Member status: active, pending and lapsed

Every member has one of three statuses. You see it on the roll and on their page.

The three statuses

• Active. A current member. They are charged dues, they receive reminders and the newsletter (if they agreed), and they are counted on the roll.
• Pending. A member who is waiting on something and is not yet fully current, for example someone an old system marked "Pending – Renewal". Pending members are on the roll but are not charged dues until they are active. An import brings in WildApricot's "Pending" statuses as pending, with a note.
• Lapsed. A member who is no longer current. Lapsed members stay on the roll with all their history; nothing is deleted. They are not charged for a new year, and a newsletter does not go to them.

Who changes it

You can set a status by hand when you add or edit a member. The dues rules can also lapse a member for you, but only if you ask them to: each membership level has a grace setting. With a grace of 14 days, a member whose dues are unpaid on the due date plus 14 days is lapsed. The moment they pay, they are active again. A level with no grace setting never lapses anyone by itself. A status you set by hand is never overridden by that rule.

What lapsed does to email

A lapsed member is left out of newsletters, and the pre-send report on the composer lists them with the reason. Step 3 of the dues reminders still reaches a member the rule has just lapsed, because it is the "last reminder" before you lose them.

Tags are separate

A tag is a label such as "committee" or "choir". It does not change what a member may do. Tags come in from a file's groups column, and you can filter the roll by one. A status is about membership; a tag is about grouping.

Related

Set up membership levels explains the grace setting, and who is overdue and who is lapsed explains how dues dates move a member's status.