Using Your Portal

Your portal is the workspace an organiser has given you so that you can bring your own guests to their event. Whether you are exhibiting at a fair, co-hosting a private view, or sponsoring an evening, you invite under your own name, from a number of guest places the organiser sets, and you watch the responses arrive as they happen.

This page is written for you, the partner. The organiser’s side of the same feature is covered in Portals. Claiming a portal needs only a free ARTSVP account: there is nothing for you to buy.

Claiming your portal

The organiser sends you a portal link. Open it, sign in or create an account, then on Connect your portal choose which organisation manages it: one you already belong to, or Create a new organisation. A new organisation asks for an Organisation name and What best describes your team? (Art Fair, Gallery, Artist, or Other).

From that moment the portal belongs to that organisation alone. Only its members can open it. If you work two fairs with the same organiser, you claim a separate portal for each.

Once connected, the portal also appears under Portals → Connected Portals in that organisation. Open portal takes you back into the workspace. A colleague who is not on the team sees This portal is locked and can Request access; Bringing in your team covers how that request is allowed.

Your allocation

An allocation is the guest capacity the organiser has granted you for one event or collection. It carries a cap, or reads No limit where they have chosen not to cap you. These rules shape the count:

• The unit is guests, not invitations. A booking for four people uses four places, however that booking arrived.
• The cap bites when a guest books, not when you send. You can create and send invitations against a full allocation, but they cannot be redeemed until the organiser raises it.
• A leftover place smaller than the event’s smallest ticket counts as none left. A pair ticket needs two places. Guests then see This invite is no longer valid, or We are sorry, this link has been fully used.
• Remaining counts confirmed guests only, so a few more places may already be spoken for by bookings still in progress.

Your portal home shows Invited guests, Confirmed guests, and Allocation used.

If the organiser takes an event or collection off your portal, its card leaves Allocations. You cannot send new invitations or copy a new booking link for it. Your guest list keeps everyone who came through it. On Guestlist, Filter lists that event under No longer allocated. Confirmed guests still includes them. Allocation used counts only the allocations you still hold, so the two figures can differ.

If the organiser cancels the event, its card stays on Allocations and reads Cancelled. Invite Guests and Copy link are no longer available. Invitations and booking links you have already shared open the event’s cancelled message. Guests who already booked stay on your guest list as Cancelled.

For an allocation that is still open, invitations and booking links you have already shared may still work until it is full, unless the organiser has closed them to new bookings. Then a guest who opens one sees This invite is no longer valid. Guests who have already booked keep their places.

Inviting your guests

Two routes lead to the same booking flow, and both draw on the same allocation.

1. Invite Guests sends a personal invitation to a named guest, who then books their own place. The composer lets you personalise the message with tokens such as {{name}} — see Personalisation variables. Before you send, Send me a test delivers the invitation as you’ve written it to your own address; your guests are not contacted, and the test link cannot be used to RSVP.
2. Copy link gives you a booking link capped by your allocation. Anyone holding it can book while places last, which suits a newsletter, a group chat, or a post.

When you type an Email on Manually, a Heads up note appears if that person already has one of your invitations, or a booking through your allocation. It is a warning, never a block. You do not see the organiser’s other guests, and the note has no View invite or View booking link. CSV Upload (which also accepts Excel .xlsx files) and Contact List are not checked.

Open a guest from your guest list and click Edit to change their name or email. If you created the invitation without an email, add it here, then click Send invite. Once they have booked, the invitation can no longer be edited.

When you only have an email address

Every invitation needs a Name, so a guest you know only by email still needs something in that field. You can send them a personal invitation by email all the same: enter a stand-in name with their email, then send it.

One thing to be aware of: the guest cannot change that name when they RSVP. Their booking form shows it as fixed, and it becomes the name on their booking, their ticket, and your guest list. So:

• Choose a stand-in that reads well to them and that you will recognise at the door, such as Guest of Galerie Lumière.
• The invitation email opens with Dear {{name}},, so the guest would read Dear Guest of Galerie Lumière,. Edit the message body before you send and change that line to a greeting without the name, such as Hello,.
• If you learn their name before they book, open them from your guest list, click Edit, and correct it.

If they are happy to give their own details, a booking link from Copy link lets them type their name themselves. A booking link is shared by you, through your own email or messages, rather than sent by ARTSVP.

Invitation emails include a footer, Unsubscribe from Gallery B invitations, named for your organisation (or the portal name if you have not connected one). A guest who uses it stops receiving further invitations from you, not from the organiser. Send me a test shows the same footer.

Invitations you create, and the names and contact details on them, stay private to your portal. The organiser sees a guest only once that guest confirms.

When you send, guests see your portal name as the sender. Replies go to the Reply-to address under Settings → Email preferences. You cannot change it. If the organiser has set one for the group, it reads Set by your organisation. Otherwise it reads Replies go to your notification email.

If the organiser has turned on Force Unique Bookings, a guest who already booked and opens your invitation sees Existing Booking Found and can Notify you. That uses your allocation for their whole party, puts them on your guest list, and sends you the same booking alerts as a new confirmation. They then see your portal name followed by Notified.

