AES Suite 1.0

Auction Conductor

General Changes

• Removed the Category limit - Number of categories is now only limited by the package number range
• When logged off due to inactivity, users are now directed to the login screen instead of a logoff error screen
• Organization, Sponsor, Category and Package Images now automatically update on the bidding site when changed and no longer need to be refreshed manually.
• Fixed a bug which could prevent the Bid Activity chart from properly displaying
• Fixed a bug that would result in silent auction packages appearing in EC as multi-units
• When enabled in the Security tab under Edit User, AC users can now edit event timelines except for Event Start and End dates. By default, this box is unchecked for all new users.

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• Fixed a bug causing declined CC transactions to be counted as issues instead of declines in the Payment Grid
• In the event of an IATS communication error, encrypted card numbers will now be put on file and flagged as store and forward transactions.
• Implemented a contributor and package API that allows organizations to integrate external databases and applications with the AES platform.  This feature eliminates the need for data exports/imports for organizations that host multiple events per year with AES.  For detailed information, please email contactus@aesauctions.com

Contributors

• Now allowing identical emails and cell phone numbers to be saved to multiple contributor records, along with new checks & balances to make sure duplicate text messages are not sent to the same number
• Now allowing identical names to be saved to multiple contributor records (such as “guest of company”)
• Added two new default contributor types Online & Attending to differentiate between Patron's attending the event versus bidding from home or online.

Reporting

• Fixed a minor bug in Custom Report Generator for round up donations
• Fixed a bug causing the system to timeout when loading Patron Receipts or the in Custom Report Generator for events with a very large number of patron receipts.
• Fixed a duplicate email bug for Auction Conductor users.
• Custom Report Generator has been fixed to prevent the mixing of different entities in a single query.
• The wording of the message displayed when Patron Receipt report is first loaded has been modified for clarity.
• Patron Receipts can now be sorted by Bidder Number, Last Name, or Table Number
• An Invoice Summary report has been added to Event Day Materials
• When the event preference option to “Hide AES branding”  is enabled, we are now removing the AES logo from all big screen reports.
• Fixed a bug in the Winners List PDF report

Bid Sheets

Added a new report for Bid Sheets (Reporting > Event Day Materials)

Features:

• Half Page and Full Page options
• Organization Logo will appear on the left
• Bid Sheet Logo will appear on the right. If there is no Bid Sheet Logo uploaded, the Sponsor logo will appear instead.
• Buy Now Price will appear at the bottom if entered
• Ability to add a middle column for name, phone, etc.
• Middle Column Header must be formatted by your AES Event Manager.
• Ability to adjust the $ Amount printed on the first row on individual bid sheets to accommodate 2nd, 3rd, etc. pages.
• If there is an existing bid in the system for the Package, the high bid will appear on the first row of the bid sheet along with the current high bidder.

Payments Grid

The payments Grid has been reformatted to include the following

Users Column

• "Device name" when a cash or check payment is accepted via MUIP in Event Conductor.
• "EM User Name" when a cash, check, or credit card payment is accepted via checkout in Event Manager.
• AC User Name" when a cash, check or credit card payment is accepted via Auction Conductor.

Cash Box Column

• "Instant Pay - Package [pkg number]" when MUIP cash and check payments are made in Event Conductor
• "Assisted Checkout" when cash, check, or credit card payment is made in the Event Manager checkout screen.
• "Self Checkout" when a credit card payment is made in Event Conductor self-checkout
• "CC Pre-Swipe" when a credit card payment is made via "apply to accounts" button in Auction Conductor.
• "Auction Conductor" when a cash, check or credit card payment is made via the “Add Payment” feature in the Auction Conductor screen.

Event Conductor

General Changes

• Home page loading performance has been improved
• Event Conductor now accepts 5-digit bidder numbers
• Fixed a bug where the search function failed to find characters between quotation marks
• Buy Now prices now automatically raise by the Package’s bid increment when the current bid comes within four (4) increments of the Buy Now price, so that the Buy Now price is always at least 4 increments above the current bid.
• Fixed a bug where the search function failed to find characters between quotation marks
• When a user self-registers and selects any country besides the United States in the address field, the zip code field now changes to a “Postal Code” field and allows foreign postal codes to be entered.
• When the “Show how much time is remaining…” checkbox in Auction Conductor properties is unchecked, we now also hide the closing time as well as the “Closing Soon” banners in the Package and Category Screens.
• Fixed a bug where the Parent Category would show up in the Category screen even if it’s subcategories had no published Packages.
• Fixed a bug in Auction Eye that failed to account for the number of attendees when calculating “Expected Guests”, “Registered Guests” and “Unregistered Guests”.
• Fixed a bug in which the countdown clock was failing to load on some pages
• When the event preference option to “Hide AES branding” is enabled, we are now removing the AES logo from all pages
• On the multi-unit purchase page, we fixed a bug that would result in a long name pushing buttons off the useable screen area.
• Fixed a bug in which saving a device name in the tools menu would occasionally cause an unhandled exception.
• The favicon displayed for the website on the browser tab and sent via text message to apple devices is now customizable (via field in BC preferences).  The event title will also show now as opposed to “AES – Event Conductor”

