Release Plan

1. Purpose

This page states what each public release of the Event and Membership System delivers. A release is a set of capabilities that an organiser or a participant can use end to end. It usually spans several components at once, because most capabilities need a backend change, a screen and often a message.

The plan is ordered by capability, not by component. A release is complete when the capabilities it lists work on a real event, not when every related task is closed.

This is a plan. Capabilities described under a future release are intended behaviour and may change before they ship. The release boundary section lists what is still being decided.

2. Components

Component Role in the releases

Admin service

The backend for every capability: events, participants, orders, payments, numbers, results, memberships and communication.

Registration portal

The participant-facing application: sign-in, entry, payment hand-off, and from Release 2 the participant’s own entry management.

Admin portal

The organiser-facing application: event operations, participants, orders, imports, numbers and reporting.

Payment gateway

Takes payment on behalf of the organiser. The payment methods offered to a participant are set per organiser in the gateway’s configuration.

Communication

The messages a participant receives: confirmations, payment reminders and event notices.

3. Release overview

Release Theme Outcome

Release 1 — Go-live

Run an event end to end, with an entry experience that stands on its own

An organiser can open entries, follow them as they arrive, reconcile payments and run race day. A participant can enter from a phone in a few minutes and leaves with their race number.

Release 2 — Self-service

Participants change their own entries; operations close their loops

A participant upgrades, downgrades or hands over an entry without contacting the organiser. Number stock and outbound messages are under the organiser’s control.

Release 3 — Engagement

Before and after the race

A participant sees their own result, rates the event and gets answers at any hour. The organiser sees how the event was received.

4. Release 1 — Go-live

4.1. Organiser: race operations

The capabilities an organiser needs to run race day:

  • Display an event and its participants — E05, E02

  • Change a participant’s category or race number — C08, C04

  • Import participants from a spreadsheet — E06

  • Export the participant feed for the timing system — E11

  • Import results from the timing system — E08

  • See every order and whether it is paid — C10, C06

4.2. Organiser: event dashboard

The event overview (E01) shows live figures, refreshed while the page is open:

  • Total entries, money collected, payments still pending, and countries represented

  • Entries over time, compared with the previous edition of the same event

  • Entries by distance or category

  • Payment status: paid, pending, failed and refunded

  • Entries by club

  • The most recent entries as they arrive

4.3. Organiser: payments and participants

  • Confirm an EFT payment against its order from the order screen, recording the payer’s reference — C06

  • The participant list shows each participant’s club, country and payment status, and can be searched and filtered on them — E02

  • Entry dates per event: when entries open, when they close, and the last date on which an entry may be changed

4.4. Participant: entry

  • One profile, reused. A participant signs in once and enters any event, for themselves or for family members, with their details pre-filled from earlier entries.

  • Clear choices. The entry page shows the event’s date, venue and start times, and each distance with its price before the participant chooses.

  • Built for a phone. Every entry screen works on a mobile phone first.

  • Payment the participant prefers. Card, EFT with a payment reference, or payment at the counter. Instant EFT and other wallet-style methods are offered wherever the organiser’s payment gateway supports them.

  • Confirmation on the spot. After payment the participant sees a confirmation page with their race number, distance and start group, and receives the same details by email.

  • My entries. A participant sees all their current and past entries in one list, with payment status and race number.

5. Release 2 — Self-service

5.1. Participant: managing an entry

Each change is available from My entries until the event’s change cut-off date.

  • Upgrade. Move to a longer distance and pay only the difference. A new race number is issued where the new distance needs one.

  • Downgrade. Move to a shorter distance. The difference is returned as a partial refund. Returning it as credit for a later entry is a possible later refinement.

  • Hand over. Transfer an entry to another person by email address. The recipient confirms their own details and accepts the event terms before the entry becomes theirs.

5.2. Organiser: closing the loops

  • Scan race numbers during a stock take, or as they are returned after an event, so that number states stay accurate — T03

  • Author email templates

  • Send a message to one participant or to everyone on an event

6. Release 3 — Engagement

  • My result. A participant sees their own finishing time and position, and the published results of the event — E04

  • Post-race review. After the event a participant rates it overall and by category (organisation, route, water points, medal and goodies) and may leave a comment. The organiser sees the combined scores on the event overview.

  • Event assistant. A participant asks questions about the event at any hour — race-pack collection, bag drop, route, rules — and about their own entry, and is pointed to the right action.

  • Organiser follow-up. Event statistics, administrative task lists, marking race numbers unfit, and assigning numbers and tags on request — T04, E07

7. Release boundary still being decided

  • Upgrade and hand-over in Release 1. Both may move into Release 1. That depends on the time available before go-live, because both need the change cut-off dates and My entries first.

  • Downgrade credit. Release 2 returns the difference as a partial refund. Whether a credit balance follows, and in which release, is open.

8. Already part of the platform

These capabilities are in place today and carry into every release:

  • Several organisations on one system, each with its own branding, sign-in options and payment gateway

  • Several sports: road and track cycling as well as running

  • Group and family entries in a single order, managed from one account

  • Memberships with renewals, and race numbers that stay with a person from one event to the next

  • Federation licence and membership checks during entry, with a day licence added when one is needed

  • Eligibility by age and gender for each category

  • Configurable entry questions, custom lists and acceptance of the event’s terms

  • Early-entry pricing and discount coupons

  • Automatic payment reminders before the payment cut-off, and resuming an unfinished entry

  • A public list of entrants that needs no sign-in

  • Race number and timing-tag stock, from manufacture through to return and disposal

  • Detection and merging of duplicate person records, so each person keeps one history

  • Series leaderboards, including club and school rankings