Event Organiser Simple Membership FAQ

If you are using a smartphone to do your group or event management and some of the screens are not fully visible, there is a setting in your web browser which may help you.  This setting will either be labelled ‘Request Desktop Site’ or just ‘Desktop Site’.  If you are using an iPhone this will probably be the first version and, when enabled, will change to say ‘Request Mobile Site’.

To find this setting:

• On Chrome, click on the 3 dot menu at the top right and it will be towards the bottom of the list
• On an iPhone, tap the ‘aA’ on the left of the search bar 

Setting Desktop mode allows the phone to view the website as if on a large screen and enables pinch-zoom plus drag

The desktop setting applies to the website domain on which you set it, so will not impact other sites you view.

The list of venues only includes those we use for groups. If you are going somewhere different, for example Alton Towers, leave the venue at the default of (Other) and type in the name of the venue in the ‘Other Venue’ box.

This is a free text box, so you can type in whatever you need to describe how long the event will last. E.g. ‘All Day’, ‘Until an hour after sunset’ or simply ‘1 hour’.

In the Event Finance screen, all members attending will show in a table and you will be able to see if they have paid. For all members who have paid by cash, make sure the box above the table says ‘Cash’, then for each member who has paid, click the orange £ symbol with the tick and confirm. For all members who have paid by cheque, change the ‘Cash’ option above the table to ‘Cheque’ and follow the same procedure as for cash.

When a member is removed from an event, either accidentally or deliberately, for which they have made a payment, they have to also be removed from the event finance page before they will re-appear on the available member list.

To remove them from the finance page if they have made a payment, first that payment has to be marked as refunded.  Once it has been marked as refunded you can then delete them from that page.

If the member was accidentally removed they will then be available to be added again.  Once they have been added, if they had previously made a payment you will have to mark them as paid and send a note to them and the Treasurer, explaining what has been done.  If they had previously paid by PayPal you will also need to include that information in the note to the Treasurer, so that he can correct the re-applied payment.

Please note: This process is under review, due to the additional work it creates for the Event Organiser and Treasurer.

Include the words ‘Date TBC’ in the name of the event and make the event date some distance into the future (e.g. a year). When the date is confirmed, enter it into the date field and remove ‘Date TBC’ from the event name

No

No, we are not currently offering Bank Transfer, just cash/cheque and card/PayPal

At the moment the system does not allow this. Until the facility is developed, the workaround is to ask u3a members to email the relevant group leader if they would like to be added into the event.

The group leader will then need to add the member to the group and then add them to the event. Following the event, any members added like this should be removed from the group.

If the group is at capacity, the maximum members value will need to be increased to accommodate the additional people.

Treasurer to refund the previous attendee and the new attendee to pay as normal through the system. If payment already made direct, Treasurer to still add a credit transaction to previous attendee and event organiser to mark new attendee as paid

Tap a name to select, tap multiple names to select multiple and tap a selected name to deselect it

Set the fee initially to the deposit amount. When the balance is required, increase the fee to the full amount.

This will require clear communications to the members to prevent them being confused about the fee

There is a button in the event description page for a Document Manager. Open this (see note below), Click the ‘Upload’ button and select the file(s) you want to upload. Once files have been selected press the ‘Upload’ button. Your files will then be uploaded and you can ‘Insert’ them into your document by pressing the ‘Insert’ button.

NB: When inserting a document it is good practice to change the target from ‘None’ to ‘New Window’, so that the document opens in a new browser window leaving the event page available.

Exit Doc Mgr, reduce the size of your browser contents (ctrl-minus) then go back into Doc Mgr. This should resolve the problem and you can make your browser contents bigger again (ctrl-plus) after you have finished with Doc Mgr

When sending an email, the following merge fields are available:
$PreferredName (uses Known As is available)
$Title
$Surname
$MembershipNumber
$Email
$MobilePhone
$HomePhone

Please note that the fields are case sensitive. I recommend you send yourself an email to test before emailing others.

If the event is not set to ‘Self sign-up’, instead of members being able to add themselves their application to attend will have to be managed by the event organiser.  This is done using the Manage Event Attendees function.

If you are running an event which has different options, incurring different fees, the following are two methods by which to deal with it:

• Set the event to ‘Apply to join’
• Set the fee to the maximum value.
• When a member applies, find out which option they want, then add them, apply the relevant discount and inform them they are on the list and can make payment.

Alternative

• When you initially set up the event, set the fee to £0.00 and explain about the different options in the description
• Ask the members attending to tell you which option they want
• Once your attendance list is complete, set the event fee to the maximum value and then apply the relevant discount to each attendee taking the cheaper options
• Send an email to the attendees, telling them that payment is now open

Please do not allow members to pay before applying the discount.  Doing so will cause more work for yourself and our Treasurer, handling refunds.

Although the event does not show on the group page, if you go into your calendar the event will be visible.