We're constantly updating and enhancing ChurchSuite, often building directly upon customer feedback to guide our development. The following lists some changes that were made to ChurchSuite between 29th November 2017 - 21st February 2018.
ChurchSuite
20-Feb-2018 - Created source
We now show the created source on our people objects, therefore giving an audit trail for GDPR purposes.
https://support.churchsuite.com/article/50-changes-made-by-church-members20-Feb-2018 - Moving contacts/children
As part of our GDPR audit, we're reviewing our change logs to make it easier to identify how new people are added to your database. Now, when moving a contact to the Children module, or a child to the Address Book module, we maintain the person's changes history and add an additional change log for the move action.
https://support.churchsuite.com/article/42-how-to-move-a-child-to-the-address-book19-Feb-2018 - New Address Book Smart Tag conditions
We've added two new Smart Tag conditions for the Address Book.
1. "Has Linked Partner?" (Yes/No) matches contacts that have a linked partner in ChurchSuite, or those whose partner is not in your database.
2. "Has My ChurchSuite Login?" (Yes/No) matches based on a contact's Public Communication options enabled for My ChurchSuite login.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/37-smart-tags16-Feb-2018 - Report permission settings
We've added settings to all report pages for administrators so that you can turn off any reports that you're not using. You can also disable communication and downloads on a report-by-report basis, meaning you can better control the transmission of personal data outside of your database, or remove reporting for any personal data you are not collecting.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/468-restricting-user-access-to-certain-reports16-Feb-2018 - Ministries get a communication log
We've added a Communication log to the Recent Activity section at the bottom of Ministry pages in the Rotas module. Communications sent to a Ministry are still logged in the sent communication log visible on each ministry member's profile page in the Address Book/Children module, but now they're also logged on the Ministry page too.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/425-communicating-to-individuals-and-groups-through-churchsuite15-Feb-2018 - See small group 'role' options and permissions more easily
We've made some visual changes to the list of Roles in the Small Groups module. Icons now show you at a glance which role options and My ChurchSuite permissions have been assigned to which role(s) - hover over any icon to see what each option is.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/342-assigning-roles-within-your-small-groups15-Feb-2018 - Improved reordering for touch devices
We've updated how reordering works for Roles, Resources and Funds, making it easier for touch devices, e.g. smartphones and tablets. You can drag & drop on a desktop and use the arrow icons to reorder on touch devices.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/309-changing-the-order-roles-display-in13-Feb-2018 - Children Visitor confirmation emails
We've added confirmation emails for Child Check-in visitors. If the visitor parent submits their email address, they'll be sent a confirmation email with a copy of the data they've submitted. You can even create a Visitor preset welcome email and set it to be sent to visitors (Children module settings > Connect tab > Visitors section) - ChurchSuite will add the personal data confirmation section to the end of your Preset welcome email.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/280-managing-visitor-information-from-child-check-in12-Feb-2018 - Missing Data Report now supports Job and Employer
You can now use the Missing Data report to filter Address Book contacts who have missing data for Job and Employer.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/159-data-cleansing-duplicates-missing-data-potential-couples-gender-check12-Feb-2018 - New Smart Tags conditions for Job and Employer
We've added two new 'Regular Expression' Smart Tag conditions for Job and Employer to the Address Book module.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/37-smart-tags12-Feb-2018 - Children "No Attendance" report
We've added a 'No Attendance' report to help you work out which children have stopped attending a group. Filter the report to see a list of children that have not attended groups within a range of dates, those in certain tags, and ordered by either group name or child name.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/327-child-attendance-reporting09-Feb-2018 - Data protection opt-in
On the Connect and Embed "My Details" forms, Visitor check-in, the Event sign-up form, the Small Group sign-up form, and in Donate, we've added a Data Protection consent checkbox. This uses the Data Protection message (your privacy notice) set in your account settings (under Administrator > Profile), to ensure a GDPR-compliant workflow of 'opt in' consent when people submit personal data into your ChurchSuite database. 'Submit' and 'Proceed' form buttons only become active after people click the checkbox to confirm they've read, understood and accept your Data Protection message.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/467-churchsuite-and-gdpr08-Feb-2018 - Unlinked parent opt-out
You can now manage the opt-in/opt-out "Receive email?" and "Receive SMS?" preferences for unlinked parents in the Children module.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/81-how-to-link-a-child-to-their-parent08-Feb-2018 - Unlinked giver opt-out
