Next-Gen Checkin Can't Handle Mutliple Schedules/Areas Without A "Skip" Error.

[JimMichael]

Description

I'm reporting this as a bug because it's a significant deviation from Classic Check-In behavior. The gist is that when you try to check in multiple people at the same kiosk, where some people check into A while other selected people check into B, ALL of them throw an error and you must click "skip" on each person, which then DOES check-them in and print.

Actual Behavior

When checking-in via NextGen, if you search for a family and select the parents AND kids, and the parents are checking into a serve team while the kids are checking into Youth (just an example), the kiosk will "error" on each person with Sorry, there are currently not any available areas that [Person] can check into at this time.

It reads to the user like something has gone wrong (it's a warning box), and there's a SKIP button at the bottom. If you select SKIP, the next person in the family gets the same warning, you SKIP, and repeat for every person you selected.

Once you skip the last person, the kiosk goes ahead and checks-on everyone to their proper place, and all labels print.

Here's a video that explains it better than I can.

Expected Behavior

This does NOT happen on classic check-in. There, the kiosk simply checks-in everyone into the thing they are eligible for, no fuss. While Nextgen DOES actually end up checking everyone in (if you press SKIP multiple times), it's a terrible UX as they inevitably think something is wrong... especially since the prior check-in experience didn't have the warning/skip.

Confusing things further, I found this issue #6388 where the OP is reporting that the SKIP button is NOT showing when it should, which implies this is all expected/intended behavior... but again, the exact same config in classic check-in works with the same scenario without any warnings or skips, so the current behavior seems wrong. But even if if IS intentional behavior, the warning text of "there are currently not ANY available areas..." is simply wrong and misleading, and makes the end user think their check-in is failing (because they don't notice the SKIP, and it's not obvious that skipping will fix the "no areas to check into" problem.)

Steps to Reproduce

1. Have a check-in active where adults can check into their serving team and kids can check into kids/youth (both going at the same time, and the kiosk configured to handle both schedules/areas).

2. Search for a family that meets the criteria and select the parents and kids.

3. Select BOTH schedules (serve team, kids/youth service)

4. Observe the warning Sorry, there are currently not any available areas that [Person] can check into (which is factually untrue.)

5. Use the SKIP button until every selected person is skipped, and they get checked in and labels print.

Issue Confirmation

• Perform a search on the Github Issues to see if your bug is already reported.
• Reproduced the problem on a fresh install or on the demo site.

Rock Version

18+

Client Culture Setting

en-US

[randyaufrecht]

We also use check-in the same way. We have multiple schedules open that the person checking in can choose and the Skip screen is confusing especially for those individuals where they have multiple Areas they could check into.

[TheArkChurch]

This is the same for us. The skip screen is confusing for families in situations where group requirements are different for check-in. I.e. Kids volunteers checking in themselves for volunteering and their children to Sunday service at the same kiosk at the same time.

[cabal95]

@JimMichael Can you provide more details on your exact setup?

How this is supposed to work is (there are other combinations, but this is the clearest example):

• You are checking in Noah who is in jr high and Alex who is in high school.
• You have check-in schedules available for both 9am and 11am.
• Jr High is only at 9am service.
• High School is only at 11am service.
• The user selects both schedules saying they want to check their kids into both service times.
• It is expected that you would get a Skip screen for Noah with the 11am service.
• It is expected that you would get a Skip screen for Alex with the 9am service.

The reasoning, is that you have told the system that you want to check-in both Noah and Alex. You have also said you want to check them in for 9am and 11am. The system is now warning you that it can't complete your request, but you can continue if you want.

In v1 check-in, it would silently move past this and you didn't realize that you couldn't take Alex to her 9am class. But check-in has been completed and one kid is checked in but the other can't be checked in, so now you have to figure out what to do since you can't leave both kids at the 9am service like you expected.

[JimMichael]

@cabal95 Thanks for that detail, it helps me understand the changes in Nextgen and how it now handles multiple schedules. I think part of the problem is that there is now an assumption that “multiple schedules” are for the “same area” (e.g. Check-in Configuration, e.g. Youth or Kids) just at different times, which is NOT our typical use case.

