Yes, we are working on this option right now. The ability to turn off the automatic cancellation. So the registration process will work without any changes, the same as now.

Not sure if I like 15 minute deletion of unpaid online event invoices. Many times people register with smart phone but wait to get back home to pay bill with credit card info. If there an option do remove this "new" feature?

People who are registering for an event must have to pay during registration. it is inconvenient for the account holder to have to constantly monitor and resend invoices for payment.

Any progress update on the very useful feature?

Right now we are working on this issue.
I merged your comment into the related thread – https://forums.wildapricot.com/forums/308932-wishlist/suggestions/8826850-only-complete-registration-once-payment-is-receive

As soon as it will be released we will update the thread status and notify users.

Wild Apricot's continued inability to address the online pay only issue of allowing a contact to register for an event without receiving payment is becoming a real problem. We find ourselves having to email or call a registrant to follow up on getting paid. We raised this issue before. If Wild Apricot cannot address this issue we may need to explore other membership software options.

Usually, we don't give any ETA, because it depends on many factors. But it could be November or December.
We will notify additionally as soon as it will be ready for release.

Does anyone know what is the implementation date for this option?

Walt, that makes sense, thanks. I got your point.

About new feature: the automatic cancellation will be enabled by default for 'Online only' payment method.
And for all new events the Event registration canceled email is enabled by default.

Katya, I see a problem if the admin has to proactively select the Registration cancelled email. Many of us copy an existing event to create a new one. We may not have that email selected now. We won't remember about this new feature and that we need to select it.

(I have the same problem on user cancellation of registration. It's a great feature but I have to remember to enable it when I copy an old event.)

So I would suggest that if a registration is automatically cancelled, an email automatically be sent to the user,

While I'm thinking about this workflow - why doesn't Registration cancellation email default to enabled? That would solve most of this problem. (But only if it is applied to all existing events.)

Walt, thanks for suggestions. Actually, it will work exactly as you described.

If registration was cancelled, the user will receive only the Registration canceled email, if it is selected in the event emails settings. And the Registration confirmed if registration was paid only (the same as it works now). So to notify your members you need to set up these emails in the event email settings.

Regarding the payment method. Yes, to turn off the automatic cancellation you would have to select the 'Offline / Online' payment method. That could increase the workload, but at the same time, the feature will decrease it for those who use Online only payments now. Our statistics say that this option is used by 30% of customers (at least once).
And we are ready to handle such requests (turn-off the feature) manually since we do not expect that there will be many of them

Katya, we would like the turn on/off option, but it should default to "on" as most users will prefer that.

A few of our members have figured out that they can pay by check under the current situation, and we can handle that.

With automatic cancellation, we would have to enable both online and offline payment. If more members choose offline, it would increase the workload for the organizer, who might have to chase more people for payment.

It would help if there were a way to send an automatic payment reminder to those who select offline payment but then don't pay right away. There is a wishlist item for that: https://forums.wildapricot.com/forums/308932-wishlist/suggestions/9360177-event-payment-reminders

Katya, it's great that this is being implemented. Two comments:

Will a member whose reservation is automatically cancelled be sent an email notice? Otherwise, if there is a problem with the payment that the member doesn't notice, they may show up at the event not knowing their reservation was cancelled.

Also, what is the workflow for an online payment? Does the member receive both a Reservation pending and a Reservation confirmed email?

I suggest that if they try to pay online, then no email should be sent until they complete payment or 15 minutes elapses. Then if they have paid they get Reservation confirmed, and if not then they get either a cancellation email (if online payments only is selected) or a Reservation pending email (if online or offline payments are selected).

Brett, good questions, thanks.

For sure, we are going to include all the information to the registration process on the public side. The time they have and the consequences that will be (cancellation).
Also, you always could use event payment instructions to include additional information for your registrants.

And, forgot to mention, we are considering the turn-on / off option for this function. But this is under the question now, will be decided later based on the feedback.

So to be clear is this place now? Could people think they are registered and be removed in 125 minutes? Does it tell them this fact? I run over 250 different events in a year and really count on knowing who is at the events. I am 100% wanting them to have to pay upon arrival but need clarification.

Katya, thanks for the update. What you have described sounds to me like a good start.

Please, please restrict registrations to only those where payments have been applied- either deposit or paid in full. It creates a nightmare to constantly be emailing those who have registered and not paid ANYTHING. (Aside from having to constantly change those who actually did leave a deposit-- to full registrations- this is also a big problem, and an additional step for admins.) SO, to be clear, we WISH that
1) All registrations require a deposit or payment in full- or the registration is not processed/accepted.
2) When a deposit is made (or that option is chosen) the system automatically applies that to the full registration cost and emails the registrant a confirmation of the deposit amount, and shows the balance due- reflective of the total cost, less the deposit.

These two small changes could make a huge difference to administrators!!!
Thank you

I agree with the original poster. I run a small business and when members register for an event without paying, it takes away a spot from a paying member and I then have to spend time tracking down the member for payment and in some scenarios, the member cancels last minute with no penalty. This should be a high priority to the WA developers.

Yes, this is absolutely a HUGE issue! I did not actually realize that unpaid registration was an option when "online payment only" is selected. Why in the world would unpaid registration be an option? Item number 1 from above is our primary issue: 1. A bunch of our events have limited registration so when people register without paying, It is closing our events to participants that have no financial commitment yet to us, which causes issues trying to receive those payments before the scheduled events.
PLEASE fix this!

We need a requirement that a non member cannot register without making payment.