Your upcoming event may be complex, but your online sign ups don’t have to be hard to manage. Select a section below and expand each FAQ to learn more about the features and functions of ivolunteer.com. Still have questions about your account or signup sheets? Click here to get more support.
Your ivolunteer.com Home Pages
You can change the Home Page Title, Visibility / Accessibility, Unique ID (not available on the Primary Home Page), Event Display Type, Event Sort Order, and the Welcome Message.
- Home Page Title – this is the title for your Home Page. E.g. “My Organization’s Events.”
- Unique ID – is the extra part of the URL for accessing the Home Page only from the URL. E.g. “http://myorganization.ivolunteer.com/myuniqueid.” You may not modify this for the Primary Home Page.
- Visibility / Accessibility – how your home page will be accessed and how it will display. Options are:
- Tab alongside other Home Pages or URL – the home page will appear as a tab with any other home page that has this option. IF there are no other home pages with this option no tab will be visible. The page can also be accessed by its URL. See Unique ID above.
- Hidden – the Home Page may only be accessed by its URL
- Disabled – the Home Page is not available for viewing.
- Event Display Type – this defines how the events will be displayed on the page. There are several display options available.
- Event Sort Order – How the events will sort on the page.
- Welcome Message – The welcome message will appear at the top of your Home Page. Customize this to welcome your potential volunteers.
When logged in as Primary Administrator or Organization Administrator, click on the Organization menu | Home Pages tab. Here you can add and edit Home Pages.
You need to be the Primary Administrator, an Organization Administrator or an Event Administrator with Design Privileges to assign events to home pages. With the event selected:
- Click on the Details tab
- Find the Show on Organization Home Page dropdown menu
- Choose a Home Page for the event, make the event hidden, or click Select Multiple Home Pages to choose more than one Home Page you wish for the Event to show up on.
If you set a logo for an event, that Event’s logo will appear on Facebook. To do this, sign in as an Administrator and select the relevant event. Go to the Settings tab | Logo sub-tab. Press Set Logo, then either type in a link to a logo hosted on your own website, or press Select to upload an image file from your computer. Press Save after the logo is set.
If you set a logo for the Organization and there is no logo for the Event, then the Organization’s logo will appear on Facebook.
IMPORTANT: Sometimes it can take more than 24 hours for a logo that you just set to appear when you access your ivolunteer.com Home Page or on an ivolunteer.com Event page from Facebook.
You can embed a Home Page or Event Signup Sheet using an iframe tag. For security reasons, embedding is allowed only in:
- the website domain entered in the “WEBSITE” field under Organization > Organization Details > Account (for example, mysite.com)
- any additional domains added in the “WEBSITE(S) ALLOWED TO EMBED HOME AND EVENT PAGES” field under Organization > Organization Settings > Display/Layout
Please be sure to fill the “WEBSITE” field as a minimum before embedding any ivolunteer pages in an iframe.
The iframe tag has several options that you may review here. You can also search for “iframe generator” in your favorite search engine to get copy-and-paste code with the options of your choice.
NOTE: In WordPress’s Gutenberg editor, you must use a “Custom HTML” block instead of an “Embed” block to embed an iframe.
Your ivolunteer.com Database
Your database stores basic information about your volunteers such as their email address, name, street address, phone numbers, etc. It can help you manage your volunteers by allowing you to record some extra information for each volunteer, create groups of volunteers, promote events to your volunteers and even restrict Event Tasks to select groups of volunteers.
The easiest / best way is to let your volunteers do it. Whenever someone signs up for an event they are automatically added to your database. You can also manually add volunteers to the Database one at a time.
You can also bulk add volunteers to the Database. To do this go into the Database menu | Participants tab and click on the Bulk Add button. Here you can copy and paste info from a spreadsheet 50 volunteers at a time. Then click on the Add button.
Yes, you can useivolunteer.com’s powerful email capabilities to promote your Event or Organization to volunteers in your Database. Simply select one or more of your Database Groups to send it to, select when you want to send it, and then author the email. You are currently limited to five times the number of your subscription slot limit for promotional emails within your subscription. E.g. 5 times 6,000 for one year would be 30,000 emails.
Groups are a way for you to organize your volunteers the way you want. For example, you may wish to group volunteers by a skill set or a certification that they have, such as CPR certification. You could create a group titled “CPR Certified” that contains all of your volunteers who have completed CPR training.