Self-Registration

• Added the ability to link directly to the self-registration page on both big and small screen devices. To link to this page, simply add “?gotoregistration=true” to the end of our EC URL (ie https://aes.bid/demo?gotoregistration=true)
• When the “look me up” function fails to find an existing contributor, we are now displaying a link to the self-registration page so the user can more easily get what they need.
• Changed the “phone” field to “cell phone” as it is more applicable to our use case.
• Made significant improvements to the self-registration logic, which will cut down on duplicate registrations (when contributors already exist in the database) and enable organizations to open pre-registration to collect significant contact information and credit cards prior to the event.
• Added a “I am attending the event” checkbox and an accompanying field for the user to input their associated company/group. This allows us to look up existing “guest of company” records and attempt to pair the new registration to it.
• When new self-registrations are paired to existing contributor records, we are now overwriting the contributor contact information with the information collected during self-registration, to ensure their contact information is always up-to-date.

Credit Card Required to Bid

• Event Conductor no longer requires a patron to immediately place a credit card on file when they log into the auction for the first time.
• Instead patrons are asked for their card when they make their first purchase, donation, or bid.
• Once the card info is entered, the purchase completes automatically.

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Event Manager

General Changes

• Now allowing identical emails and cell phone numbers to be saved to multiple contributor records, such as when a family wishes to share the same email address or cell phone.
• Slash Minimum Bids now shows all packages without bids in numerical order, including pre-event auction packages.
• Credit cards now go into store and forward when IATS codes are not entered or there is a communication error with IATS.
• Slash Minimum Bids now shows all packages without bids in numerical order, including pre-event auction packages.
• Fixed a bug that prevented bid paddles from being generated for patrons with special characters (!@#$%^&*[]”:;’) in their name.
• Reformatted bid paddles for patrons with 5-digit bidder numbers to make them more legible.
• Fixed a bug that generated a false error when saving a live auction sell price before the bidder number.
• When entering bids via quick entry, the Buy Now price increases (if necessary) in order to maintain a Buy Now price of at least four (4) bid increments above the current bid.

Check-in

• Fixed a bug that could result in two newly added contributors being assigned the same bidder number
• Users can now sell additional admission tickets to a patron, even if they are marked paid or have already purchased as many admissions as they have attendees
• Admission Packages marked Instant Pay now just make sure a card is on file, but do not process till the contributor is checked out or Collect Abandoned Invoices is run.
• Users can now add patrons to tables that are already full or create a new table directly from the patron record in Check-In.

Checkout

• Fixed a bug that would prevent a bidders card on file from being used for an associated contributor
• Fixed a bug that would result in packages not being available for checkout when the package was part of an early categorical closing
• Changed the default search to bidder number (as opposed to name)
• Added a customized error message when the receipt type is not set
• Fixed a bug preventing some users from entering a donation.
• Updated the Purchases grid to refresh automatically when a user deletes a donation at checkout.

Sell No Bids

A “Sell No Bids” button has been added to the checkout screen

• Allows users to unsold silent auction and live packages directly from the checkout screen.
• If the auction is still open, silent auction packages will be greyed out and not available for sale, live packages can be sold at any time.

Sell Multi-Unit

A "Sell Multi-Unit" button has been added to the checkout screen

• Allows users to sell multi-unit packages (including admissions, sponsorships and fixed price packages) directly from the checkout screen.
• EM Admins are able to sell multi-units for below sale price and sell more multi-units than are available with a warning.
• Non-EM Admins can only sell for the pre-set price and qty.

Add Donation

The “Add Round-Up Donation” button has been changed to an “Add Donation” button that then allows the user to choose between a standard donation and a round-up donation.

Benefit Conductor

General Changes

• BC now checks to validate that the event status is confirmed before allowing the event to be published.
• Fixed a minor bug forcing new event contacts to have a password even if the contact is not an Auction Conductor user.
• Fixed a bug where Benefit Conductor would “lose” the event acronym and cloud server if the Save Changes button was clicked immediately after the event was deployed without making any additional changes to the event.
• Added a new checkbox to event preferences called “hide AES branding”. Enabling this feature will remove the AES logo from the mobile bidding application EC and any big screen reports being displayed at the event.
• Contributor import now allows identical names, emails and cell phone numbers to be imported to multiple contributor records

Security

• Passwords must now be changed every 90 days
• All passwords must be at least 8 characters of which one must be an upper case letter, one lower case letter, one a numeric digit and at least one of the following characters (!,@,#,$,%)

Package Import

• There is a new column “Show Restrictions”
• The “Make Available” column has been changed to “Publish to” allowing the user to publish the package to “Online Only”, “Event Only”, "None", or “All”