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Auto-Renewal Functionality Question

Beth Varro
$organization

Hello everyone,

We are investigating instituting auto-renewals for our membership program at the Science Museum of Minnesota.  In reading through the documentation of this process, my colleague Jenny and I have hit the wall.  As far as we can tell, the only way that the functionality can identify someone as wanting to auto-renew is if their previous membership was set up as a pledge with the appropriate billing type.

The problem is, how do you let people opt in or out of an auto-renewal program if everything is based on the previous gift's setup?  Per the Tessitura documentation, contributions should be processed as gifts if they are being paid immediately; thus all our membership payments are set up as gifts, not as pledges.  According to what we have found, the functionality would require that the pre-existing membership had been sold as a pledge, in order for that customer to pull in to the auto-renewal utility. That would prevent anyone who wants auto-renewal from signing up online or via our frontline staff (75% of our gifts), as the ticketing module cannot take pledges.  In addition, we need to allow people to opt in during the course of their existing membership, which we can't do if everything is based on the gift that's already been processed. I also cannot figure out how someone would be able to opt OUT of auto-renewing; if their previous membership was purchased via a pledge, which is how the auto-renew utilities work, we can't go back later and change that billing type, so there would be no way to prevent them from being pulled into the auto-ren utility for the next year once they told us they wanted to opt out.

Are we just missing something here?  Has anyone found workarounds for these issues?  Or would we have to do custom work to allow for smooth opt-in and opt-out functionality?

Thanks,

Beth (and Jenny)

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  • $organization
    I am so sorry, Megan - this got buried in my inbox!

    Sadly, no, we did not reach a solution to this. Other priorities came up, so we haven't started doing automatic renewals yet. I know MOS Boston is, but I think they have a customization.

    I am on the Member Advisory Committee and we are going to start working on membership functionality as our next big project, so you can be sure that I'll raise the issue there. I'm sure we'll get some really solid functionality for automatic renewals at the end of the process. Feel free to email me at bvarro@smm.org if you have any particular wish-list items as far as how you would want auto-renewals to work, other than getting around the pledge issue, and I'll make sure your concerns are on my list.

    Beth




    Elizabeth Varro
    Director of Membership
    (651) 265-9829

    The National Park Service is turning 100 – don’t miss your chance to unwrap the gifts! National Parks Adventure, a giant screen showcase of some of America’s most spectacular landscapes, is running in the Science Museum’s Omnitheater through October 13. Get tickets today!


    From: "Megan Martin" <bounce-meganmartin1175@tessituranetwork.com>
    To: evarro@smm.org
    Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2016 12:32:45 PM
    Subject: Re: [Tessitura Technical Forum] Auto-Renewal Functionality Question

    Beth- We are facing the same situation. I know this is an old post but I'm curious to see where you ended up with this. Did you find a good solution?

    Thanks,

    Megan

     

    From: Beth Varro <bounce-elizabethvarro6946@tessituranetwork.com>
    Sent: 5/2/2013 3:05:25 PM

    Hello everyone,

    We are investigating instituting auto-renewals for our membership program at the Science Museum of Minnesota.  In reading through the documentation of this process, my colleague Jenny and I have hit the wall.  As far as we can tell, the only way that the functionality can identify someone as wanting to auto-renew is if their previous membership was set up as a pledge with the appropriate billing type.

    The problem is, how do you let people opt in or out of an auto-renewal program if everything is based on the previous gift's setup?  Per the Tessitura documentation, contributions should be processed as gifts if they are being paid immediately; thus all our membership payments are set up as gifts, not as pledges.  According to what we have found, the functionality would require that the pre-existing membership had been sold as a pledge, in order for that customer to pull in to the auto-renewal utility. That would prevent anyone who wants auto-renewal from signing up online or via our frontline staff (75% of our gifts), as the ticketing module cannot take pledges.  In addition, we need to allow people to opt in during the course of their existing membership, which we can't do if everything is based on the gift that's already been processed. I also cannot figure out how someone would be able to opt OUT of auto-renewing; if their previous membership was purchased via a pledge, which is how the auto-renew utilities work, we can't go back later and change that billing type, so there would be no way to prevent them from being pulled into the auto-ren utility for the next year once they told us they wanted to opt out.

