Membership Management

Institution-level feature — managed from your institution dashboard at deandesk.com/dashboard. Memberships are scoped to your institution, not to individual schools. See Institutions & Schools for how these levels relate.

Video walkthrough

This walkthrough uses the real DeanDesk interface with the fictional Northstar Academy demo school and a calm, AI-generated English voice. Payments and outside services are not connected in the demo.

Screenshots use fictional Northstar demo data. Payment and integration screens illustrate the demo setup; no live transactions or connections are shown. DeanDesk includes a full membership management system at the institution level. You can create membership plans, accept payments through Stripe, import members in bulk, track membership history, and use membership status to gate access to products and discounts across your schools.

What is a membership?

A Membership represents a person’s paid or manually-assigned membership in your institution. It is separate from — and sits alongside — the Identity and User account systems.

How Membership, Identity, and User relate

Institution
  └── Identity (login credential — username, email, password)
        └── Membership (membership entitlement — plan, billing, status, metadata)
        └── User in School A (school profile — roles, courses, grades)
        └── User in School B (school profile — roles, courses, grades)

Concept	What it is	Scope
Identity	A login account for your institution. Holds credentials (username, email, password) and institution-level roles.	Institution-wide
User	A profile inside a specific school. Holds school-specific roles, course enrollments, grades, and billing. Created automatically when an Identity accesses a school.	Per school
Membership	A membership entitlement tied to an Identity. Tracks the membership plan, billing status, term dates, contact info, and custom metadata.	Institution-wide

An Identity can exist without a Membership (they are just an account holder). A Membership requires an Identity to be linked to — though during bulk import, memberships can be queued for Identities that don’t exist yet and will be linked automatically when the Identity is created.

A person has one Identity per institution, one Membership per institution (at most), and one User per school they access. These are three separate records that work together.

Membership plans

Before you can add members, you need to create at least one membership plan. You can publish multiple plans within the same tier (e.g. a “Standard Family” and a “Supporter Family” plan), and each plan has its own pricing, features, and display order on the public landing page.

Northstar demo: Configuration — Northstar demo — Configuration

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Creating a plan

Open Membership settings

From your institution dashboard, go to Memberships → Configuration.

Choose a tier type

DeanDesk supports two tier types:

Tier	What it includes
Individual	A single-person membership
Family	A membership that covers a primary member plus spouse and children (configurable max size, default 5)

You can create as many plans as you like within each tier. Plans are grouped by tier on the public membership landing page under Individual Memberships and Family Memberships headings.

Set pricing

Configure the pricing options you want to offer:

Monthly price — recurring charge every month
Annual price — recurring charge once per year

You can enable one or both billing intervals.

Add plan details

Fill in the plan name, description, and optionally:

Features — a list of benefits shown to prospective members
Terms — terms and conditions members must accept when subscribing
Policies — free-text policy text shown alongside the plan
Max family size — for family plans, the maximum number of members (default 5, max 20)
Display order — controls the order plans appear in their tier section on the landing page
Active toggle — hide a plan from the landing page without deleting it

Save

Click Save. DeanDesk automatically creates the corresponding Stripe product and price objects in both your test and live environments.

Use multiple plans within a tier to offer pricing variations like “Standard” vs “Supporter”, or to surface special-event or seasonal plans without retiring your default plan.

Membership term settings

Configure when your membership year starts and ends, and how to handle members who join mid-term.

Open Membership settings

Go to Memberships → Configuration → Annual membership period in the institution dashboard.

Set the annual term dates

Define the start and end of your membership year (e.g. January 1 through December 31, or September 1 through August 31).

Choose a late join policy

When someone signs up for an annual plan after the term has already started:

Policy	What happens
Full price	The member pays the full annual amount regardless of when they join
Prorated	The member pays a reduced amount based on the remaining time in the current term

Adding members

There are three ways to add members: self-service signup, manual activation, and bulk import.

