← Integrations · Event ticketing
Sell tickets on your own site. No Eventbrite cut.
The ticketing module plugs into your UK Web Marketing site as an embedded checkout — pick the event, pick the tier, Stripe takes the card, QR ticket goes to the attendee's phone. Same builder (me) on both sides — TicketWave is the live platform that already runs Dubai Events 2026 and UK festivals. The bit you don't pay: 3–7% to Eventbrite, Universe or DICE.
The maths
What Eventbrite, Universe and DICE actually charge.
Event ticketing platforms publish "free for organizers" but make money on per-ticket booking fees, either charged to the attendee (most common) or paid by the organizer. Either way, the money comes off the same pot. Plus a Stripe-style payment fee on top. The result for a typical UK event:
| Platform | Per ticket fee | Payment fee | On a £25 ticket × 200 sold |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eventbrite (UK) | 3.7% + £1.79 | 2.5% (Eventbrite Payment Processing) | £549 in fees (£25k gross → £24.45k net) |
| Universe (Ticketmaster) | 3% + £0.99 | 1.5% | £359 in fees |
| DICE | ~7% (Org's pay-the-fee model) | included | £350 in fees |
| Your own UK Web Marketing site + TicketWave HQ ticketing | £0 | 1.5% + 20p Stripe | £115 in fees (£24.88k net) |
For one 200-ticket event you save £200–400 vs. Eventbrite. Over a season of 12 events: £2.5k–5k. Plus you keep the attendee data (Eventbrite famously makes it hard to export), plus you keep the SEO equity (no "Buy on Eventbrite" outbound link), plus no risk of de-platforming during ticket-on-sale week (which has happened to multiple UK events in the last 24 months).
For organisations running recurring events, the cumulative numbers get serious quickly: a 50-event-a-year operation easily saves £15k+/year in platform fees vs. Eventbrite.
Anatomy of one ticket sale
What happens when someone wants two tickets to your gig.
- Attendee lands on your UK Web Marketing site — your domain, your branding, your event page. Found via Google, social, or your email.
- They pick the event + ticket type. General admission, early bird, VIP, table-of-10 — whatever tiers you've configured. Quantity selector. Real-time inventory ("only 12 left at this price").
- Stripe Checkout takes the card. Apple Pay / Google Pay enabled. Your business is the merchant of record. Stripe charges the standard 1.5% + 20p.
- Tickets generate immediately — PDF + Apple/Google Wallet pass + email link. Each ticket has a unique QR code tied to that purchase.
- On the day: staff at the door open the TicketWave HQ ticketing app on their phone, point the camera at the attendee's QR code. Green tick = admit; red cross = already scanned / not valid. Works offline if your venue has bad signal.
- Post-event: attendee CSV is downloadable from your TicketWave HQ dashboard — name, email, phone, tickets, when they entered. Yours to use for next event's marketing.
What's in the box
Features that come with the ticketing module.
- Multi-tier ticketing — General admission, early bird, VIP, table-of-10, group discount, comp ticket. Configurable cap per tier; auto-progression (early-bird sells out → general admission opens).
- QR-scan at door — staff iOS / Android app that scans tickets, marks them admitted, syncs in real-time. Works offline; syncs when reconnected.
- Apple Wallet + Google Wallet passes — attendees can save the ticket to their phone wallet instead of remembering an email. Adds the event to their calendar automatically.
- Refund flow built in — attendee requests a refund; you approve/deny in the dashboard; Stripe processes it back to the original card. No support-ticket-chase situation.
- Capacity caps + waitlist — sell out fast? Waitlist auto-opens; if someone refunds, the next person on the waitlist gets a chance to buy.
- Promo codes — generate single-use or multi-use discount codes for partner promotions, social pushes, influencer collabs.
- Attendee CSV export — name, email, phone, ticket type, time scanned. Exportable any time, including during the event for "show me who's actually here".
- Recurring events — for class businesses, gym sessions, weekly nights: duplicate an event template, schedule the next 12 instances at once.
- Box-office mode — staff can sell walk-in tickets at the door via the app, including cash sales tracked separately. Same database, same QR codes, same scan-in flow.
How the integration works technically
Iframe mode — fastest to ship, robust at the door.
The ticketing module uses the iframe pattern: the live TicketWave HQ ticketing interface is embedded in your UK Web Marketing site via a sandboxed iframe (essentially a small window inside your page that loads the ticketing system). The reason: ticketing has the fastest product iteration of any module (every event has slightly different needs; the team is constantly shipping refinements), and iframes let TicketWave HQ ship those refinements without touching every event organiser's UK Web Marketing build.
