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. 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.
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. Three 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.
- 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 for each allocation you hold.
Inviting your guests
Two routes lead to the same booking flow, and both draw on the same allocation.
- Invite Guests sends a personal invitation to a named guest, who then books their own place. You can add an optional Mobile number; it needs a country code, for example +44 7700 900123.
- 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.
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.
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.
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.
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
Settings → Share access holds a team invite link. Anyone who joins your organisation through it can help run the portal. Your guests are visible to your portal team and to the organiser of the events they book into, and never to another partner’s portal.
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 · Invitations