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Must know
  • New chats start on Web Only, which posts the message in the family portal with no text or email.
  • Web & SMS needs the SMS feature on your club’s plan and a verified phone. If a family texts back, the text reaches your club’s main chat inbox, not your thread.
  • Web & Email sends a branded email the family can reply to. If your club has switched off the Chat message notification email, the message fails instead.
  • Each conversation is on one channel at a time. Switching changes only future messages.
What a channel does. The channel decides how each message you send reaches the family. Your messages and the family’s portal replies stay in one thread on every channel. Web & SMS. Your club’s plan must include SMS. Without it, you cannot start a Web & SMS chat, switch a chat to it, or send on one. You see the error Feature "sms" is not available on your current plan, though the option still shows. The family also needs a verified phone number. Web & Email. A family’s emailed reply joins your thread only if it comes from the email address on the conversation and the chat is still on Web & Email. Otherwise it is dropped, such as after you switch channels. Your club can turn chat emails to families off in Settings > Communication > Notifications (under System Rules, Chat message notification). It is on by default. When it is off, your Web & Email message is not emailed and shows as failed with “Chat email notifications to families are switched off in Notifications settings.” Web & Email messages also fail while your club is still finishing its import. Starting a chat. Web Only is preselected in the New Conversation dialog, and chats you start from an athlete profile or the Families page always open as Web Only. If you pick someone you already chat with on a different channel, the dialog asks Switch channel?. Choose Switch to [channel] or Cancel, so there is still one thread per person. On phones the channel label in the thread header shows only an icon. More detail. Greyed-out names are explained in Why can’t I pick a family member for an SMS or email chat?. Length limits are in Can I send photos or files in a chat message?. Refusals, such as a family who texted STOP or a used-up SMS allowance, are in Why did my chat message fail to send?. Related: What happens when a family replies to me? · How do I switch a chat to a different channel? · Why can’t I pick a family member for an SMS or email chat? · Why did my chat message fail to send?