Blog · Access control
The 7 access control mistakes every event repeats
After hundreds of events, access control failures no longer surprise us: they are always the same seven. What does surprise is how cheap they are to avoid compared with what they cost at the door.
Here they are, in order of how much they hurt.
1. Two lists, "just in case"
The digital list plus a printed spreadsheet "for safety". At 9:05 somebody pencils a change onto the paper, and from that moment nobody knows which list rules. One list, live until the last minute — late changes get imported, not scribbled. It is piece number 1 of the complete guide, and not by accident.
2. The organiser's password, shared in a group chat
All the door staff signing in with the organiser's account: anyone can touch what they shouldn't, and the log cannot tell who scanned what. Scanner accounts exist for exactly this: they only scan, they are created for the event and retired afterwards — and every read is signed by its device.
3. Not deciding what happens with a repeated QR
The warning fires mid-rush and the door staff improvises: one gets through, the next doesn't, and the queue has opinions. There are two valid policies — warn and let a human decide, or reject outright — and both are decided the day before, not at the door. It is point 3 of the day-of checklist.
4. Trusting the venue's coverage
The system "worked perfectly" at the office, and the event is in a basement. If the app cannot validate offline against the downloaded list, the antenna governs your queue. Test it ON SITE with airplane mode: it takes a minute, and the app is built for it.
5. Sizing by total capacity instead of the peak
"We're 800 people, two phones will do." Depends: do they arrive over two hours or over twenty minutes? A human scanner reads a QR every 2-3 seconds, and the correct calculation is done on the peak minute. The honorary eighth mistake is blaming the server: it sustains 330+ scans per second — the bottleneck is always the physical door.
6. Asking for half a biography at registration
Every extra form field scares off sign-ups, and you will use it neither at the door nor in the report. Ask for the essentials and mark as unique the fields that must not repeat — registration done right is half of event day already won.
7. Never opening the report afterwards
The event ends, everyone goes home, and the scan log dies unopened. It was all in there: when the real peak arrived, how many repeat warnings fired, how many people came through each door. Today's report is the sizing of your next event — export it to Excel that same night, and next year you build the door on data, not on memories.
Recognised yourself in any of these? The good news: all seven are fixed in one afternoon with the platform properly configured — and if you would rather go over your setup together, write to us: reviewing a configuration takes twenty minutes and saves all seven headaches at once.