Solutions to the most common errors and surprises when creating or saving a booking.
Fixing "Cannot create artist on the fly"
If saving a booking returns an error telling you an artist cannot be created on the fly, the booking is pointing at an artist record that is damaged — usually because two records for the same artist exist, often left behind by an import.
What to do
Removing and re-adding the artist on the booking will not hold while the duplicate record is still there, so start with us rather than with the booking.
Start a chat from the messenger and tell us the artist name and roughly how many bookings are showing the error. We'll clear the duplicate record behind it.
Once we confirm it's cleared, open the affected booking and go to the Change tab (the last tab on the left).
Click the trash icon next to the artist name. This only removes the artist from this booking — it does not delete the artist from your roster.
Re-add the artist from the artist field.
Click Save Booking.
Repeat on each affected booking.
If that doesn't work
If a booking throws several errors stacked on top of each other and still refuses to save after the artist is re-added, stop there and don't keep retrying — that booking needs rebuilding on our side. Start a chat from the messenger, tell us which booking it is and paste the error text exactly as it appears, and we'll take it from there.
Good to know
Paste the error word for word when you message us. The error often names a different record than the one you were editing, and that name is the fastest route to the cause.
If more than one booking is affected, tell us all of them at once — the underlying record is shared, so they're usually fixed together.
To avoid this recurring, keep one roster entry per artist. When you import a list, check the roster afterwards for two entries with the same or nearly the same name.
Fixing errors when creating a buyer or venue
A new buyer, promoter or venue record that refuses to save is either a problem with that one record or a limit that has been reached on your whole account. Which one it is tells you what to do next, so check that first.
Work out which it is
Try creating a second, unrelated buyer or venue with a different name and email.
If that one saves fine, the problem is with the first record — keep reading below.
If every buyer and venue save fails with a generic error, your account has hit the limit on how many contacts can be created in a short window. Nothing in your settings changes this. Start a chat from the messenger with your account name, the exact error and a screenshot, and we'll lift the limit — creation works again straight away once we do.
If only one record fails
Open the Contacts tab on the booking and search for the name. Duplicates left over from imports are a common cause.
Check whether one of the results is an organization card rather than a person — organization cards show a building icon. Having both an organization card and a person card for the same company causes save errors and sends documents to the wrong signer.
Run Contacts > Manage Settings > Clear Cache to refresh a stale contact list, then try the save again.
Turn off ad blockers and privacy extensions for your Gigwell domain, retry in a private window, and try a second browser. These extensions break parts of the dashboard.
Good to know
If the record saved but the name or email on it is wrong, don't edit it inline and don't delete it — that isn't the fix and inline edits appear to revert. See the article on correcting a buyer or venue name or email for the procedure that actually holds.
Give each person their own email address. Two contacts sharing one address is the root of most signer and routing surprises later on.
Band members disappearing from a booking
If you add players or band members to a booking and they're gone when the page comes back, it's usually down to where you added them from. Members added on the events screen are the ones that go missing most often.
How to make members stick
Try these in order — most people are sorted by the first one.
Open the booking and go to the Change tab. The member list sits on the right-hand side.
Add your players or band members there rather than from Events > Artist & Location.
Click Save Booking. Reopen the booking and check the members are listed.
If you'd rather work from the events screen:
Add the members under Events > Artist & Location.
Click Save Booking directly. Don't click Close first — closing the panel before saving is what drops the list.
Reopen the booking to confirm.
If that doesn't work
Turn off ad blockers and privacy extensions for your Gigwell domain, or open the booking in a private window, and try again. These extensions block parts of the dashboard and silently drop form data.
Try a second browser, and if you can, a second computer.
If the members still vanish after all of that, this one needs our team. Start a chat from the messenger, tell us which booking it is and which browsers you tried, and a short screen recording of the save helps us a lot.
Good to know
Save often while you're building a booking with a long member list. Adding everything in one pass and saving at the end gives you more to redo if something drops.
Members you add on a booking are specific to that booking. Adding a permanent band member to the artist's roster entry means they carry onto new bookings automatically.
Terms not showing on the contract or offer
If a value is on the booking but blank on the document, the data is fine — the template has no matching variable for it. Documents only render values where a matching variable exists in the template, so the fix is in the template rather than on the booking.
This comes up most often with special provisions, hospitality, ticket info, backline, account info, merch rate, deal phrase and contract ID.
How to fix it
Open the template the booking uses and search it for a variable matching the missing value.
If there's no matching variable, add one in the right place in the document. The templates and variables articles cover which variable to use and where it has to sit.
Save the template.
Go back to the booking and re-save it, or create a new draft, so the document is rebuilt with the updated template.
Generate the document again and check the value appears.
If the document is already out for signature
A document that has been issued never updates retroactively — it's a fixed record of what was sent. Editing the template does nothing to it. To get the corrected version in front of your signer you have to retract and issue a new one, which invalidates the signing links already sent.
Good to know
Some values exist only as part of a larger variable rather than on their own. Ticket-tier bonus phrasing is the common example: it renders as part of the deal phrasing and has no standalone form, so you can't place it by itself.
Variable placement inside tables, nested rows and signer blocks is fiddly, and a variable in the wrong cell renders blank even though it's spelled correctly. If you've added the variable and it's still empty, start a chat from the messenger — tell us which template, where the content should appear, and which booking you're testing on.
Templates are Google Docs and save automatically, so routine wording edits are yours to make without anyone's help.
If you have any questions or need additional help, please reach out to support@gigwell.com or use the chat widget on your screen.