The trade-off: an iframe is slightly slower than native HTML rendering (~200 milliseconds longer to first paint). The benefit: rock-solid behaviour at the door (the scan-in app + ticket validation are TicketWave HQ's most-tested surfaces, untouched by your UK Web Marketing site's specifics), and the ability to push fixes the same day you discover an edge case at a live event.
If your event has unusually strict SEO requirements (you need every event page indexable with full structured data), I can switch this module to the API pattern instead — at a slightly higher integration cost. Default is iframe. New to these terms? See the glossary.
Onboarding timeline
From "I want this" to "first ticket sold".
- Day 0: WhatsApp me with the event details. I send the TicketWave HQ ticketing signup link + pricing.
- Day 1: You subscribe on TicketWave HQ. Generate your client ID. Set up your first event in the dashboard — name, date, venue, tiers, capacity.
- Day 1–2: Stripe Connect setup so payments land in your bank. UK accounts approve same-day usually.
- Day 2: I wire the ticketing embed into your UK Web Marketing site. Each event gets its own page like
/events/[slug]; the "Buy tickets" button opens the embedded checkout. - Day 2–3: Test sale to yourself. Test QR scan-in via the staff app. Test refund flow.
- Day 3: Tickets go on sale. Email blast to your existing list ("Hi everyone, we've moved off Eventbrite — buy direct here for the same price"). Social pushes.
- Day 7+: Tickets selling; data accumulating in your TicketWave HQ dashboard; pre-event reminders auto-fire 24h and 1h before the event.
For a single one-off event: tickets on sale within ~3 days of starting. For an event series, the second event is faster (~half a day) because the venue + capacity + tier structures are already templated.
Common questions
What event organisers ask before activating ticketing.
How does this compare to Eventbrite's "free event" tier?
Eventbrite's free tier is for genuinely free events only — the second you charge anything, the booking fee kicks in. If your tickets are free and you just need RSVP tracking, Eventbrite's free is genuinely free; you might not need this module. The moment money changes hands, the TicketWave HQ module's maths is dramatically better.
Will Eventbrite let me export my existing attendee list?
Yes, but begrudgingly — you can export attendee CSVs per event but Eventbrite makes it deliberately hard to bulk-export across events. Plan on doing it event-by-event during your transition month. I'll help with the import on the TicketWave HQ side.
Can I migrate ticket sales for an in-progress event?
Technically yes — set up the event in TicketWave HQ, switch the "Buy tickets" button on your site to point at the new module, and refund/re-sell on Eventbrite for anyone confused. In practice: usually easier to finish out an in-progress event on Eventbrite and switch on TicketWave HQ for the next one. I'll advise based on the specific event.
How does refunding work?
Attendee submits a refund request through their ticket page. You approve or deny in the TicketWave HQ dashboard. Stripe refunds the original card; the refund hits the attendee's bank in 5–10 days (Stripe's standard timing). Your refund policy is configurable — "no refunds within 24h of event", "75% refund within 14 days", etc. Surfaced to the buyer at the point of sale.
What about touts / scalping?
Tickets are tied to the buyer's email + phone by default, and re-selling is disabled (the QR code becomes the holder's, non-transferable). You can enable transfers if you want them. For high-demand events you can also turn on a "verified resale" flow where the original buyer can list their ticket back to your platform and a new buyer picks it up at the original price — your cut, not StubHub's.
What if there's bad signal at the venue?
The scan-in app works offline. Tickets cached on the device at door-open; scans logged locally and synced when signal returns. No "the QR scanner won't work because the venue's wifi is rubbish" scenario at the gate.
What the embed actually looks like
Preview of the event ticketing module hook.
Below is the exact placeholder that sits on every UK Web Marketing site in the matching vertical until the customer activates the TicketWave HQ subscription. When activated, this region flips to the live module — no rebuild, no page change.
Event ticketing for events · clubs · classes · workshops
This site is built with the integration hook ready. Once you activate the TicketWave HQ event ticketing subscription, this region of the page becomes the live module — no rebuild, same day. Pricing and timing on the TicketWave HQ side.
Get this on your site
Start the website first. Add this module when you're ready.
The UK Web Marketing site is £45/mo with the first month free; this module activates separately via TicketWave HQ on its own pricing.