterwards to see who attended and who did not. Not ideal because duplicates would not be seen by the scanner, but it would provide continues scan.

Best option would be, with the plugin as it works now, is a scanner app that can work with browsers opening the links in the background. Do you know of such a QR app? That would help very much.

Jack

[Cliff]

Jack, thanks for your candid feedback. I’ve passed it along to our development team. Turns out we already had an internally-logged discussion/feature request about this.

Other than that, I can’t offer much more assistance or advice.

Thanks for sticking with us as we continue trying to make things better over time.

[Jack]

Hi Cliff, so there is no QR app you guys could recommend? I would expect you must have all kinds of experience with this.

[Cliff]

We don’t have a single recommendation, but I’ve heard of others having success with these:

• https://webqr.com for computers with a webcam
• http://get.beetagg.com/ has an app for pretty much every mobile device

However, I know there are dozens more QR code readers out there. I’m sure the one you’re using is comparable to BeeTagg (which hasn’t been updated in quite a while, not that it needs to be) and other alternatives.

Sorry we don’t have a better suggestion for you. A dedicated app or a page optimized for checking-in would be ideal…

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

[Author]

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