Chats and messages
The Chats tab is where volunteers talk with the people they serve with. At the top, Teams shows team, plan, and group chats, and Direct shows one-to-one messages. Direct shows how many are unread.
Kinds of chats
| Chat | Who’s in it |
|---|---|
| Team chat | Everyone on the team, plus its leaders and admins. Every team has one. |
| Plan chat | Everyone who accepted a spot on that date, plus the leaders of its teams. It shows up two weeks before the date and closes, read-only, a week after. |
| Group | People a leader picked, like a planning team or the worship band. See Groups. |
New messages show a dot and the time. Pull down to refresh.
Send a message
Type in Message and tap send. With the + button they can add:
- Photo: up to four at a time.
- Poll: a question with 2 to 12 options. Turn on Allow multiple answers to let people pick more than one. Whoever sent it can close or reopen voting.
- Checklist: a title and up to 50 items. Anyone in the chat can tick an item or Add item. Ticked items show who ticked them.
Messages can have links and simple formatting: **bold**, *italic*, and lines starting with - or 1. for lists. A link shows a preview of the page a few seconds after it’s sent.
Press and hold a message to react to it, Reply, or Copy it. Long-press a reaction to see who reacted.
Older messages at the top loads earlier ones.
Mute a chat
In a chat, tap the … button, then Mute. They stop getting notifications for that chat but still see its messages. Unmute turns them back on.
Announcements
When a leader uses Message everyone serving on a plan, the message posts in the plan chat marked Announcement, and goes out as a notification. See Leading a team.
Direct messages
To message one person, tap the compose button at the top and pick someone. Volunteers can only start a message with someone they serve with: a teammate on any of their teams, or one of their team’s leaders.
Your church’s messaging rules still apply:
- Children 13 and under can’t send direct messages. Ages 14 to 17 can only message each other, and adults can only message adults.
- Blocks, a parent turning messaging off, and your church turning off messaging for someone all carry over from your church’s app.
If two people can’t message, the app says Messaging isn’t available between you two.
Groups
Team leaders can make a group chat with people from the teams they lead. Teams admins can add anyone on any team.
- In Chats, tap the compose button, then New group.
- Enter a Group name and pick who’s in it.
- Select Create.
In a group, tap its name at the top for Group info: who’s in it, with leaders marked Leader.
- Anyone can Leave group. They won’t see it again unless a leader adds them back.
- The group’s leaders can Rename or change people, or Close group, which removes it from everyone’s chats.