You can now manage the opt-in/opt-out "Receive email?" and "Receive SMS?" preferences for unlinked givers in the Giving module.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/120-adding-a-new-giver08-Feb-2018 - Donate fund confirmation emails
We now always send fund confirmation emails to ensure double confirmation and best compliance with GDPR.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/115-setting-up-and-managing-funds-in-giving08-Feb-2018 - Sign-up email confirmations
We now always send event sign-up confirmation emails to ensure double confirmation and best compliance with GDPR.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/195-sending-an-event-sign-up-confirmation-email07-Feb-2018 - "All Sites" option for small groups
For multi-site churches it's now possible to add a group to the Small Groups module as an "All Sites" group, making it visible to all contacts through My ChurchSuite.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/216-multi-site-functionality06-Feb-2018 - Data Protection statement added to My ChurchSuite
We've added the Data Protection statement from your administrator profile to the Privacy Settings section of My ChurchSuite.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/107-managing-privacy-settings-in-my-churchsuite06-Feb-2018 - Password strength checker
We've added a password strength bar to the 'Edit password' window for administrators and users of Church Suite helping you to make sure you've got a strong password for your users.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/123-changing-a-users-password01-Feb-2018 - Rotas index
Our rotas page is now orderable and the search box provides instant results on the page.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/52-how-to-create-a-rota30-Jan-2018 - New Data Protection contact
Within Administrator > Profile, we've added a new type of contact for your account, the Data Protection contact. We've auto-populated this contact with your existing Account contact's detail and will begin to notify this person each time someone unsubscribes from your emails or issues a request to be removed from ChurchSuite (these features are coming soon).
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/296-changing-your-account-billing-contact29-Jan-2018 - Search for people and tags
When using auto-complete fields to "Search for people and tags" you can now search by Children module tags as well as Address Book tags. For example, you can bulk-add children members to small groups, teams in a ministry; and you can send event invitations to the children in a children tag.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/460-event-invitations22-Jan-2018 - HMRC Transaction Engine
We've updated our GiftAid submission to HMRC service to use their new Transaction Engine.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/119-reclaiming-gift-aid19-Jan-2018 - New "[Parent of linked] child in tag" Smart Tag condition
You can now add a Smart Tag condition to your Address Book to selecting contacts with linked children that are in a given tag in the Children module.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/37-smart-tags21-Dec-2017 - Rota email reminder ordering
We've updated email rota reminders so that the people who are serving are now ordered in the same way as when you view the rota. Previously reminders were always ordered by name, but if your rota is ordered by role, you'll now see your reminders ordered by role.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/252-sending-rota-reminders21-Dec-2017 - "Created by" date/time stamp now visible when viewing people
As part of the GDPR enhancements we've got planned, we've made it much clearer for you to see how and when new people are added to your database. You can now see the "created by" user/date/time stamp when viewing a contact, child or giver's profile page. Previously this was only visible when editing a person. Now located under the 'Recent Activity' section you can see at a glance when a person was first added to your database and by whom.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/50-changes-made-by-church-members20-Dec-2017 - Adding 'future' groups to Small Group clusters
When editing a cluster you can now add future groups as well as active groups. Similarly, when viewing a cluster you'll now see active and future groups listed.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/211-managing-small-group-oversight-with-clusters30-Nov-2017 - Data Protection message now support HTML
The Data Protection message that can customised in Administrator > Profile now fully supports HTML, meaning you can create elegantly formatted privacy notices that people can click to view when submitting their details through any of our public-facing forms, like events, visitor check-in, Donate, small group sign-up, and the My Details connect form.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/62-how-to-personalise-the-appearance-of-your-churchsuite-account
Donate
18-Jan-2018 - One-off gift funds for Donate
When editing a Fund in the Giving module, you now have the option to decide whether you want a fund to accept both one-off and recurring donations or just one-off donations.
When taking an offering for a special cause, e.g. disaster relief or sending out a church plant, you might be asking for one-off donations rather than ongoing regular donations, this update allows you to remove the latter from being shown for the fund.
http://support.churchsuite.com/article/115-setting-up-and-managing-funds-in-giving
If you have any thoughts or suggestions for us, please let us know - we'd love to hear from you.