If you do not have enough remaining places for the party, they see This invite is no longer valid instead. When they already have a booking, that page also says You already have a booking for this event. and offers Email me my booking link.

Pending invitations

An invitation is Pending when it has been created but not yet sent. This happens when you add guests and choose to send later, or when you upload a CSV or Excel file (.xlsx) without sending straight away. Imported rows are created in the background, and nothing is sent automatically — the invitations appear in your guest list shortly (large lists can take a few minutes) at Pending status.

To send pending invitations, open Guestlist from your portal, select the Pending tab, tick the guests you want to reach, then open Actions → Send invites. That opens the invite composer where you can write your message and send. If the organiser has enabled WhatsApp invitations, you will see both Send via email and Send via WhatsApp options; otherwise only email is available.

Send tickets also appears under Actions for guests who have already confirmed.

If you reached a guest another way (a WhatsApp message outside ARTSVP, a phone call, or an in-person conversation), open their row from your guest list, then choose Mark as invited. That moves them from Pending to Invited so your list reflects that you have contacted them.

Removing a guest

On Guestlist, each row has a menu (three dots on the right). What you can do depends on whether the guest has booked:

• Not booked yet. This covers guests you have invited and guests still pending (not sent yet). Open the row menu and choose Delete guest. A confirmation asks whether to remove them; once you confirm, the invite is removed from your list. Your places left do not change, because places are only used when a guest books. No email is sent to the guest.
• Booked guests. The row menu has no delete option. A booking belongs to the organiser, not to your portal, so only they can cancel it. Contact the event organiser if you need a booking removed.

Asking for more places

When the organiser allows allocation increase requests, open the allocation’s availability badge or choose Increase allocation. Choose how many extra places you need, up to 50 at a time, add a message if it helps your case, and the organiser reviews it. The request opens a thread in Inbox, so the conversation stays attached to the portal rather than scattering across email. If neither control appears, contact the organiser directly.

Who is notified about inbox messages

When the organiser sends you a message, the email notification goes to your portal’s Notification email. Set it under Settings → Notifications. If no Notification email is set, the message still appears in Inbox, but no email notification is sent. When you reply or request more places, the organiser’s team receives the notification at their Support email.

Following the responses

Your guest list fills as invitations are answered and links are booked, and on the day it moves again as guests are checked in at the door. Once an event has ended it drops out of your actionable list, though your guest data stays readable.

On Guestlist, Date is the event slot. Tick Created under Columns to see when each booking or invitation was made. Click Created to put the newest rows at the top. Guests on the same booking share one time.

Click Download and choose Guest List. The CSV is emailed to the address on your account, not the notification address under Settings → Notifications. It matches the tab, search, and Filter you have open: every guest and invitation in that view, with the details your portal shows. Organiser notes and tags stay off the file.

Each portal can alert you by email and by WhatsApp when a guest books and when a guest checks in. All four alerts are on by default. Change them, along with the address and number they reach you on, under Settings → Notifications.

Bringing in your team

Admins invite colleagues from Settings → Share access with Copy team invite, or from Manage team. Anyone who joins your organisation can help run the portal. Your guests are visible to your portal team and to the organiser of the events they book into. Another partner cannot open your guest list. A guest who already booked through someone else, and then notifies you, appears on both lists.

When a colleague is locked out

Check the email first. Often the person on the locked screen is not a new colleague but someone already on your team, signed in with another address. Only accounts that are members of the organisation that claimed the portal can open it. The locked screen shows Signed in as with the email in use. If that is not the address the portal was claimed under, click Sign out and sign back in with that address. Your invitations and guests are safe: they belong to the portal, not to the account you sign in with. Keep Request access for colleagues who are genuinely new to your organisation.

If they open the portal link signed in with an account that is not on your organisation, the screen reads This portal is locked. They click Request access, confirm, and the screen shows Request sent. Your organisation’s owner receives an email with Allow access.

Allow access opens a page where an admin of your organisation chooses their Role (Admin, Event Manager, Booking Manager, or Check-in only; Event Manager is selected) and clicks Accept & send invitation. That invitation adds them to your organisation with the role you chose, not only to this portal. Roles are covered in Teams.

One thing to be aware of: the request email goes to the organisation owner. Other admins can still accept it if they have the link. If your plan has no free team seats, the page offers Upgrade plan instead of sending the invitation.

Once you have allowed access, their locked screen shows Access allowed. with Accept invitation. After they accept, the portal opens for them. A second request is not sent while one is still waiting. If they turn the invitation down, Request access appears again.

When a portal goes read-only

A portal becomes read-only four months after it is activated. Its settings lock and it issues no new booking links, with existing links shown as disabled. Your guest data stays readable throughout, and links you have already shared keep working until the allocation runs out. For a new season, expect the organiser to open a fresh portal rather than revive this one.

Keep reading: Portals · Reporting and Exports · Invitations · Teams