Groups are easy to create and manage. To see how to do this, check out our training video.
You can promote your organization or events by sending an email to one or several of your groups. You can also use groups to restrict an event task.
There are two custom prompt types that will assign a volunteer to a group: DATABASE_GROUP and DATABASE_GROUP_DEFINED. Simply add one of these prompts to your event and the volunteer will be assigned. The DATABASE_GROUP prompt allows volunteers to choose which group they should be in, and the DATABASE_GROUP_DEFINED prompt will automatically assign them to a group.
Yes. After selecting the group, use the Add Members From Event(s) button and select all the events you wish to add members from.
Yes. On the Participants tab, click on the More… button next to the volunteer’s name you wish to look at. Then click on “Activity” at the bottom of their information. Here you can see all of the volunteer’s activity within the organization, including dates, times, and event names they sign up for.
Although you currently can’t merge two Participant records, you can transfer slots from one Participant another. Under the Database > Participants tab, find the Participant with the email address that you want to merge with another one. Click the More… button to the left of the Participant. Click Transfer X’s Slots Someone Else. Select the To Participant. Click Transfer. Once the slots have been transferred to the other Participant, you can remove the one without slots.
No, they will still be signed up for any events they have confirmed. A Cancel ability will be added in a future release.
We have added the ability for you to add Custom Database Fields for your volunteers’ database entries. Your Database Fields are now managed in the Organization Menu > Settings tab in the Database sub-tab. Here you can see all database fields, their types, and you can now manage where they show up in your Organization. The button at the bottom of the page is “Add Custom Database Field”. These custom database fields can also be linked to Custom Prompts so that your volunteers fill out the information when they sign up. These can be used for Sports Teams, Nicknames, Registration status, Certification status, Titles, and much more.
Volunteer Help
- Visit the ivolunteer.com home page of the organization you want to sign up with.
- Click on a signup opportunity. Each open slot will have a button labeled Volunteer, Register, etc.
- Click the button for your desired slot and fill out the information. Required fields have an asterisk. Note: The organization may require you to confirm your email address the first time you sign up.
- Once confirmed, you will get an email with a link to your My Commitments page to manage your signups. Open the page in your web browser. On your phone—depending on your device and web browser—you may get an option to Add to Home Screen or Install App. If not, just bookmark the page to save it.
- In My Commitments, you will see a list of slots you have signed up for. Click on a slot to view and manage it. Click Past in the footer to see past signups.
- To Cancel a Slot: Click on the upcoming volunteer slot and then click the Cancel This link in the header or footer. Note: If you DO NOT see a Cancel link next to a commitment, contact the event administrator. Either the event does not allow self-cancellation or it’s too close to the date to self-cancel.
- To Print a Report: Click Report to get a PDF report of your participation for a specific date range.
- For questions about signup opportunities, contact the event administrator for the organization. For technical assistance, contact support@ivolunteer.com.
Go to My Commitments in the browser that you used to sign up for your slot(s):
https://participant.ivolunteer.com
Click on the upcoming volunteer slot and then click the Cancel link at the bottom.
Note: If you DO NOT see a Cancel link next to a commitment it could be because:
- The event does not allow self cancellations
- OR, it’s too close to the event to self cancel.
To change your email address:
- Go to your personal volunteer page (this was the page you were directed to to confirm).
- Click the Settings button at the bottom of the page.
- Type in your new email address twice.
- Click the Save button.
Please contact your event coordinator if you need further assistance.
In your My Commitments portal, you can edit your online signup if the organization you signed up with allows it.
To modify the information you entered:
- Click on the + (plus) sign next to the commitment / slot to expand it.
- Click the Edit button.
- Make your changes and press the Save button.
Note: If you do not see an Edit button it is because self cancellation is not allowed, therefore editing is also not allowed. Please contact your event administrator if you need further assistance.
Subscription Questions
Take a look at our options here and select the subscription that will work best for your organization, or click here to get started with the free version and view our pricing options.
Instead of a Free Trial, we now offer a 30-day Free Subscription with a maximum of 15 volunteers in your database and a single Primary Administrator for your Organization. This subscription is renewable, so after your 30 days are up, you can renew your subscription right away, or you can wait and come back to it when you’re ready to renew. There is no payment information taken for the Free Subscription.