    Are we just missing something here?  Has anyone found workarounds for these issues?  Or would we have to do custom work to allow for smooth opt-in and opt-out functionality?

    Thanks,

    Beth (and Jenny)




    This message was sent automatically to you by www.tessituranetwork.com because you subscribed to the Tessitura Technical Forum. You may reply to this message to post to the Technical forum or visit the site to search, read and post to the forums. In the interest of keeping the forum posts from becoming cluttered, we encourage you to delete previous message text from your reply before sending. Thank you!

Reply
  • $organization
    I am so sorry, Megan - this got buried in my inbox!

    Sadly, no, we did not reach a solution to this. Other priorities came up, so we haven't started doing automatic renewals yet. I know MOS Boston is, but I think they have a customization.

    I am on the Member Advisory Committee and we are going to start working on membership functionality as our next big project, so you can be sure that I'll raise the issue there. I'm sure we'll get some really solid functionality for automatic renewals at the end of the process. Feel free to email me at bvarro@smm.org if you have any particular wish-list items as far as how you would want auto-renewals to work, other than getting around the pledge issue, and I'll make sure your concerns are on my list.

    Beth




    Elizabeth Varro
    Director of Membership
    (651) 265-9829

    The National Park Service is turning 100 – don’t miss your chance to unwrap the gifts! National Parks Adventure, a giant screen showcase of some of America’s most spectacular landscapes, is running in the Science Museum’s Omnitheater through October 13. Get tickets today!


    From: "Megan Martin" <bounce-meganmartin1175@tessituranetwork.com>
    To: evarro@smm.org
    Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2016 12:32:45 PM
    Subject: Re: [Tessitura Technical Forum] Auto-Renewal Functionality Question

    Beth- We are facing the same situation. I know this is an old post but I'm curious to see where you ended up with this. Did you find a good solution?

    Thanks,

    Megan

     

    From: Beth Varro <bounce-elizabethvarro6946@tessituranetwork.com>
    Sent: 5/2/2013 3:05:25 PM

    Hello everyone,

    We are investigating instituting auto-renewals for our membership program at the Science Museum of Minnesota.  In reading through the documentation of this process, my colleague Jenny and I have hit the wall.  As far as we can tell, the only way that the functionality can identify someone as wanting to auto-renew is if their previous membership was set up as a pledge with the appropriate billing type.

    The problem is, how do you let people opt in or out of an auto-renewal program if everything is based on the previous gift's setup?  Per the Tessitura documentation, contributions should be processed as gifts if they are being paid immediately; thus all our membership payments are set up as gifts, not as pledges.  According to what we have found, the functionality would require that the pre-existing membership had been sold as a pledge, in order for that customer to pull in to the auto-renewal utility. That would prevent anyone who wants auto-renewal from signing up online or via our frontline staff (75% of our gifts), as the ticketing module cannot take pledges.  In addition, we need to allow people to opt in during the course of their existing membership, which we can't do if everything is based on the gift that's already been processed. I also cannot figure out how someone would be able to opt OUT of auto-renewing; if their previous membership was purchased via a pledge, which is how the auto-renew utilities work, we can't go back later and change that billing type, so there would be no way to prevent them from being pulled into the auto-ren utility for the next year once they told us they wanted to opt out.

    Are we just missing something here?  Has anyone found workarounds for these issues?  Or would we have to do custom work to allow for smooth opt-in and opt-out functionality?

    Thanks,

    Beth (and Jenny)




    This message was sent automatically to you by www.tessituranetwork.com because you subscribed to the Tessitura Technical Forum. You may reply to this message to post to the Technical forum or visit the site to search, read and post to the forums. In the interest of keeping the forum posts from becoming cluttered, we encourage you to delete previous message text from your reply before sending. Thank you!

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