Overview
It is possible for TutorFirst to send a reminder email to the tutor, the student or a customer/parent of a student on a session or any combination of the above.
This is system wide and will go to all tutors or all students or all parents depending on your settings.
It is possible to exclude a specific session type from being included in session reminders.
Article Sections
- What Needs to be in Place
- Which Email Address is Used
- When are Reminders Sent
- Set Reminder Emails
- Configure the Emails
- Adding a Note to Student Session Reminders
- Email Log Report
- Exclude a Session Type
- Send Reminders Manually
- Prevent a Reminder being Sent for Submitted, Reviewed or Approved Sessions
What Needs to be in Place
1. Configure which reminders to send. Go to: Setup > Company > Config Settings > Email > Email/SMS Session Reminders > Choose option > Apply Changes.
2. Choose when to send each session reminder you have selected in point 1. Enter a number to represent the number of hours before a session the reminder is to be sent.
3. To set a reminder to be sent twice enter both numbers, comma separated, no spaces.
4. A session must have a session type to be included and session reminders for that session type must be on. (On is the default when a session type created) SU06. Configuring Session Types
5. Note:
- A session must be created before the send time. A session created after the reminders have been sent will not be sent automatically but can be sent manually.
- A session must have a tutor to be included in reminders.
Which Email Address is Used
6. Email address used:
- The tutor email will go to the principal email address in the staff record.
- The student reminder will go to the email address for the student in the student record.
- The customer/parent reminder will go to the parent email address as recorded under the Primary Email field for the primary guardian in the student record. If there is no email in the Primary Email field and only if there is no email in this field, the reminder will be sent to the email address of the first linked customer record.
7. The reminders for the customer session reminder email follow this process for 2 specific reasons:
- Contract students don't need a linked customer record for billing but may still want customer reminders.
- The first linked customer record may be for invoicing only and it's the second linked customer record that needs the session reminder. Therefore, place the email address for the second customer record into the Primary Email field in the student record to act as an override.
When are Reminders Sent
8. The default time for reminders to be sent is 24 hours before the session based on the local time of your database but you may change this and/or choose to send an additional reminder at a different time or multiple reminders to each group.
9. Reminders are batched and sent on the hour every hour. Therefore if your session is at 3:30pm and your reminders are set to go an hour before, this will be included with the session reminders that go at 2:00pm.
Set Reminder Emails
10. Go to Set Up and select Config Settings.
11. Expand the Emails section.
12. In the Email/SMS Session Reminders section choose the people groups who will receive reminders.
13. Then set the times the reminders are to be sent to each group that was selected in the Reminders section. To send an email twice comma separate with no spaces. For example: 2,12,24 will send the email 3 times; 2 hours, 12 hours and 24 hours before the session.
14. If the group is not selected in Email/SMS Session Reminders the reminders will not be sent.
Configure the Emails
15. Go to Setup > Other > Template Set up.
16. Each group has a separate email template to enable you to configure specific messages.
17. You can configure the email title and body by adding text and any additional macros for custom session fields available from the dynamic macros list, but do not remove the #SESSIONLIST# macro which will insert the details, unless following instructions in item 19.
Adding an advance Student Session Note to Student Session Reminders
While any student session notes added to the session in advance will automatically be included in the Tutor reminder, it is also possible to include the student session note on student session reminders by using the student note area of the session.
18. Change the merge macro in the template for SESSION REMINDER EMAIL - STUDENT.
Go to Set Up - Other - Templates - select Session Reminder Email - Student.
19. Replace the existing merge macro of #SESSIONLIST# with #SESSIONLISTNOTE# by copying and pasting from the list of merge macros at the bottom of the page.
Note: The SessionList macro will include advance student session notes on the tutor reminder.
20. Now add a student note to a session where the reminder has not yet been sent. Be sure to use the student note field and NOT the session note field.
21. The note will now be added to the student session reminder when it is emailed out.
22. You may also add additional information from the dynamic macros list in the templates.
Email Log Report
23. The status of any email sent by the TutorFirst system may be viewed in Reports - Other - Email Log.
24. You may also request to be bcc'd on all emails leaving the TutorFirst system.
Exclude a Session Type
25. To prevent session reminders from being sent for a particular session type turn off the reminders from the Configure Session Types page.
26. Go to: Setup > Other > Configure Session Types.
27. Switch off the slider for Session Reminders > Apply Changes.
Session Reminder On
Session Reminder Off
Send Reminders Manually
28. If a session is created late the reminders can be sent manually from the session list.
29. Check off session and in the Actions menu choose to send reminders.
Prevent a Reminder being Sent for Submitted, Reviewed or Approved Sessions
30. It is possible to prevent reminders being sent for sessions in the future if the session is Submitted, Reviewed or Approved.
This is a config item and needs to be switched on: Go to Setup > Company > Config Settings > Email > Skip Reminders > Enable > Apply Changes.
Remember to remove the Submit, Review or Approve after the start time of the session if the tutor needs access.
Link To
SX10. Sending Student Session Notes to Parents/Guardians after session completed