Why is a membership 'pending'?
A pending membership status is used to represent either a membership which required human approval (a setting you can configure on the plan) or a membership which was aborted in the self-service signup.
If you are using manual approval then you can "activate" individual memberships once they have pass your internal process or use the Membership Approval Flow Board.
A self-service membership which is pending will typically represent an aborted purchase. In the registration flow a pending membership will exist after the "Confirm Details" button had been pressed, just before payment.
How can I help the user complete their pending membership?
Firstly, it is important to determine what the user wanted. If they stopped registration because they no longer want to proceed then the membership should be deleted. If the user was distracted from their registration but still wants to proceed then you will need to arrange payment and then activate their membership.
For Direct Debit payments
Find the contact and open the membership panel. On the membership card click "activate" to change the status from pending to active.
Edit the membership to set the payment plan
Ask the user to log into their sheepApp account and create a Direct Debit mandate in the payments section of the app.
Once the mandate has been approved by the user's bank, go back to the membership in sheepCRM and click "unpack payment plan" (this will fail if the mandate is not active)
For other payment options
Managing this process for other payment options is not currently supported in the app. Follow the steps above to activate the membership for the user, but
you will need to arrange payment yourself.
Why can't I renew a lapsed membership
For most lapsed or expiring memberships, you will see a renew button which allows you to instantly renew the membership, creating a new membership record for the contact. Sometimes this button can be missing - here are a few reasons as to why this button may not be present:
Membership has exceeded the grace period
If the membership plan expiry date has exceeded your flock grace period for renewals, you will be unable to renew the membership plan and will need to either:
Adjust the expiry date on the lapsed record to fit within the grace period
Create a new membership record
Your grace period for renewals can be changed in your membership settings.
Membership has already been renewed
If the membership record has already been renewed, it will be flagged as such and will be unable to be renewed again. A renewal will create a new membership record, keeping the old lapsed record unchanged for historic reporting - even if this new record is deleted, the old membership record will remain 'renewed' and you will not be able to renew the record again.
In the unlikely case that the new record has been deleted, you will need to create a new membership record manually.