In my example above, I’m trying to check-in a family where the PARENTS need to check into their Serve Teams (which are an ‘additional area’ in classic check-in) while the KIDS need to check into Youth. Because of reasons, these two different “check-in types” use DIFFERENT schedules.

In Classic check-in, everyone just checked into where they needed to be (what they qualified for in the moment) when both schedules were selected (because again, some people need to check into their group using schedule A while others need to check into their group using schedule B).

Your example of presenting the skip dialog sort of makes sense in the context of two kids checking into Youth areas at different times, but doesn’t make as much sense with OUR above scenario… especially since it worked flawlessly in Classic. Instead, with Nextgen, ALL people checking into that family get a scary-looking “there’s nothing for you to check into” screen with a skip they have to notice at the bottom of the screen.

Not great. No one here is selecting two schedules and expecting everyone selected in the family to check into BOTH things. The different schedules represent two completely different things to check-into… one for the parents in the fam, another for the kids in the fam. We don’t need or want a “warning” that there’s no Youth for the parents to check into, or no Serving Team for the kids to check into (that’s kind of nonsensical)… which is exactly how Classic worked.

Since this appears to be a deliberate design change in Nextgen, it would have at least been nice to have had a switch (block setting) to enable the new SKIP behavior vs. the old "just works" behavior, instead of it being forced on us. The Select All Schedules Automatically block setting SORT OF fixes the problem by selecting all schedules and NOT presenting the SKIP (yay), but doing that creates a new problem, which is when someone (typically an adult on multiple serving teams) needs to check into only ONE team on a given weekend, even though they’re eligible for both.

In that scenario, if we have the Select All Schedules Automatically setting enabled, the schedule choice gets skipped (nice), but they also get checked into both serving teams instead of being asked which one they want to check into (ugh)

So, we’re now faced with the choice of automatically selecting schedules and bypassing the skip (which feels more like Classic check-in behavior), BUT ALSO getting incorrect/corrupt check-in data by doing so (because a person literally checks into two teams when they only served at one) OR just dealing with the new behavior and having SKIP appear all the time, confusing people unnecessarily.

Hope that all makes sense.

[cabal95]

Thanks @JimMichael for the extensive write-up on how you are using it. That will help us have an discussion on this. That also clarifies that the new code is working "correctly" (as it was intended to work anyway) rather than a bug in how we implemented it, so that helps us know how to direct the discussion.

To also help our discussion, would updating text/messages/button/colors of the skip screen move the needle from "major scary/confusing screen" to "mildly annoying"?

[asdf1nit]

We are int he same situation as Jim. We allow volunteers and children to check into their respective areas, and each has their own schedule. We also have multiple services so for a volunteer serving 2/3 services and children attending 2/3 services, with a family of 3-5 this is pretty cumbersome, that clicking skip 6 times or even more in a few cases. While making the Skip button more "visible" could help the first time voounteers navigate the screens better, it doesn't stop the frustration and complaints that would likely only stop if the skip button went away all together.

Having been on next gen for almost a year (first week of Sept), I can say that I hear the complaints often enough and my answer has shortened to, "Sorry about that, hopefully one day this will be resolved, it's out of our control, thank your for doing your part!".

While the "jargon" on the screen tells me something because I know the system, to a person at check-in it's misleading as I will never be able to checkin to access as I'm not special needs, so an area and time would never matter, it's not allowed, full stop, same for an adult in a childrens class, or child in a volunteer area.

In the end it is a bad user experience. Please know, I'm not complaining, just passing allong experience. Next-Gen is so much better in many other areas than classic, speed, label reprinting, all of the helpful messages like already checked in, not eligible and so on are great, the guest entry options are better, remove from family is amazing!... the list goes on. BUT in this one area it is consideribly worse.

We all want Rock to be the best product. I believe Jim's request is spot on. I am thankful that he wrote it up.

[zackdutra]

We are also in the same situation as Jim, next gen check in introduced confusion for our families and volunteers compared to the simplicity of classic check in. I have about the same canned response as Jonathan at this point when I'm asked about it by staff and volunteers. If there's anything we could do to fix this, we'd appreciate it!

[cabal95]

Hey everyone, we talked a little about this today and wanted to get some more specific information.

