Event Reminders - How do they work?

One of the really useful features of ITM is the ability for it to automatically generate Event Reminder emails a week before your event starts.

This article answers some of the more common questions about how this feature works.

Q: How do I turn on this feature?
A: You can enable or disable the sending of reminders on a per-Event basis. Simply go to the 'Communications' mode of your Event, and tick the 'Send An Event Reminder' tickbox. You can also enter a message to be included with the reminder when it is sent.

Q: How can I have reminders for all my events?
A: If you are an ITM administrator for your organisation, you can set the preference called "Default Reminder Setting". This preference is available at both the Organisation, and the Organisation Group levels. It is a default, meaning that all new Events created after it is set will inherit that default setting. Events created beforehand will not be affected.

Q: When are Event Reminders sent?
A: ITM will first try to send the reminders one week before the event starts. It checks once each day to see if it needs to send out messages or not, at approximately 4am UTC (which is 9pm MT / 4pm NZST). If you only enable the Event Reminder for your event within that last week before the Event starts, the Reminders will be sent the next time ITM checks if it needs to send messages.

Q: Who gets the Event Reminders?
A: All the confirmed participants for your Event are sent Event Reminders. Participants who are not confirmed, as well as instructors, assistants and other people involved - do not get a reminder.

Q: How do I know if the Reminders were sent?
A: When you visit the 'Communications' mode of your Event, you will see a message showing that the Event Reminders were successfully queued for sending. From this point on you can no longer make changes to the Reminder message.

Q: What happens if there is a problem sending the Reminder?
A: After an Event Reminder is queued for sending, it could still possibly fail for a number of reasons. The most common one is that the email address for one of your participant's is missing or invalid. It is also possible, although unlikely, that ITM's mail server was having technical problems at the time the messages were to be sent. You'll be sent an 'online' notification about the problem for each one of the Reminders that cannot be sent. 'Online' means that you won't receive it by email, but rather you'll see it in your Notifications list inside ITM.

Q: What if one of my participants doesn't have an email address?
A: If the person's contact entry in ITM does not have an email address at all, then the Event Reminder will not be sent for that person, and you will receive an online notification about the problem as described above. However if you've entered their email address as noemail@missioncontrol.co.nz (as recommended here), then there will be no failure notification. Obviously you'll want to contact that person by phone or through some other method to ensure they are reminded about your event.

Q: What if I cancel my Event?
A: ITM does not send Event Reminders for cancelled events, regardless of whether you have enabled the 'Send An Event Reminder' setting or not.

Q: What if I change my event details after the Reminder is sent?
A: ITM only sends the Reminders once. It will not resend them if you change event details after the Reminders have been sent. However, the emails your participants receive only contain a few specific details (the name of the Event, and the start date and time). For all other information (such as Location, description etc) they have to click on the link that's provided in the email, which will take them to the ITM public calendar entry for your event. From there they will be able to see the most up to date information.