Browse current members

In Members, use All Current Members to review current membership records, including people who have not connected a login.

Northstar demo: Members — All Current Members — Northstar demo — Members — All Current Members

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Find members with logins

Use Members with Logins to work with current members who have an institution Identity. Open a member to review their details.

Northstar demo: Members — Members with Logins — Northstar demo — Members — Members with Logins

Open full-size screenshot Members can purchase a membership themselves from your institution portal.

The member visits your institution’s portal and clicks to join.
They see the available plans with pricing (including prorated amounts if applicable).
They select a plan and billing interval, enter payment details, and accept the terms.
Stripe processes the payment and DeanDesk creates the membership automatically.
The member receives a confirmation email for their purchase.

Manual activation

Admins can activate memberships on behalf of individuals — useful for members who pay in person, sign up over the phone, or receive complimentary memberships. Go to Memberships → Members and click Manual Activate to open a four-step wizard.

Identity

Pick the identity the membership belongs to. Search for an existing identity, or create a new account for the member — a built-in duplicate search helps you avoid creating a second record for someone who already exists.

Details

Fill in the member’s name, email, phone, address, and spouse details.

Payment

Choose how the membership is paid:

Option	When to use it
External source	The payment already happened outside DeanDesk — type where it was paid in Payment Occurred At (for example cash, check, Zelle, or Venmo)
Process payment now	Charge a saved or new card or bank account. Payments settle in your institution’s connected Stripe account.

Payment source is searchable on the Members page and is one of the filters in the custom report builder.

Membership

Choose the membership plan and tier, set the referral source, add an internal note, and fill in any custom fields. Review the summary, then click Process and Activate.

When the wizard creates a new identity, the member receives an account email — “Your DeanDesk account for [your institution]” — with the login URL and a temporary password to change on first sign-in.

Bulk import

Import hundreds or thousands of members at once using the Bulk Import wizard. The wizard walks you through column mapping, validation, and execution, and tracks every import as a job you can revisit and retry.

Open Bulk Import

Go to Memberships → Bulk Import in the institution dashboard.

Upload your CSV

Upload a CSV containing your member rows. The wizard parses the file and shows the headers it detected.

Map your columns

Match each CSV column to a DeanDesk field (email, first name, last name, plan, dates, custom metadata fields, etc.). Click Auto-Map to have DeanDesk match columns by name automatically — you can then adjust any mappings that didn’t resolve correctly.

Validate

Run validation. The wizard reports any rows that have missing required fields, invalid emails, unknown plan IDs, or metadata values that don’t match the schema. Fix issues in your source file and re-upload, or proceed with the valid rows only.

Execute the import

Run the import. DeanDesk processes each record:

If the Identity exists: creates the membership immediately
If the Identity doesn’t exist yet: queues as a pending member
If the person already has an active membership: skipped

Review the job

Each import is saved as a job in Memberships → Bulk Import. Open a job to see row-level results — created, queued, skipped, failed — with the failure reason for each row. Review failures and correct the source data before retrying through the available import controls.

Northstar demo: Bulk Import — Northstar demo — Bulk Import

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Historical backfill from an import

Once a bulk import job has completed, you can use it as the source for a historical backfill — converting the imported rows into historical membership periods on existing member profiles. This is useful when you import a snapshot of a prior membership year and want to keep it as a closed historical period rather than an active membership.

Open the completed import

On Memberships → Bulk Import, click into a completed job.

Open the Historical Backfill panel

Scroll to the Backfill Live Memberships card on the job detail page.

Pick the target plan and year

Select the live membership plan and the membership year you want to attribute the rows to.

Run the backfill

DeanDesk creates a historical period on each member’s profile, scoped to this import job. Re-running the backfill is safe — only rows that haven’t been backfilled yet are processed.

Backfill is scoped per-import-job, so different imports can be attributed to different plans and years without interfering with each other.

