Leavers — recording who left, and why

Members leave. Some move away, some get too old for it, some die, and some go because the subscription went up or because something happened at the club that nobody dealt with. Only the last two are things a committee can do anything about — and until 9.99.162 Pavilion could not tell you which was which, because the reason for archiving somebody was typed into a free-text box and then read back by nothing at all.

👋 Recording somebody as having left

On the member list, use Archive. Pavilion checks first and tells you what they are still holding — an upcoming booking, a duty on Saturday’s rota, a competition entry, a locker, a committee role, an unpaid subscription. Then you pick a reason from the list, add a note if there is anything worth keeping, and set the date they left.

Leave “release everything they were holding” ticked and Pavilion does what a club otherwise has to remember by hand: cancels their future bookings, takes them off the rota, withdraws them from competitions, frees the locker and clears any club role. Untick it only when you are tidying up an old record rather than recording a real departure.

✉️ Why it matters that the status changes

Archiving used to hide somebody from the member list and do nothing else. Their membership still said “active”, and every mailing looks at the status — so an archived member carried on getting newsletters, email campaigns, texts and the whole renewal chasing sequence. A member archived after a bereavement was sent “We miss you — please renew your membership” twenty-eight days after their renewal date. Recording somebody as having left now sets their status, and one shared rule keeps them out of every mailing.

🕊 Deceased members

Deceased is its own reason and its own membership status, precisely because everything that suppresses email keys on the status. Choosing it means the club will never write to that address again. Their record, their playing history and their name in past results all stay exactly as they are.

📊 The report

Members → Leavers shows a season at a time: how many joined, how many left, the net change, and what proportion of the membership you kept. Below that is the breakdown by reason, which is the part worth taking to a committee meeting. Four people moving away is weather. Four people saying it costs too much is a decision you have made.

↩️ If somebody comes back

Restore them from the archived list. They come back as lapsed rather than active, because coming back is a membership decision and the subscription still has to be sorted out. Why they left the first time is kept — it used to be wiped, which threw away the one thing you most wanted to know about them.

📣 When a member tells you first

Members can now say they are leaving from the app, under More. It sends a message to the club and changes nothing — the request appears at the top of this screen, and somebody speaks to them before anything is recorded. That matters: money may be owed either way, and a fair few people who press it on a bad Tuesday have changed their mind by the weekend.

Common questions

Does archiving stop them logging in?

No. Their WordPress account still exists and still works — they simply cannot book, and the club will not write to them. Removing the login is a separate decision, and if somebody has asked to be erased under GDPR that is the tool to use, not this one.

Somebody left owing us a subscription. Should I archive them?

Yes — and settle the money separately. The pre-archive check tells you the fee is outstanding so you cannot miss it, but archiving deliberately does not write anything off. The charge stays on their account.

What happens to their match appearances and past results?

Nothing. Everything historical stays. Only future commitments are released, because those are the ones that affect somebody else — a rink standing empty or a rota slot nobody knows is unfilled.

We archived people before this existed. Will the report show them?

Yes, but as “not recorded” — there was no reason to record. Anything typed into the old free-text box is shown as it was written. From now on the list of reasons builds a picture.

A member has died and their family are still getting emails.

Archive them with the reason “deceased”. That sets the status which every mailing checks, and it stops immediately. If it has already happened, that is the bug fixed in this version, and we are sorry it took so long.

Can I delete a member instead of archiving them?

You can, from GDPR → erase, but think first: deleting takes their playing history, their appearances and their payment record with them, and the accounts will no longer add up for past years. Archiving is almost always what you want.