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Moving from another membership platform
Most clubs that come to us are already on something — membermojo, LoveAdmin, WebCollect, Spond, ClubBuzz, Pitchero, or a system a member built years ago. They differ in the detail and they are all the same shape underneath: a list of members, and a way of taking money. This page is about getting both across.
We do this with you, during your pilot. You do the exporting, because it is your account; we bring it in with you on your club's Bring members across page, matching each person to the members you already have and showing you what it will do before anything changes.
Who can do this?
Exporting from your old system: whoever administers it there. Loading it here is ours. Checking what arrived is for your club's Club Admin or Membership Manager. Importing your Direct Debit mandates afterwards is for a Club Admin or Treasurer.
Export the members first
Ask your old system for a full member export, as a spreadsheet. Take everything it offers rather than the tidy version — a column you did not need there may be the one that saves a duplicate here.
What we look for in it:
| We use | For |
|---|---|
| First name, last name, date of birth | The member record, and matching them when they later sign in themselves |
| Email address and phone number | Inviting them, and reaching them afterwards |
| Postal address | Their record, and anything the club posts |
| Family or household links | Keeping a family together so one parent can renew for everybody |
| Membership type and the date they first joined | Setting their membership up in the right place |
| Current standing — member, lapsed, resigned | So your first member count is honest |
| England Athletics registration number | Their affiliation history, and matching them to the England Athletics roster |
| Emergency contact details | The information a first aider needs on the night |
Two things are worth a sentence from you rather than a column: which of the people in the file are actually current members, and what your own codes mean. Nobody else can answer either.
Export it twice, a fortnight apart
Clubs keep running while they move. Take an export when you send it to us, and another a few days before you go live, so the handful of people who joined in between are not lost.
Then deal with the money
This is the part that differs most between systems, and it comes down to one question: whose GoCardless account are your members' Direct Debits held on?
- Your club's own account. Then the mandates come across, your members do not have to set anything up again, and you do it yourself once GoCardless is connected — see From GoCardless.
- The old system's account, collecting on your behalf. Then the mandates are not yours to bring, and your members will need to set up a new Direct Debit here. Plan for that: it is the single biggest thing your members have to do, and it is much easier asked at renewal than out of the blue. Your old provider can tell you which of the two applies; ask them before you commit to a launch date.
- Cards, or a payment link. A card authorisation does not transfer between platforms either. Members set up a payment method here the first time they pay you.
Money you have already collected is history, not memberships. We do not rebuild past seasons from a payment export, because a payment on its own does not say which membership year or membership type it was for — and a reconstruction that guesses is worse than a clean start. Keep your old records; your treasurer needs them for the accounts anyway, and the season you set up here starts from today.
What does not come across
- Sign-ins. Nobody's account, on any platform, moves. Members are invited here when you are ready.
- Consents. Collected again at first sign-in, on your club's current wording — see Consents.
- Your old system's pages, forms and files, unless you send them separately.
- Anything the export leaves out. If the system will not give you a column, we cannot bring it in. Some will export more if you ask their support directly.
How it is brought in
The export goes through the same steps as a spreadsheet: matched against the members you already have (your England Athletics roster especially), families grouped into households, current members recorded into the season on their membership type with no payment, and lapsed and resigned members kept with their status. Nothing is sent to anyone, and it can be undone while nothing depends on it. From a spreadsheet explains each step.
What happens after we load it
- You check it — the number of members, a handful of names and dates of birth. Dates of birth matter more than you would expect: they are how each row is matched to a member you already have.
- You set up a season, membership types and fees — see Subscriptions.
- You connect GoCardless and import your mandates, if they are yours to import.
- You invite your committee, then everybody else — see Running a pilot → Step 5.
What your members see
Nothing until you send the invitations, and then one email each with a link to sign in. No password, no account to create, and no form asking them to type in what you have already given us — the short form they complete is the few things nobody knew, plus the club's agreements.
If they also have to set up a new Direct Debit, say so in your own words before the invitations go out. A member who is expecting it does it in two minutes; a member who is not messages you asking whether the email is genuine.
See also
- Moving your club to RunClub HQ — all the arrival paths in one table
- From GoCardless — bringing existing Direct Debits across
- From a spreadsheet — what to tidy before you send a file
- Getting your members in — the England Athletics roster import
- Going live — deciding how you will take money before launch