Each subscription includes a maximum number of volunteers allowed in your database with unlimited signups per volunteer. For example, the Free Subscription allows for up to 15 volunteers in your database with unlimited signups per volunteer, and is a great way to try out ivolunteer.com. The Standard Subscription allows you to choose the number of volunteers you anticipate having in your database, up to 500 volunteer database entries with unlimited signups per volunteer. The Premium Subscription allows you to choose the number of volunteers you anticipate in your database, up to 10,000 volunteer database entries with unlimited signups per volunteer. For more information on these subscriptions, click here.
Yes. We will keep your data in the system available for the next year unless you specifically ask us to remove it. When you are ready to re-subscribe, log in as the Primary Administrator as you did the previous year, go to the Organization menu | Subscription tab and select the desired subscription level. If you would like the exact same subscription level as last year, it will already be selected for you. You can change any of the subscription limits available to you as well, to better suit your organization’s needs.
Signup Sheet Design
Yes. In the Signup Sheet Design tab of the selected event, select the slot position and then modify the number of volunteers for that slot position.
Yes, you can add a logo already defined in the Organization or Event as the Organization Logo or the Event Logo. If you don’t already have an image defined for the Event, go into the Event Settings tab | Logo sub-tab and click on “Set Logo…” Here you can input a URL to a website where your Logo is located, or you can click on Select to upload a new image from your computer. Then you can use the variable [EVENT_LOGO] to place it on your Signup Sheet.
To add the Organization or Event Logo, go into the Signup Sheet Design tab and click on the Top Instructions button. Then, in the Variables menu, select[ ORGANIZATION_LOGO] for the Organization Logo, or [EVENT_LOGO] for the Event Logo.
Custom Prompts is a feature that allows you to define extra prompts that will be requested when a participant signs up for a slot.
To view the training video on how to create custom prompts, click here.
NOTE: Custom Prompts will appear after the required prompts Email, First Name, and Last Name.
Yes, you can hide tasks where all of the slots in the task happened in the past. Slots that happened int he past will still be displayed in the same task with other current slots, but they will not have a Volunteer button.
To make sure this works
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Under the Settings tab | Display sub-tab check the option “Hide old tasks.” Then press Save.
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You must put in the correct dates into the field designated for DATEs and NOT just in the text fields of headers. Check the Task Date Option for each task. If it is “Task is on one day” make sure the correct Task Date is provided. If it is “Dates are in Column or Row Headers” make sure the correct date is put into the Date field of the relevant Column or Row headers. If it is “Dates are in each Slot Position” make sure the correct date is put into the Date field of each slot.
To learn more about how dates work in ivolunteer.com, take a look at this video.
To link a volunteer directly to a task they may be interested in, you can put the task’s number at the end of your URL like so: http://[myorganization].ivolunteer.com/myevent/3
This would link your volunteer directly to the third task in your event. However, if you have any hidden tasks, or tasks that have appeared in the past, this feature will work a little differently. If a task is hidden, you will not have access to it. For example if you have tasks “One”, “Two” and “Three” you would link directly to 2 by going /eventname/2 at the end of your URL. If Two is hidden, then /eventname/2 will then link to task “3”.
Reports
Yes, you can select any event and go to the Reports tab. From there, you can choose a Report to run, and then click the check boxes next to the Events to choose which Events you would like to run the Report on.
Use the Report to display a concise view of an event’s volunteer schedule. This should also be your final view of an event’s volunteer plan. The Report displays an event in two formats: 1) The traditional row- column model just like the sign-up sheet and 2) a detailed one slot per row model. If you press the button to open the report in Excel, the report is downloaded into Excel. View the Log to see exactly when volunteers signed up, confirmed, cancelled, or received system warnings. Use the Log to research any difficulties that could arise in the process of signing up volunteers, such as where a volunteer, who failed to confirm, attempted to volunteer.
The Administrator can view this information in the Activity Log tab of the Event. Additionally, the Administrator can view the Activity Log report available in Reports.
Under the Organization page click on the Reports Tab, select the Sign In Sheet Report, the Signup Sheet, or the One Slot Per Row Reports, and under the Options, click on the button next to “Include unfilled slots” as well as any other criteria you would like to have on the report. Click on the events you would like to run the report on, and then click on the Run Report button at the top of the page.