Can a couple of you give us a screenshot of the Schedule Select screen and some clarity on exactly what the different schedules represent? Are they representing different services, or representing the same service, or something in-between? If the same service or somewhere in-between, some details on the "why" would help. e.g. "Our volunteers usually arrive 30 minutes early so we have a 9am schedule and 8:30am Serving schedule both representing the same service time-slot."

The change was at the request of a number of churches who helped fund next-gen check-in to solve the confusion that would arise from legacy check-in just silently moving past a "nowhere to check-in" state when doing family check-in. The issue they ran into is that the parents/guests wouldn't know that one of the kids couldn't be checked in (for whatever reason) until after check-in was completed and the other child already had an attendance record and label.

We are open to and discussing how to tighten the gap, but the more details we can get on the use-cases the better. So we would appreciate as much information as any of you can provide.

[asdf1nit]

I have a document that I share with check-in volunteers, it's attached at the end. I've removed the first few pages as they're mostly training on processes and not helpful for this discussion but this section walks through process using myself, and test family members, kids, special needs, and volunteering. This document was screen shotted on a Wednesday night, but Sunday is similar.

Our schedules are as follows; Volunteer schedules, AK(Kids), and Access(Special Needsa) Each ending 30 min after service so they go away, eventually(t for kids the close check-in after start setting is also used so that check-in only last 30 min into service). So starting at the beginning of the day on a kiosk that lets Volunteers and their children check-in you have many schedules.

Our volunteer schedules open at 6 AM, But out kids and Access Service schedules do not open until 30 min before service - with the exception of AK schedules, 2nd service open 90 min before and 3rd starts 180 min before so that they all open at 8am for the 830 AM service so that volunteers do not have to go to the check-in stations multiple times a day and get different tags for each service.

• Sunday Volunteer 1st, Sunday Volunteer 2nd, Sunday volunteer 3rd

• AK 1st Service, AK 2nd Service, AK 3rd Service

• Access 2nd Service, Access, 3rd Service. - does not start untill second service

• 1st service can have up to 6 shedules, each schedule for a specific type of check-in

• 2nd service can also have up to 5 schedules

• 3rd service would have 3 schedules.

checkin.pdf

[KarenRossi84]

@cabal95 I work with Jim, and a big reason we ended up needing extra schedules in the first place is that our serve teams rely heavily on the Rock scheduling feature. We have several teams that don't use auto-scheduling at all. They exclusively sign up for shifts on the schedule toolbox.

If we used the same schedule for everything, people couldn't sign up for two roles that happen at the same service time but don't conflict. For example, someone could set up communion before the 9am service and also serve in Guest Relations during the service. Those two things overlap in service but don't exclude each other, so we have to give the set-up role its own schedule so a person can sign up for both if they wanted. The other scenario that can happen for us, still thinking through communion, is that we don't offer it every week. Usually, it's every three to four weeks. Since we have people sign up, it really needs its own schedule so only the true dates appear, but many of these folks also serve in guest relations so on communion weekends they will always have the communion option and their regular service schedule that we use as much as possible.

We run into the same thing with our Monday night classes. If one person is in a 5-week class and another is in an 8-week class, those are two different schedules. If a family has people in both classes and check them in at the same time, they are not trying to check them all into both classes. Each person should just get a tag for their own class.

Another example: a husband and wife are both serving on a weekend. The husband is on the parking team and has volunteered to set up cones at the start of the day which is on a unique schedule since that team can also serve for parking at the 9am service actually directing cars. His wife serves as a greeter with Guest Experiences at that same first service. If they check in together and each select the schedule that applies to them, it triggers the error, but they were never trying to check the wife into parking lot setup. They're just each trying to get to their own name tags.

Ultimately, we never really had people confused as to why they didn't get checked into every selected schedule. We name our schedules in a way that really calls that out. If skipping the schedule selection screen still showed eligible groups if someone had more than one to choose from, the way classic check-in did, that would help us a ton. Right now, if I'm eligible for both the communion role and Guest Experiences, and we skip the schedule selection step, it checks me into both, even if I only really served at one. For us this bad data really makes it an unusable option

Hope that helps. Happy to answer more questions.

[cabal95]

Thanks @asdf1nit and @KarenRossi84 for the details. We are digging into this further to see what we can come up with.