Service plans and serving rosters

A service plan is the order of everything that will happen: songs, readings, the sermon, announcements. The whole team sees the same plan, in the browser, in the phone app and in the desktop app at the projector. People with the Service plans: Edit permission (e.g. Leader) create plans. Teams, rosters and the schedule are changed by people with Teams & roster: Edit (Leader has it too).

A new service

1. Planning → Services → New service.
2. In the Date field, choose the day and time (10:00 by default), then the Service type, e.g. “Sunday service”. The first type on your list is already selected. The Title is filled in with that type and today's date, and it doesn't follow your changes, so correct it if you're planning another day.
3. On the left is the Songs list. Search by title or sort: Title, Recently played, Most played. Click + Add next to the songs for this service.
4. On the right, in the In this service section, drag the rows to set the order.
5. Click Save service.

A new plan is a Draft. The team can already see it, marked as a draft.

You add service types in Planning → Services, on the Service types tab.

Other items and plan details

On the plan page:

• Add item — Song, Header, Scripture, Sermon, Announcement or Other, e.g. a “Communion” header. With Scripture you type the reference.
• Service notes — information for the whole team.
• Form on a song — keep the song's form, choose a named form (e.g. “Short”) or set one For this service, e.g. without the third verse. The song itself doesn't change.
• Publish — the plan is ready. The status changes from Draft to Published, and the plan's songs go into the history behind Recently played and Most played.
• Duplicate — a copy of the plan titled “… (copy)” with the same date. Change its date and title, e.g. for next Sunday.
• Save as template — a fixed order for every Sunday. Templates are on the Templates tab.
• ▶ Perform mode — the plan's songs full screen, for musicians in the browser.
• Add sermon — links this service to a sermon in the archive. See Sermons and reading plans.

Presentations (PDF, PowerPoint, Keynote) and media are added in the desktop app: Preparing a service on the computer.

Teams and positions

First, set up your teams once:

1. Planning → Teams → Add team, e.g. “Worship”.
2. On the team page, in the Positions section, type a name in the Position name field (e.g. Vocals, Guitar, Drums) and click + (Add position). A new position needs one person. You'll see “×1” next to its name.
3. In the Members section, pick a person from the list and click Add member.

Useful settings:

• How often — the list next to each person in the Members section (“no limit” by default), e.g. “max 2× a month”,
• After a decline, invite the next person automatically — a setting for the whole team (off by default). At most 3 attempts per spot, and never less than 24 hours before the service,
• Lead vocal — a tick next to a position. The person serving there suggests their song keys in the plan (Personal keys on the song page).

Each team member needs the positions they serve in ticked. Otherwise Suggest a roster and automatic replacement will never pick them. You can't set this in the browser. Do it in the phone app: Church → Teams → the team → swipe the person left → Positions (people without a position are in the No position group). There you can also change how many people a position needs: the position's menu → Edit position → People needed.

You pick people for teams from the directory (People → Directory). Church members are added there automatically. People without an account are added there with Add person by someone with People: Edit (e.g. Administrator; Leader can only view), and from a CSV file (the Import tab) by someone with People: Manage.

In a larger church, the lists of people on the team page and in Roster only reach the first 50 names in the directory. Add the rest to a team in the phone app (Add person in the team), then assign them in Planning → Schedule, which lists team members.

The roster for one service

1. On the plan page, click Roster.
2. In the Assign section, choose a team, a position and a person. Next to the person you'll see Available or Unavailable. The latter means they've added blockout dates for that day.
3. Click the Assign button below the lists. The person appears in the list as Draft. Repeat for everyone else.
4. Click Send invites. You'll see, e.g., “Sent 5, skipped 0.”

Send invites goes to everyone with a draft or an unanswered invitation, so clicking it again sends the email again to people who haven't replied. To send only to new people, use the button in Schedule (below).

When someone declines, the Roster page suggests a replacement: Add draft, then Send invites.

A roster for many weeks

Planning → Schedule (Serving schedule) shows services and positions in one table.

• Drag a person onto a cell, or use the Roster button in the cell.
• Suggest a roster — the app fills the empty places. It first picks people who have served least in the shown period, then, on a tie, those who haven't served for the longest. It skips anyone unavailable or without that position, keeps to the “how often” limit and prefers to put members of one household together, unless one of them chose “Never on the same day”. You can change a suggestion (Replace with…). Then click Approve suggestions. They're saved as drafts.
• Send invitations — the button under the service name at the top of its column (it appears when there are drafts). Only now do people get requests. Until then the assignments are drafts and nobody is notified.
• Mark as open — in the Open spots to take section under the table. You offer a position so team members can take a date themselves. A sign-up goes straight into the roster as accepted, and people with that position get one combined notification. They see the list in the browser and on Android. The iPhone and iPad app in the App Store doesn't show it yet.

What the person on the roster gets

A “Serving request” email with a Respond button. It opens a page with Accept and Can't make it buttons (and an Add blockout dates option), with no sign-in needed. On iPhone and iPad, a notification also arrives with the same buttons. On Android the notification has no buttons, so they tap it to answer in the app. Everyone sees their own serving in the browser under Mine → My serving, and in the phone app on the Church tab, in the My serving section (when they have upcoming serving). More: My serving: responding and blockout dates.

Reminders before serving

Reminders are set in Settings → Reminders by someone with Church settings: Manage (e.g. Administrator).

There's a catch for now: a reminder only goes out for a plan with a service time saved, and New service saves the date alone. A service created in Music → Charts → New has one, and you can also set a Rehearsal (optional) there. Pick the right date in that window: changing the date on the plan page later doesn't move the saved time, and a duplicate keeps the original's time. For other plans, remind people yourself: in the phone app, open the plan and tap Remind in its roster. It goes to those who haven't answered, each at most once a day.

It's the same with the church calendar: only a published plan with a service time shows up in Planning → Calendar.

What's next

• The desktop app: installing and first launch
• Preparing a service on the computer