The Auction Dashboard
Once your auction is live, the admin dashboard becomes your central command center. It has three main views:
Silent Auction Items
Participants
Live Auction Items
Manage Auto Charge if Enabled
You can switch between these using the tabs at the top of the dashboard.
Silent Auction Items View
This tab shows all items available for silent auction bidding. For each item you can see:
Item name
Leading bid — The current highest bid amount (updates as the auction progresses).
Gift amount — Automatically calculated as the difference between the highest bid and the fair market value. This represents the tax-deductible portion.
Total number of bids — Shows how much interest each item has generated.
Highest bidder — The name of the person currently winning the item.
Sold status — Whether the item has been sold.
Fund — Which fund the proceeds are designated for.
You can sort by any column to quickly find the most popular items, the highest bids, or items nearing their close.
Use the Refresh button to pull in the latest bid data.
Participants View
This tab shows everyone who is participating in the auction. For each participant, you can see:
Name of the participant.
Items they are currently winning — Which items they hold the leading bid on.
Total number of bids — How many bids this person has placed across all items.
Amount owed — The total amount this participant currently owes based on items they are winning.
This view is especially useful for identifying your most active bidders and understanding overall engagement.
Live Auction Items View
This tab shows all items tagged as "live auction." These items are auctioned in person, and the winning bid is recorded manually by an admin.
Assigning a Live Auction Winner
After an item has been auctioned off at your event:
Go to the Live Auction Items tab.
Find the item and click Assign Winner.
Select the winner's name from the list of registered participants.
Enter the winning bid amount (must be equal to or greater than the starting bid).
Click Record a Sale.
The item will now show the winner's name and display as "Sold."
You can assign winners during the live auction as each item is sold, or record all winners at the end of the event — whichever works best for your team.
Adding New Items During an Auction
If you need to add items while the auction is already in progress:
Click the Create New button on the dashboard.
Fill in the item details (same process as initial setup).
Publish the item.
The new item will immediately appear on the auction site for participants.
Monitoring Tips
Refresh regularly — Use the refresh button to keep the dashboard current, especially during the final hours of an auction.
Watch the bid count — Items with many bids are generating the most excitement. Consider promoting items with fewer bids.
Check participant engagement — The Participants view helps you see who's most active. This data is useful for post-auction donor engagement.
Use multiple pages — If you have many items, the dashboard supports pagination. You can browse through all items across multiple pages.
After the Auction Closes
Once the auction end time passes:
The highest bidder on each silent auction item is declared the winner.
Winners receive a congratulations email with payment details.
During the payment window, winners can go to the Cart section of the auction site and complete checkout.
Monitor payment completion from the dashboard.
Auto-Charge Management
If auto-charge is enabled for your auction, payment for winning bidders is processed automatically using their saved cards.
Scheduled auto-charge — When you configured the auction, you set a date and time for auto-charge to trigger. The dashboard shows the scheduled auto-charge time and its current status (pending, processing, or completed).
Manual trigger — If you need to process payments before the scheduled time, or if you chose not to set an automatic schedule, click the Trigger Auto-Charge button on the dashboard. This immediately initiates payment processing for all winners with saved cards.
Monitoring auto-charge results — After auto-charge runs, the dashboard updates each winner's payment status:
Paid — Payment was successfully processed.
Failed — The saved card was declined or could not be charged. You can follow up with these winners to arrange an alternative payment method.
Pending — Payment is still being processed.
