When you open your service settings, you will see three different sections:
- Services
- Volunteers
- Roster
Services TAB
Reporting
Custom reporting fields for the services area are very similar to the groups area where you can record custom information for the services in your church.
Unlike groups where you may like to take individual attendance (e.g., John was there, Evie was there), instead, you would do a headcount. To set up a reporting field to include that in a service, follow these steps:
- Click and drag a reporting field box over.
- Name it "Headcount".
The available fields are:
- Heading: A heading or title.
- Reporting: For numbers.
- Notes: For text.
- Separator: A line, for visual aesthetics.
Print Presets
When viewing a service, you can print out a service plan. These presets will appear when you print a service and save it as a preset. This will be set up when you decide you need to print something down the track. For now, it won’t apply.
Volunteers TAB
Notification Settings
This section has various settings mainly related to notifying volunteers that they have been scheduled onto a service.
Notify ‘Reports To’ Volunteer/Person
When you roster a new volunteer onto a service, you can choose who the volunteer reports to (under Departments). By default, the 'Reports To' volunteer is notified when a scheduled volunteer confirms or declines. You can change this so that the 'Reports To' volunteer is only notified when someone declines.
Automatically Contact Volunteers when Scheduled onto a Service
If you enable this option, the moment you schedule a volunteer onto a service, they will be notified by email or SMS. If you enable either of these, our app will also send a push notification at the same time.
Automatically Contact Volunteers when UNScheduled from a Service
This is the same as the above, but it’s when you un-schedule them. This setting isn’t used as much as the one above, but if you feel people need to know you’ve removed them from an upcoming service, this is a way to notify them automatically when you do it.
Follow Up Unconfirmed Volunteers
Using this setting enables your account to automatically follow them up until they confirm or decline a scheduled request. You can send the reminder in 2 days and then every 2 days until you get an action. Adjust the frequency based on how soon you need the scheduling to be actioned.
Volunteer Schedule Reminder
This is a way of reminding people they are scheduled for an upcoming service and you’re awaiting their availability. This is sent every 2 days until they confirm. Depending on how far out you organize rosters, you may like to change this.
Every setting in your account can be adjusted at any time, so nothing you save is locked in concrete, and you can always come back and review again once you start using Elvanto regularly.
Roster TAB
This section is specifically about how a person’s roster is viewed.
Default Status when Scheduling New Volunteers onto a Service
When you schedule a volunteer onto a service, do you wish them to be confirmed or unconfirmed by default? 'Confirmed' means that the volunteer is happy to be scheduled on the service, and 'unconfirmed' means you are giving them an option to say yes or no.
Services On A Roster
So going back to the Roster Settings, you can choose how many services in advance you wish to show on the member's roster. By default, it will display 4 weeks, but you can change it to as many weeks or months in advance as you want.
Default Roster Tab
When looking at a service within the roster, do you want to show the list of volunteers and who are scheduled on first, or show the plan of the service (e.g., what is happening at the service)?
Unconfirmed Volunteers on Roster
There is an option for you to show or hide the unconfirmed volunteers on the roster. Some people only like to show confirmed people, but others want to show everyone until they say decline.
Show Family Members on Roster
This setting allows your volunteers to also see where their family members are scheduled on. This is useful for parents or spouses to know where each member of the family is on any upcoming service.
Only Display Services that Volunteers are Scheduled on the Roster
If there are 10 services coming up, but a volunteer was only rostered on 2 of the 10, do you want that volunteer to see all 10 services or just the 2 they are rostered on?
Only Display Departments that Volunteers are Assigned to on the Roster
This works in conjunction with the above, but when you look at the roster, do you want the volunteers to see all the departments and volunteers rostered across the church, or do you only want to show the department/area that that volunteer individual is serving in?
Block Volunteers from Declining Services after Confirming
Once a volunteer has confirmed they can serve at an upcoming service, do you want them to be able to decline at a later date? You can block it completely or set a time limit (e.g., 5 days before the service starts).
Unavailability Submission Time Limits
This is similar to the above, but it’s regarding how much notice volunteers must give when submitting their availabilities. How many days notice do you need from them to notify that they cannot attend or volunteer at an upcoming service?
Block Volunteers from Submitting Unavailability when Scheduled
If a volunteer tries to submit unavailability for a date they are already rostered on for an upcoming service, do you wish to block or allow this?
Swap & Replace
Swap and Replace is a clever tool. Once a volunteer has been scheduled on a service, rather than having them decline if they’re not available, they use the feature called “Swap & Replace”.
- Swap: They can swap with someone who may be rostered on an upcoming service.
- Replace: They can find a replacement from available volunteers on the list.
Prevent Requests
You can give a time limit to when a volunteer can swap and replace (e.g., 7 days before the service starts).
Cancel Pending Requests
You may wish to cancel any pending requests within 5 days of your service starting. If this is enabled, the volunteer would be notified at this point and they would then need to contact the church’s admins for assistance in finding a replacement.
Conflict Time
Volunteers can’t be in two locations at once, so by default, if a volunteer is scheduled on a service, the system will mark them as having a conflict if someone tries to schedule them on at the same time. This setting allows you to set a time limit between when they are available again so as not to overlap or be rostered on more than once on the same day.
Scheduled Preferences
When your volunteers set their scheduling preferences, they can choose how many services they are able to serve at. This setting allows you to choose whether to treat a service time as its own service or not.