Attendance
People stop showing up
before they stop paying
A cancellation is the last event in a story that started weeks earlier. Attendance is where that story is written down — which makes it the most undervalued data in a membership business, and the reason this is not filed under “admin”.
The actual problem
Most systems treat attendance as a log file
Something to tick off, prove for insurance, and never look at again. So it gets stored as a list of dates, and the only question it can answer is “did they come in?” The competition is honest about this: on Kicksite, spotting a member who is slipping is a manual job — filter the log, read it, notice something.
That works if you have forty members. At three hundred, nobody notices the boy who used to come three times a week and now comes once, and by the time the cancellation arrives the conversation that would have kept him is two months too late.
At the door
Built for a queue, not for a desk
- A terminal you leave running
- A dedicated check-in screen that takes a scanned barcode, records the visit and clears itself for the next person. Twenty people move through it without anyone standing at a keyboard.
- The whole family at once
- Check-in works at household level as well as per member — which is what actually happens when a parent arrives with three children and a queue behind them.
- Tied to the class, not just the day
- Nearly every mark records which class it was, and which program the member is enrolled in. “Attendance is down” is not actionable; “Tuesday evening is down and Saturday is not” is.
- Check-out where you need it
- Optional per location. Where it is on, most visits carry a leaving time as well — which is not a nicety for after-school and childcare programs, where knowing a child left and when is the point.
What it is really for
A mark becomes a signal when you keep enough of them
One visit is a record. Fifteen years of visits, each tied to a class and a program, is a pattern — and patterns are what tell you someone is drifting while there is still time to do something about it. The oldest attendance on this system was taken in 2011, and more was written this afternoon.
That is what separates attendance-as-compliance from attendance-as-warning. The first ninety days are where the industry loses people, and the drop-off shows up in the check-in data long before anyone announces they are stopping. Nothing is thinned out or rolled up after a year, because a cohort curve needs the whole record to be worth drawing.
In practice
How this runs in your business
Martial Arts
Ranks, promotions and testing fees are first-class here — not a custom field someone bolted on.
Gyms & Fitness
Recurring revenue, real retention numbers, and a front desk that is not chasing failed cards.
Dance, Gymnastics & Cheer
Tuition, siblings, levels and competition season — handled on one account.
Swim, Music & After-School
Session packages, weekly and daily rates, pickup services and parents who need one bill.
Questions
The things people actually ask
How do members check in?
On a dedicated terminal at the door. It takes a scanned barcode and clears itself ready for the next person, so a queue of twenty moves without anyone standing at a keyboard. It is a screen you leave running, not a page someone works through.
Does it record which class they attended, or just that they came in?
Which class. Virtually every mark is tied to a specific event and to the program the member is enrolled in. That distinction is what makes the reporting useful later — "attendance is down" is not actionable, but "Tuesday evening is down and Saturday is not" tells you where to look.
Can we record when people leave as well as arrive?
Yes, and it is a per-location setting rather than something forced on everyone. Where it is switched on, roughly six in ten visits carry a check-out time. It matters most for after-school and childcare programs, where knowing a child left and when is not optional.
What does attendance have to do with retention?
Everything. People stop attending well before they cancel, so a thinning attendance pattern is the earliest signal you get that someone is leaving — usually weeks before they say so. Attendance is what makes the first-90-day at-risk flags possible.
How far back does attendance history go?
As far back as your records go. The oldest marks on this system were taken in 2011 and it is still being written today. That accumulated history is the raw material for cohort analysis; nothing is thinned out or rolled up after a year.
Can a whole family check in at once?
Yes. Check-in works at the household level as well as the individual, which matters at the door when a parent arrives with three children and a queue behind them.
Included, like everything else
From $39 a month with every feature switched on. Thirty days free, no card and no contract.