Using Member Wizard to Manage Your Organisation - An Overview

If you are setting up your organisation in Member Wizard for the first time below is a checklist of the order in which you should do this. Please note if you do not see the Settings menu item in the main menu you need to contact your database administrator to be given rights to Settings in your login. 

Importing your Members

If requested, Member Wizard can carry this out for you. Once your members are imported then proceed to carry out the following tasks:

1. Complete your Organisation Details by providing address, phone number, ABN, web page, logo and membership cycle details. See Setting/Organisation Details and Settings/Upload Logo in the main navigation panel menu. Make sure you check all the tabs on the Settings/Organisation Details page including all the tabs at the top of the page.
2. Set up your Membership Types. By default Member Wizard has only one membership type, that of Unclassified, however when you import your members you will import their Membership Types as well. After import you will need to tell Member Wizard the membership fees for each and also the membership period each covers. You can deactivate any unused types to avoid them appearing as options when you create a new member. Do this in Settings/Membership Types.
3. Set up the New Member Application in Settings. This will dictate the default membership type for new members, whether new members need Approval before being accepted, what data is mandatory for joining and information on how to handle membership periods. See Setting up and Managing your Members/Online Membership Applications in this database for full details.
4. Create your Bank Accounts. For this you will need your Account name, number including BSB, initial balance based on the the Start Date you nominate. See Settings, Bank Accounts in the main navigation panel menu.
5. Create your Account Categories. These are the income and expenses you wish to track in your Profit and Loss Report. See Settings, Account Categories in the main navigation panel menu.
6. Set up your Member Payment Details. This is where you decide if you want your Membership Invoices to include options to pay by Direct Deposit or Credit / Debit Card. These will then appear on the emailed Membership Invoices and your members will be able to click on them and either pay online or obtain direct deposit details. See Connecting Stripe in this knowledge database.
7. If your organisation requires members to accept any conditions upon renewing their membership you can configure these in Membership Renewal Instructions and Print Renewal Instructions. If you wish to include Terms and Conditions for new members you need to enter this in the New Member Application page.
8. Decide how you wish to record Phone Names. Member Wizard provides 3 fields for phone number. By default these are shown as Phone name 1, Phone name 2, Phone name 3 however you may wish to make these fields more useful by calling them for example Home phone, Mobile phone or Alternative phone . Once you make these changes in Settings/Phone Names in the main menu navigation, they will change for all your member records. You can also edit the names of the address and first/last name fields.
9. You may have imported fields designated as Custom field however if you wish to add any after importing your members you can do so using Settings/Custom Fields. Once you have created your new fields they will by default appear in the Custom Fields tab in each members record. You can move them to another tab/page using Settings/Member Form Layout. You can also move existing fields from one tab location to another. If you wish to delete a Custom Field you firstly have to remove all records which have data stored within it. You can identify these by highlighting the Custom Field and clicking the See Values in the left hand menu on the Custom Fields page.
10. Set up the Member Portal to allow your members access to their record and other functions. You will need to nominate a registered User of your database as the first point of contact for your members who have any questions or minor issues with the portal. You also need to select the Membership Types you wish to have access to this functionality. Once this has been completed you will be able to send out the Member Portal email which will instruct your members on how to set up and access their Member Portal.
11. Setting up your organisations finances. Using Member Wizard to manage your organisation's financial recording has some major advantages to the alternatives which are either to purchase a stand alone financial package outside of your organisation's member management application or keep manual records.
12. The primary advantage is that you don't need to double up recording member subscription payments as Member Wizard will both receipt your member and simultaneously update their new due date and their financial status within your organisation and as a bonus your member will have the opportunity when paying membership dues, to update their contact details so your membership database is always up to date and in line with your financial recording. Automatic receipting occurs if your member pays online through Credit / Debit Card as - no need for you to create a receipt to record their payment, the system does it all for you.
13. Member Wizard offers a complete financial solution including recording expenses, reconciling bank accounts, issuing invoices, creating and recording receipts, producing Profit and Loss Reports and Balance Sheet, providing a General Journal and doing all this with a full financial audit trail for security. We are constantly adding enhancements and extra features and are always happy to hear from you if you have any special requests you would like to see happen in the system.