Group Meetings, Attendance & RSVPs
Beyond the simple "log a meeting with an attendee count" workflow, TimelyChurch supports per-attendee attendance records and RSVPs for each meeting. This article walks through how leaders and members work with both.
How It Fits Together
There are three pieces to this feature:
- Meetings — one record per meeting (date, topic, notes, an overall attendee count, and an optional room).
- Attendance — a present/absent record for each member at a specific meeting.
- RSVPs — each member's intent (yes / no / maybe / pending) recorded ahead of the meeting.
A meeting can have both an RSVP roster (collected before the meeting) and an attendance roster (recorded during/after the meeting). They are independent — a member can RSVP "yes" and still be marked absent.
Recording a Meeting (Leader / Admin)
From the group detail page, leaders click Record Meeting and fill in:
| Field | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Date | Yes | The meeting date |
| Time | No | The meeting time |
| Topic | No | Free text |
| Notes | No | Free text |
| Attendee Count | No | An overall fallback when no per-member attendance is recorded |
| Room | No | If set, reserves the room for the meeting |
Members can also record meetings from the My Group portal when they're a leader on that group.
Per-Attendee Attendance Tracking
Leaders can mark a single member present or absent, or mark several members at once. When you record attendance:
- The system checks that each member actually belongs to the group.
- It saves the present/absent record for each member.
- It updates the meeting's attendee count to match the number of members marked present.
From a meeting you can see who attended, who was marked absent, and a quick present/absent/total summary.
RSVP Responses
Each member can indicate how they plan to respond ahead of the meeting. The four choices:
| Value | Label |
|---|---|
| Yes | Going |
| No | Not Going |
| Maybe | Maybe |
| Pending | Pending (no response yet) |
Each RSVP records when it was submitted and can include an optional note.
Leader-Side Update
Leaders can record an RSVP on behalf of a member who responded out-of-band (text, email, etc.).
Member-Side RSVP from the Portal
Members RSVP for themselves from the My Group portal page. The form accepts the response and an optional note.
RSVP Summary
The meeting shows a tally of how many members chose yes, no, maybe, and pending — useful for showing leaders how many people have committed.
Attendance vs. RSVP — When to Use Which
| Question | Use |
|---|---|
| "How many people are coming on Tuesday?" | RSVP summary |
| "How many people actually showed up?" | Attendance records |
| "Who hasn't responded yet?" | RSVPs still pending |
| "Who has missed 3+ meetings in a row?" | Attendance records (drives the at-risk member list on the Health tab) |
The Health tab uses attendance records (not RSVPs) when calculating consecutive absences and average attendance percentage.
Class Attendance — A Different Path
For the Class engine type, attendance is collected through the Check-In module rather than the meeting attendance described above. The Attendance tab on a class shows per-student rates derived from check-in records, not from meeting attendance. See 09-group-reports.md for the class attendance report details.
Deleting a Meeting
Deleting a meeting also removes its attendance and RSVP records. The group's last-meeting date and meetings-this-quarter totals are recalculated from the remaining meetings.
Tip: Encourage leaders to record per-member attendance (not just an overall count) whenever possible. Per-member data drives the at-risk member list, attendance trend chart, and consecutive-absence tracking — features that disappear if you only fill in the overall attendee count.