Go into the Reports tab, and select the Name Badges report. Choose the format, PDF or Excel spreadsheet; the Sort/Group option, Name or Date; the Page Size, Avery 5390 or Avery 5395; and the Date Range. Then choose from these options to display on the Name Badges:
- Show event name
- Show task name. Pages are separated by task so if, for example, your tasks were booths or stations, you could send people to the task station to receive their name badge
- Show participant first name. This is on by default.
- Show participant last name. This is on by default
- Show participant title
- Show logo
- Nameless badges. A badge with no name you might use for walk-ins. Clicking on Nameless badges will deselect participant name options and prompt for the number of badges you would like printed per sheet. Deselecting will return participant name options to default.
Organization and Event Settings/Configuration
The Organization has default Settings, and each Event has its own copy of Settings. When you add a new Event, the new Event’s Settings are inherited from the Organization’s Settings, but can be tailored as needed for the Event. When you copy an Event, the Settings for that event are also copied. This means that Settings for any Event can be modified without affecting any other Event’s Settings or the Organization’s Settings. Likewise, modifying the Organization Settings will not affect any existing Event. A good practice is to modify the Organization’s Settings as needed early on, so that any new Events will have Settings tailored for the Organization. This can reduce the amount of work required to set up a new event.
General Questions
ivolunteer.com is online sign up software that works for volunteer scheduling as well as many other types of sign ups. Volunteer coordinators and event managers use our platform both to sign up participants and to manage and run reports on events.
ivolunteer.com works well on Macs, PCs, Linux, iPads and Smart Phones (our own developers use Macs, PCs, and Linux!). While ivolunteer.com is optimized to work very well in most browsers for both volunteers and administrators, we recommend using Google Chrome for optimal performance for administrators when events get very large (e.g. 1,000+ volunteers).
Volunteers can use just about any browser commercially available that supports javascript, including browsers on many mobile devices like the iPhone, Android and recent versions of Blackberry. For administration of ivolunteer.com, we recommend using current versions of Chrome, Firefox, or Internet Explorer 9 or 10. Google Chrome is our browser of choice and performs extremely well with large events. Chrome can be downloaded here. Internet Explorer 8 and older are NOT supported for administration of events needing more than about 1,000 volunteers.
We offer several resources to help you with ivolunteer.com, including our comprehensive Administrative Help and our growing list of video tutorials.
Please email questions to support@ivolunteer.com. You may also call our support number at 866.826.7926 (dial 2 for support).
ivolunteer.com does not match volunteers to organizations that are running events. We respect the privacy and security of our customer organization and we do not publicly share or advertise any event or volunteer information. It is up to each organization to promote their events hosted on ivolunteer.com to their own pool of volunteers.
No! ivolunteer.com does not display third-party advertisements to our customers or to their volunteers/participants.
Volunteers’ email addresses are only transmitted and visible to the user signed on as an Administrator, and are only used by the ivolunteer.com system to send system-generated confirmation emails. ivolunteer.com will never send unsolicited email or use or share your email addresses in any way. ivolunteer.com will never share, copy or review customers’ databases other than to support technical problems or to backup the system.
In addition, we expect our customers to extend this level of privacy to their volunteers by only using the information for the volunteering purposes for which it was intended. We strongly encourage all of our customers to review and modify their Organization Privacy Statement (under Settings | General | Legal Statements) so that it is clear to volunteers what the Organization’s intention is with keeping volunteers’ information safe and private.
Yes. The system is backed up to avoid a loss in the event of a system failure. You can backup your own individual event information by running a Report or Exporting events to Excel. Be sure to review this topic in the license agreement (available for review in the online checkout process) when you purchase ivolunteer.com.
If you have deleted an event, click on the Restore button within 90 days after removing it to restore it to the state it was in when it was removed.
We currently retain all event structure and volunteer information at least five years for active accounts at least one year for inactive accounts, because some customers renew seasonally.
Yes. Specify different start and end dates for your event. Each task can then be assigned to a different date within the start and end dates.
Yes, we expect to be working on upgrades as long as there are ways to make things easier for our customers. Customers are upgraded automatically as new features become available.
Auto-complete, which is on by default, allows a volunteer to just enter their email address when signing up for a slot. The rest of their information, including any custom fields, is automatically filled. This also works from the Administrator’s side, by entering the email address of a volunteer, the rest of their information will be filled in.
Also on the Administrator side, you can add volunteers from your Database. To learn more about the Database, go here.