Conferences, in depth

Staff with the conferences role create a conference in the admin area. A conference has a status: Draft, Open, Waitlist, Closed, Cancelled or Completed. A family sees a conference only after staff publish it. The place can be on campus, off site or virtual, so a retreat in another state needs no parish room.

Staff set the dates, the registration window and the price. They add roles, such as Participant or Chaperone, and each role can have its own price. They also write the waivers and the questions. Each has an English text and a Spanish text, and staff choose who sees it: everyone, participants or chaperones. A change to a waiver raises its version. Earlier signatures keep the version that the person signed.

A registration has one of these states: PendingPayment, Confirmed, Waitlisted, Cancelled, CheckedIn or Completed.

1. A family registers inside the window. The server checks the answers and the waivers. A signature records the typed name and the version.
2. The server holds a place. If the conference is full, the family joins the waitlist in order.
3. The registration record exists before any money moves. If a family abandons the payment, staff can still recover the record.
4. The deposit confirms the place. A free conference confirms at once.

A family can cancel while the registration is pending, confirmed or waitlisted. A cancelled place passes to the next family on the waitlist. That family gets a deposit link and 72 hours to pay.

Staff set a total capacity. They can also set a limit for one group, such as one grade or one gender. A registration must fit in every limit that applies to it, or the server refuses it. A place is held for a short time while a family pays, and the hold expires by itself. The count can therefore err toward fewer places, never toward too many.

Staff can also create discount codes for one conference. A code lowers the total, so the balance falls with it. Codes from other parts of the parish do not apply here.

The server records money in a ledger of payment steps. The deposit is the first step. The balance opens after the deposit settles. Staff can split the balance into dated installments, and the last installment absorbs any rounding. Payments run through the parish payment system, and a family receives a payment link.

The payer gets a notice when the balance opens. The payer then gets reminders as the due date nears, and a notice after it passes. A family gets one message at a time, not a notice and a reminder together. The parish turns these messages on, and staff can edit their wording.

A family can ask for a scholarship. Staff approve or deny the request. An award changes only the unpaid steps. If a family paid more than the new total, the difference is a decision for staff. The server never refunds it by itself. The Finance and Receivables tabs show what each family owes.

An adult who picks a chaperone role must confirm the Safe Environment policy first. A person below the minimum age is refused. The Chaperones tab shows each application with the clearance state, which comes from the person record and refreshes each day. Staff approve, decline or withdraw. A young chaperone always needs a staff decision. A coverage panel shows how many chaperones the conference still needs.

The Assignments tab places registrants into cabins, small groups, tracks or shifts. A plan changes nothing until staff apply it. The plan lists the people it could not place and the requests it could not meet. Staff can lock a person in place. Families can name friends to be with and people to be apart from. A family never learns whether a name matched. After staff publish, a family sees only its group name and the first name of its leader.

The Roster tab lists every registration with its status and balance. The Attendance tab is the check-in list, with large buttons for use at the door. A check-in moves the registration to CheckedIn and records the time.

A conference can turn on fundraising. Staff add funds and set a goal. A family starts a page with a first name, a headline, a message, a link and a QR code. Friends give through the page. A gift can pay down the family's balance when staff allow it for that fund. A ledger lists every gift. The page never shows a last name, an age, a school or a photo.