ClaimRow function not working when using twice in the same Email Send

Question

I am using regularly the ClaimRow() function in many of my sends for assigning coupons to my subscribers. As I have to be able to assign more than one coupon to my subscribers from different sends, I have included some extended functionality to the ClaimRow function: basically after claiming one coupon, I delete the coupon from the original data extension and insert the claimed details in a secondary data extension for keep monitoring the coupons being claimed properly. As I am deleting the records from the original data extension I can use ClaimRow later on and assign new coupons to the same subscriber. This functionality is working properly.

Now, I have to assign in one unique email, two different coupons to the same subscriber, so what I am doing is to execute my code twice in a row. The thing is that is not working. It is assigning properly the first coupon, so the first time I call ClaimRow() function is working but after that gets blocked and the Email is being cancelled.

My code is:

   Set @CouponRow = ClaimRow('DEName', 'IsClaimed', 'SubscriberKey', _subscriberkey, 'EmailAddress', emailaddr)
   IF NOT EMPTY(@CouponRow) THEN
   Set @couponCode = Field(@CouponRow, "CouponCode")
   Set @ClaimedDate = Lookup('DEName','ClaimedDate','CouponCode', @couponCode)
   Set @TimeStamp = Lookup('DEName','TimeStamp','CouponCode', @couponCode)
   InsertDE('DEName_Claimed','CouponCode', @couponCode, 'EmailAddress', emailaddr, 'isClaimed','True', 'TimeStamp', @TimeStamp, 'ClaimedDate', @ClaimedDate, 'SubscriberKey', _subscriberkey)
   DeleteDE('DEName','CouponCode', @couponCode)

Answer 1

I can see, that you are using a very basic set of criteria to identify which row to claim:

Set @CouponRow = ClaimRow('DEName', 'IsClaimed', 'SubscriberKey',
 _subscriberkey, 'EmailAddress', emailaddr)

This will limit the claiming to only one row in Data Extension for each of your subscribers. What you need, is another column, allowing you to distinguish each of the function calls, e.g.:

Set @CouponRow1 = ClaimRow('DEName', 'IsClaimed', 'SubscriberKey',
 _subscriberkey, 'EmailAddress', emailaddr, 'claimNumber',1)
Set @CouponRow2 = ClaimRow('DEName', 'IsClaimed', 'SubscriberKey',
 _subscriberkey, 'EmailAddress', emailaddr, 'claimNumber',2)

When your second function call is executed, it will look for unclaimed row, with a combination of subscriber key, email address and claimNumber. As number 1 is already claimed, and number two is not, it will execute twice, and mark two rows as claimed.

The value of claimNumber should just be null on import. Do keep in mind, that you can't do conditional claiming. I.e. all your coupons in the data extension should be of same type (e.g. free shipping OR 10% off). If your two coupons differ by type, they need to be claimed from two different DEs. The value of claimNumber only serves the purpose of identifying in which context the coupon was claimed.

The example on the documentation page also includes additional values, such as jobId and listId, making it unnecessary to remove claimed rows from your data extension:

SET @CouponRow = ClaimRow('Coupon', 'IsClaimed', 'JobID', JobID,
 'ListID', ListID, 'BatchID', _JobSubscriberBatchID,
 'SubscriberID', SubscriberID)