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Play areas

Your physical playing fields — "Indoor Field 1", "Speedball", "The Village". Set these up if you want parties booked onto specific fields, or you need to cap how many groups run at once.

Who can do this: Owners and Managers. Where: Sidebar → Catalog & Pricing → Play Areas

Do I need play areas?#

No, if you run one field, or you don't care which group goes where. PBHQ works fine without them — the area step is skipped and all your availability math is unchanged.

Yes, if you want to:

  • Let party customers choose (or be assigned) a specific field
  • Cap simultaneous parties per group of fields ("only 2 parties indoors at once")
  • Split gear stock between fields (gear allocations)
  • Reserve specific fields for an event
  • Close one field for a rain-out while the rest stay open (special hours)

Walk-ons are never affected by play areas. They always draw from the general pool.

Groups come first#

Every area belongs to a group, and you have to create a group before you can create an area. If you try, PBHQ redirects you with "Create a play area group first before adding areas."

Groups are how you organize fields and how you cap concurrency.

Creating a group#

"Group Details"

Field What it does
"Group Name" e.g., "Indoor", "Outdoor", "Speedball"
"Max Concurrent Parties" "Maximum private parties that can run simultaneously in any area within this group."
"Sort Order" Display order.

"Max Concurrent Parties" is usually about staffing, not space. Three outdoor fields with two referees means a cap of 2.

Validation: the group cap can't exceed your field-wide cap — "Facility max concurrent parties is {n} so this group cannot allow more than that. Adjust the facility setting or choose a lower number." The field-wide number is "Maximum Simultaneous Private Parties" in Operations settings.

Creating an area#

"Area Details"

Field What it does
"Area Name" e.g., "Indoor Field 1", "Outdoor Field 2"
"Tagline (optional)" Short subtitle shown under the area name on the booking page, e.g. "Container Maze"
"Group" Which group it belongs to. Required.
"Activity" "Which activity this area is for. Choose Any to show it for every activity."
"Sort Order" Display order within the group.
"Active" Turn an area off without deleting it — winter closures, resurfacing.
"Area Photo (optional)" Shown on the area's card during booking.

How availability works#

When a customer picks a time, PBHQ offers areas that are:

  1. Active
  2. Not already booked for that window, including your buffer minutes
  3. Within the group's "Max Concurrent Parties" cap
  4. Within your field-wide "Maximum Simultaneous Private Parties" cap
  5. Not reserved by a published event
  6. Not closed by special hours

Areas allowed by a party package's "Allowed Play Areas" setting are filtered on top of that.

Your dashboard shows area status#

On a single-day view, the dashboard home page has a "Field availability" panel with a dot per area and a note like "Open all day", "Next 3:00 PM", or "{party name} · now" — a quick read on what's free right now. See Dashboard home.

Deleting an area#

Two guards:

Refused if a future published event reserves it:

Cannot delete "{name}" — it is reserved by upcoming event(s): "X", "Y". Cancel or reschedule the event(s) first, or remove this area from them.

Allowed, with a warning, if bookings use it:

Play area "{name}" deleted. {n} upcoming booking(s) are no longer associated with a play area.

Those bookings survive — they just no longer have a field assigned, and you'll want to reassign them by hand. Untick "Active" instead if you might want the area back.