When a membership is created for someone whose Identity doesn’t exist yet, it is saved as an awaiting-login member. The Members page has tabs that segment the list:

Tab	What it shows
All current	Every active membership, regardless of login state
Members with logins	Current memberships linked to an Identity account
Awaiting logins	Memberships waiting on the person to create an Identity
Historical	Past membership periods (see Membership history)

Awaiting-login records are automatically linked when the person registers:

When a new Identity is created (via signup or invitation), DeanDesk checks for any awaiting records that match the email or username.
If a match is found, the membership is created and linked to the new Identity automatically.
You can also manually trigger a sync or link individual awaiting records from the Awaiting logins tab.

Northstar demo: Members — Members Awaiting Logins — Northstar demo — Members — Members Awaiting Logins

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Undo an incorrect import link

For a member connected from an awaiting-login import, open the member detail page and choose Undo Identity Link when available. Review the confirmation carefully: the imported profile returns to Awaiting Login; a membership created by that link is removed, while a pre-existing membership is left unchanged. This is an import-link correction, not a subscription cancellation. If DeanDesk asks you to review an older family link, check the household and spouse details after unlinking.

Member detail page

Clicking a row in any Members tab opens a dedicated detail page at /dashboard/memberships/members/[kind]/[id] (where kind is current, awaiting-login, or historical). The page is organized into tabs — Overview, Manage, Payments, Timeline, and Connect — with panels like Membership Snapshot, Membership Actions, Payment History, and Custom Member Fields. Awaiting-login and historical members show their saved import snapshot. Across the tabs you can:

Re-link the membership to a different Identity
Edit contact info, address, payment source, referral source, and custom metadata
Edit spouse details on the membership
Change the plan or billing interval
View transaction history
Add or edit history periods (historical members)
Merge duplicate profiles when the same person appears more than once
Manually change membership status

Plan upgrades are prorated and charged immediately. Downgrades and credits apply to the member’s next invoice.

Northstar demo: Member detail — Overview — Northstar demo — Member detail — Overview

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Northstar demo: Member detail — Payments — Northstar demo — Member detail — Payments

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Northstar demo: Member detail — Manage — Northstar demo — Member detail — Manage

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Household and spouse

The Household and Spouse panel on the member detail page shows the member’s family group, the number of active members in it, and the spouse’s name, email, phone, and linked identity.

Membership metadata

Custom metadata fields let you store institution-specific information on each membership — volunteer roles, committee assignments, t-shirt sizes, dietary restrictions, or anything else your organization needs to track.

Configuring metadata fields

Open metadata settings

Go to Memberships → Configuration → Custom member fields. Settings → Metadata configures Identity fields, which are separate from membership fields.

Add a field

Click Add Field and configure:

Setting	What it controls
Field name	The unique identifier used when mapping imports
Field label	The display name shown to admins and in reports
Field type	The data type — see table below
Required	Whether the field must be filled in when creating or editing a membership
Options	For select and multiselect types, the list of allowed values
Description	Help text shown to admins

Supported field types

Type	Description	Example
Text	Short text input	”Board Member”, “Room 204”
Textarea	Long text input	Notes, special requests
Number	Numeric value	Years of membership, age
Date	Date picker	Join date, certification expiry
Boolean	Yes/No toggle	”Volunteer?”, “Newsletter opt-in”
Select	Single choice from a list	”Committee: Finance / Education / Events”
Multiselect	Multiple choices from a list	”Interests: Sports, Arts, Technology”

Where metadata appears

Member list and detail views in the institution dashboard
Bulk import — metadata values can be included in import data and are validated against the schema
Reports — custom metadata columns are included when exporting membership reports as CSV
Discount rules — metadata fields can be used as conditions in rule-based discounts (see Membership entitlements below)

Referral source tracking

To understand where new members come from, you can configure a Referral Source dropdown that appears during membership signup.

Define your referral options

In Memberships → Configuration, add the referral options you want to track (e.g. “School admissions”, “Friend referral”, “Social media”, “Newsletter”, “Event”).

