Proposal: Accept T&C Per Event Instead of Pre-Filtering Invitations

[mroderick]

Problem

The current invitation system filters out members who haven't accepted the Terms of Service at the point of invitation. This filtering is invisible to both organisers and members, effectively acting as gatekeeping that prevents previously active community members from participating — without their knowledge.

Scale of Exclusion

• 11,097 members (38% of active community) are currently excluded from invitations because they haven't accepted T&C
• Of these, 10,670 (96%) registered before the T&C requirement existed (February 2020)
• Post-2021 members have <1% exclusion rate — the problem is entirely historical

By Registration Year

Year	Members	Without T&C	% Excluded
Pre-2020	16,141	10,670	66%
2020	2,349	353	15%
2021+	8,474	74	<1%

Top Chapters by Excluded Members

Chapter	Excluded	% of Chapter
London	3,057	43%
South London	756	38%
West London	745	35%
Brighton	653	45%
New York	548	52%

Proposed Solution

Instead of pre-filtering by T&C status:

1. Invite all subscribed members to workshops
2. Require T&C acceptance at RSVP time — with a checkbox on the accept invitation page
3. Store T&C acceptance timestamp on the invitation record (not the member)
4. Show (collapsible) T&C text on the acceptance page

Why This Works

• Self-selecting: Only members who actually want to attend will accept T&C
• No gatekeeping: Everyone receives an invitation regardless of historical T&C status
• Better tracking: We know exactly which T&C version each member accepted
• Re-engagement: Inactive members get invited again and may return

Estimated Impact

Note: These are speculative projections based on historical data. There are no guarantees this will increase attendance — the actual impact could be higher or lower. But at least all members are included, which is a fundamental principle of codebar.

Based on current 1.69% invitation→attendance conversion rate, projecting 10% of excluded members return:

Chapter	Members Without T&C	Extra Attendees/Event
London	3,057	~5
South London	756	~1
West London	745	~1
Brighton	653	~1
New York	548	~1

Chapter-Specific Examples

Brighton: Currently ~13 attendees/workshop. At 10% re-engagement of the 653 excluded members, we'd expect roughly 14 attendees (+1).

London: Currently ~30 attendees/workshop. At 10% re-engagement of the 3,057 excluded members, we'd expect roughly 35 attendees (+5).

Implementation Considerations

• Need to add accepted_toc_at column to workshop_invitations table (or create new table)
• Modify invitation acceptance flow to require T&C checkbox
• Update invitation view to display T&C text
• Decide whether to keep or remove member-level accepted_toc_at column

[KimberleyCook]

Would this approach mean people would have to accept the T&Cs every time they RSVP?

[mikej]

Would this approach mean people would have to accept the T&Cs every time they RSVP?

I was wondering the same thing and also wondering if a variation on this idea could work where we:

• Send invites too all non-banned members (even if they haven't accepted the T&Cs)
• Require T&Cs to be accepted when RSVPing if they haven't been accepted already (but for this use the existing accepted_toc_at on the Member rather than a per-workshop field)
• If the T&Cs have been accepted we could avoid showing the check box on the RSVP to reduce friction

As a possible enhancement: we've got the T&C accepted status as a timestamp so if we issued updated T&Cs there's potential to require members to re-accept the terms when RSVPing if the latest T&Cs are newer than the date when they accepted.

[mroderick]

As a possible enhancement: we've got the T&C accepted status as a timestamp so if we issued updated T&Cs there's potential to require members to re-accept the terms when RSVPing if the latest T&Cs are newer than the date when they accepted.

I had the same thought this morning :)

[scoutb-cogapp]

I welcome these suggestions! I am not sure it will hugely increase our attendee numbers in Brighton because:

• attendee numbers are capped at the moment because of low student engagement. only if student numbers increase, can we accept more coaches per workshop
• this will of course also send emails to a huge number of former students but it is highly unlikely that these will start attending again as students.

but we will still benefit because this can potentially increase our coaches pool which in turn can surface new hosts and sponsors. and increased coach diversity in itself is great.

this measure will also hopefully help tidy up the list of people who are signed up. when they receive emails again, it will encourage them to remove themselves from codebar or become active. either way is a good thing for data hygiene.

[scoutb-cogapp]

i also agree that the perfect solution would:

• track which version of t&c's a user has agreed to
• encourage/force them to agree to the latest version
• not ask them every time they sign up but only when the version is out of date

[mroderick]

Thanks all!
Once I have some breathing room, I'll make a PR for this :)