Process Bulk Non-Attendance

This article guides you through to steps to mark off non-attendance in bulk (e.g. closure for renovations, teacher absences, emergency shutdown, or forgetting to put in blocks for a Public Holiday before invoicing etc).

A Quick Reference Guide is located first, guiding you through the steps to process.

If you need a more detailed guide with screen shots, refer to the detailed process further down.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you need to send out an urgent SMS notifying of a cancellation of classes from the Attendance screen, you will need to do this before marking students as absent. If you forget to do this first, you can send out a message via a Communication Campaign instead.

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Quick Reference Guide

From Administration click on Process Bulk Non-Attendance, then:

1. Select the Non-Attendance Reason

2. Enter your start and end dates (same date for both if it is the one day)

3. Enter your start and end times (leave to the default setting if you want to non-attend ALL classes on the dates entered)

4. The remaining fields are optional. If you want to Non-Attend ALL classes in the date and timeframe specified above, you do not need to complete any further details on this page. Only complete if you need to filter by fee calculation template / class levels / teacher / area.

5. Scroll to the bottom of the screen and click 'Next'.

6. If there is an option to enter an effective date, enter one (see note below if you need further help with this).

7. Scroll to the bottom of the screen and click 'Process Bulk Non-Attendance Records'.

IMPORTANT: Stay on this screen and do not let the screen go to sleep until you get the green tick to say it is completed.

We recommend to put in a make-up booking block to match your bulk non-attendance. Refer to recommendations below.

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Recommendations

Non-Attendance Reasons

As for any non-attendance, you need to have a Non-Attendance Reason ready to use. We recommend naming this exactly what it is because the reason is displayed in the App (Customer Portal) - examples below. You can select from your existing reasons or create a new reason if you do not have an appropriate reason available to use. Naming can be generic so it can be re-used. Related article: Creating Non-Attendance Reasons. Examples:

Attendance Credit

Lesson Cancelled

Renovation Closure

Cancelled for today

Public Holiday

Centre closed

Make-up Lesson Block

Go to Configuration -> Block Make-up Booking Date Ranges (under the 'Customer / Family Portal' heading) and add a make-up booking block to match your Bulk Non-Attendance so families cannot book make-ups into these classes.

When to Process?

The recommended action is to wait.

Depending on the reason why you need to action a non-attendance, we strongly recommend that you wait until after the date/s have passed so that you are certain those date/s need to be non-attended as things can change. 

An exception to this recommendation would be circumstances where the date is certain (e.g. Public Holiday or urgent cancellation of classes).

The bulk non-attendance action takes less than five minutes. Maintenance closure dates may change. It is better to "wait and see" what happens and be certain in your decisions in terms of closures and if you will give a make-up or a credit for any missed lessons. Waiting will not impact upon your clients, as they will not be able to utilise any make-ups or credits until you re-open. Reversing the bulk non-attendances and the actions attached to them, however, is time-intensive and labour-intensive and something that can only be actioned by Support.

Effective Dates

Have the effective date outside of the bulk non-attendance dates. For example, if you run it for the Monday to Saturday, have the effective date as the Sunday. If you don't run classes on a certain day of the week, have the effective date fall on that day. If you are only actioning one day, there may be no option for an effective date. This is ok.

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Detailed Process - Marking off Non-Attendance in Bulk

From your Administration screen, click on "Process Bulk Non-Attendance".

Here you can action your non-attendance in bulk. The Non-Attendance Reasons that are displayed are all of the reasons configured in your system.

Explanation on how to fill out this screen is below the image.

Field 1. Mandatory Field - Non Attendance Reason: 

All of your configured "Non-Attendance Reasons" will be displayed. 

Select the reason you wish to use. 

To credit your families accounts you will need to have and select a reason with a "($)". 

To give a Make-up to the students, you will need to have and select a reason with a "(M)". 

Reasons with neither of these symbols will mark the non-attendance but will not give anything back to the student.

Field 2. Mandatory Field - Attendance Dates: 

Next you will need to select the dates you wish to bulk non-attend. 

If you are non-attending classes on one day, enter the same date in the start and end dates.

If you need to non-attend multiple dates, put in a start and end date. Any classes within that date range matching your parameters will be marked as non-attend with the reason selected. 

We recommend not running more than a week at a time.

Field 3. Mandatory Field - Class Time: 

Class times are important. 

If you are wanting to bulk non-attend ALL lessons for the WHOLE day then you can leave the times as is. 

If you ONLY want to bulk non-attend selected classes on the selected day/s you will need to set the times.

Fields 4, 5, 6 & 7. Optional Fields: 

We have enabled you to be able to select filters based on 

• Fee Calculation templates
• Class Level
• Class Teacher
• Area/Lane/Pool

Fields 4, 5, 6 & 7 are all optional and allow you to Bulk non-attend based on more specific filtering.

If you would like to bulk non-attend ALL students between the dates and times selected then you do not to fill out these options and you can just scroll to the bottom of the screen and click on the "Next" button. 

If you wish to only bulk non-attend certain students by limiting any of the optional fields, you can use these filters to do so and click on the "Next" button.

Confirmation

A confirmation screen will appear next with a list of the lessons to be bulk non-attended, showing the non-attendance reason selected.

You will see a "Credit Invoice Effective Date". A date needs to be entered here, and this date should fall outside the dates you are processing. For example if processing for a whole week make the effective date the Sunday or a day you don't have classes. This is the date that will be used for Calculated Value Direct Debits so it is important. For more information see bottom of article.

Click "Process Bulk Non-Attendance records" at the bottom of the screen.

Processing

It is important to remain on the processing screen until you see the complete message.

DO NOT MOVE AWAY FROM THE PROCESSING SCREEN AND DO NOT LET THE SCREEN GO TO SLEEP UNTIL THE GREEN COMPLETE BAR HAS APPEARED. Moving away from this screen or letting it go to sleep will interrupt the process and the action will not complete.

This should only take a few minutes but the processing time will depend on how many days you are processing at the time.

Check

Once you see the green completed message above, you can check your Attendance screen for the dates / times that were processed. You will see the student's attendance in the date/timeframe you selected is now marked at the Non-Attend reason you selected, and if a credit was given, the family's account would now have been credited and as shown in the images below.

Attendance marked off

Credit line in Family Account (if the reason issued a credit back to the family)

NOTE: Credit Invoice Effective Date & Calculated Value Direct Debits

The date you enter here will affect those who run Direct Debits. The "Credit Invoice Effective Date" is the date it will come off the direct debit. The effective date should be in the same week as the non-attendance.

Last updated 13 August 2024