Members select on signup

The dropdown is shown during the signup flow. The selected option is saved on the membership record.

Report on referral channels

Referral source is included as a column in the bulk export and in custom reports, so you can see which acquisition channels are driving signups.

Demographic sync

Memberships can store demographic data on each member — useful for community reporting, grant applications, and program eligibility. Demographic fields collected during signup or import are synced into the membership record automatically.

Membership demographic information is managed at the institution level. Review who has institution access before collecting or exporting sensitive member details.

Family memberships

When a member subscribes to the Family tier, DeanDesk creates a family group that the primary member can manage.

Family roles

Role	Who	How they’re added
Primary	The account holder who purchased the family membership	Automatically assigned
Spouse	The primary member’s partner	Invited by email — must accept the invite
Child (13+)	A child aged 13 or older	Invited by email — must accept the invite
Child (under 13)	A child under 13	Listed by name only (no email/account required)

Adding family members

The primary member (or an admin) can invite family members from the membership portal:

Click Invite Family Member and choose the role (spouse or child).
For spouse and children 13+, enter their email. DeanDesk creates an Identity for them if one doesn’t exist and sends an invitation email.
For children under 13, enter their name only — they are listed on the family group without an account.
Invited members accept the invitation by signing in and confirming.

The family group size is capped by the plan’s max family size setting.

Membership entitlements

Membership status can be used to control access and pricing across your schools.

Members-only products

When creating or editing a tuition product, you can set its access to Members Only. When a product is marked as members-only:

Only users with a valid, active membership at the institution level can select and purchase it.
Users without a membership see the product but are blocked from enrolling with a message indicating a membership is required.
Admins can always bypass this restriction.

Choose Members Only in the tuition product’s access settings.

Use members-only products to offer exclusive tuition rates, premium courses, or special programs that are only available to paying members of your institution.

Membership-based discounts

The discount rule engine can evaluate a user’s membership status when deciding whether to apply a discount. Two membership-related fields are available as discount rule conditions:

Field	Type	What it checks
Has Active Membership	Boolean	Whether the user’s Identity has a valid, active membership at the institution
Membership Tier	Select (individual / family)	The tier type of the user’s active membership

This lets you create discounts like:

“10% off all tuition for active members”
“Family plan members get $50 off per child enrollment”
“$25 discount for anyone with an active membership”

These fields are evaluated automatically — you don’t need to tag users manually. DeanDesk checks the user’s linked Identity and current membership status in real time when the discount rules are evaluated.

Membership history

DeanDesk maintains a historical record of all membership periods — both current DeanDesk-managed memberships and imported historical data.

Historical profiles

Each person gets a history profile that tracks all their membership periods across time. This is useful for:

Tracking long-term membership tenure for members who joined before you started using DeanDesk
Importing records from a previous membership system
Maintaining a complete audit trail of membership activity

Northstar demo: Members — Historical — Northstar demo — Members — Historical

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Importing historical data

Use the historical import to load past membership periods. Each imported record includes:

The member’s email (used to match or create a profile)
The period’s start and end dates
An import label (e.g. “2022-2023 Membership Year”)
Plan name, tier type, and any metadata

Historical profiles are automatically linked to existing Identities when a matching email is found. If multiple profiles exist for the same person (e.g. from separate imports with different email addresses), you can merge them.

Active membership sync

When a member subscribes or renews through Stripe, DeanDesk automatically adds a period to their history profile. This keeps the historical record up to date without manual intervention.

Membership reports

The Reports workspace at Memberships → Reports lets you preview and download canned reports, or build a custom report with the filters you need.

Canned reports

Report	What it includes
Active Members	All currently valid memberships with contact info and metadata
Manual Memberships	Memberships created manually (not through Stripe)
DeanDesk Billing	Stripe-backed memberships with subscription details and revenue
Expiring Soon	Memberships approaching their end date — useful for retention outreach

Northstar demo: Reports — Quick Reports — Northstar demo — Reports — Quick Reports

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Custom report builder

Build a report tailored to a specific question by filtering on:

Filter	Values
Status	Active, expired, cancelled, pending
Tier	Individual, family
Plan	Any of your published plans
Payment source	DeanDesk (Stripe), Cash, Venmo, Zelle, Check, Other
Days until expiration	Numeric range — surface members expiring in the next N days

Preview results in the dashboard, then download as CSV. Reports include all standard fields plus any custom metadata columns you’ve configured.

Northstar demo: Reports — Report Builder — Northstar demo — Reports — Report Builder

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Northstar demo: Reports — Preview — Northstar demo — Reports — Preview

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Membership workspace reference

The sidebar separates four pages so configuration, daily operations, reporting, and imports can be reached directly.

Sidebar page	Capabilities
Configuration	Maintain individual/family plans, annual membership dates and late-join pricing, referral options, and custom member fields.
Members	Search, filter, sort, export, manually activate, and open member profiles. The list has All Current Members, Members with Logins, Members Awaiting Logins, and Historical tabs.
Reports	Quick Reports offers predefined reports. Report Builder selects custom filters. Preview shows the chosen report before CSV download.
Bulk Import	Upload File, Map Columns, Validate, and Import; review saved import jobs, failures, duplicates, and historical backfill.

Member detail tabs by record type

A detail page shows only the tabs that apply to that record. A historical or awaiting-login profile does not have every live-member action.

Tab	Purpose
Overview	Inspect the live Membership Snapshot, Awaiting-Login Snapshot, or Historical Profile Snapshot, together with address, household/spouse, and custom fields.
Payments	Review institution Payment History for a current membership.
Manage	Use Membership Actions and Edit Membership Fields on a current membership, including its status, plan, billing interval, saved contact details, spouse, source, and metadata.
Connect	Review and correct account/profile relationships using the linking and merge controls available for that record.
Timeline	Inspect historical periods, dates, plan/tier, source, notes, and available history-edit actions.

Import review tabs

During Validate, use All, Valid, and Invalid to inspect row outcomes. During the import result review, All, Imported, Failed, and Duplicates separate successful rows from errors and skipped duplicate records. Saved job detail uses All, Imported, Failed, and Skipped. Review the row-level reason before retrying; an imported row and a newly created login are different outcomes.

​Video walkthrough

​What is a membership?

​How Membership, Identity, and User relate

​Membership plans

​Creating a plan

​Membership term settings

​Adding members

​Browse current members

​Find members with logins

​Self-service signup

​Manual activation

​Bulk import

​Historical backfill from an import

​Awaiting-login members

​Undo an incorrect import link

​Member detail page

​Household and spouse

​Membership metadata

​Configuring metadata fields

​Supported field types

​Where metadata appears

​Referral source tracking

​Demographic sync

​Family memberships

​Family roles

​Adding family members

​Membership entitlements

​Members-only products

​Membership-based discounts

​Membership history

​Historical profiles

​Importing historical data

​Active membership sync

​Membership reports

​Canned reports

​Custom report builder

​Membership workspace reference

​Member detail tabs by record type

​Import review tabs

Video walkthrough

What is a membership?

How Membership, Identity, and User relate

Membership plans

Creating a plan

Membership term settings

Adding members

Browse current members

Find members with logins

Self-service signup

Manual activation

Bulk import

Historical backfill from an import

Awaiting-login members

Undo an incorrect import link

Member detail page

Household and spouse

Membership metadata

Configuring metadata fields

Supported field types

Where metadata appears

Referral source tracking

Demographic sync

Family memberships

Family roles

Adding family members

Membership entitlements

Members-only products

Membership-based discounts

Membership history

Historical profiles

Importing historical data

Active membership sync

Membership reports

Canned reports

Custom report builder

Membership workspace reference

Member detail tabs by record type

Import review tabs