HomeDigital MinistryKidMinChildren's Check-In Church Management Software Roundup

Children’s Check-In Church Management Software Roundup

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Children's check-in software is an invaluable resource for the church. Whether you have ten kids or 1,000 kids coming Sunday, having a system in place that serves the needs of children and parents well, while allowing ministry leaders to do their jobs well, is the goal.

We've taken some time to round up some of the most popular kids check-in software options available today. There are lots of church software options, and the landscape can be quite confusing, but with good discernment and some time available to pore over helps like our website and other software review sites like Capterra (I counted 71 children's check-in software options when I ran a search), you can make a great well-informed decision for your church.

Please note that the companies were contacted for information on their check-in solutions and that this is not a comprehensive list of all that's available on the market, but some of the biggest software providers to churches are listed.

 

Realm by ACS Technologies

Every church knows, no matter its size, having a secure, easy-to-use, and quick check-in system in place is a must. Realm, a new approach to church management software, not only facilitates check-in, but also aligns family records as part of a complete solution. Plus, Realm check-in saves your staff valuable time by automatically posting attendance in real-time.

Some of Realm's Check-In features Include:

  • Automatic attendance: There’s no need to mark attendance when your check-in system does it for you, reducing manual tasks while increasing accuracy and giving you powerful insights that help you care for families.
  • Self-serve check-in: Optimized for accuracy and speed with minimal staff involvement, parents use a touch-screen optimized interface to indicate which children they’re checking in and to quickly print name tags.
  • Customizable kiosks: Making a great first impression with families is easy with Realm’s customizable check-in kiosks, helping you set a tone of trust and security while enabling quick, seamless check-in.
  • Realm check-in functionality doesn’t end with children’s programming. Each kiosk can be customized for each event to provide a unique check-in experience for all ministries and age groups.

By the Book

Roll Call is an affordable check-in system being used by ministries that need a flexible and affordable solution for check-in.

  • Check students into a class or meeting
  • Record check in and out times
  • Print name tags and parent security tags

Use the childcare check-in software to track the attendance of your youth group members. Your ministry could assign a barcode key tag to each student. When they arrive they simply scan the barcode to check in. You’ll always know who is present and be able to run reports to find folks that haven’t come in a while.

Roll Call’s check-in is a great way to check students into their VBS group or AWANA class. Print name tags if you’d like, and attendance is automatically recorded. For those students that aren’t “pre-registered” it’s very easy to enroll them and get them checked in as well.

Church Community Builder

With CCB's Check-In system, you can check kiddos into Sunday School, adults into small groups, or volunteers into their respective areas of service. It also allows you to track real-time attendance in any setting and promotes security. It’s simple to find people and families, quickly check them in, and print out name badges and pick up tags. Is someone getting fussy? Churches can also use the Check-In tool for Text Message Paging. The Deluxe version gives churches access to Self Check-In, digital Check-Out, and a Check-In app for iPad. Churches can also check people into multiple services at one time, suggest classes based on their age, and make sure you have enough teachers in each classroom.

Features Include:

  • iPad App
  • Ability to print to portable, bluetooth connected printers
  • A new, fresh interface designed specifically for touch screen devices
  • Secure
  • Track who picked up the child and when with Check-Out
  • Prevent children from checking into a room without enough teachers/volunteers with ratio holds
  • Keep rooms from over-filling with room capacities
  • Easy family management
  • Add new families quickly
  • Update information when it changes

Fellowship One

FellowshipOne™ My Check-in is a web-based application designed to allow assigned participants and volunteers to check in to activities from the convenience of their smartphones. This cutting-edge tool simplifies and expedites the check-in process and makes gathering elusive individual attendance data easier than ever.

Congregants can effortlessly:

  • Check themselves and/or household members into assigned activities such as Weekend Services, classes, and special events
  • Check themselves and/or household members into assigned activities such as Weekend Services, classes, and special events
  • Update contact information
  • Communicate Special Instructions to teachers regarding the care of kids in the household
  • Upon arriving at church, print any necessary name tags, item tags, and parent receipts by simply scanning the displayed QR code

My Check-in is optimized for viewing on smartphone web browsers and can also be viewed on desktop/laptop web browsers. Note: Screen appearance varies depending on screen size.

Printing functionality is designed exclusively for use with iOS Check-in and utilizes the iPad camera to scan the provided QR code and then print name tags, item tags, and parent receipts from a compatible printer.

Additional Apps included in FellowshipOne’s Advanced Check-in Suite:

FellowshipOne Teacher is a web-based application designed to make managing classrooms easy and safe. Teachers login using their own mobile device and view real-time information on the participants checked into their classroom.

FellowshipOne Teacher equips your team by:

  • Providing details about when the student checked into the roster, arrived at the classroom, and checked out
  • Displaying their security code, photo, last attendance date
  • Alerting the teacher when the student has special instructions that they should be aware of, such as a food allergy or a medical condition
  • Informing the teacher if the student has recently or is about to celebrate a birthday

FellowshipOne Coordinator is a web-based application designed to make managing multiple classrooms intuitive and efficient.

FellowshipOne Coordinator allows service coordinators to:

  • See the roster capacity and the number of volunteers and students checked in to each class in real time
  • Be alerted when a roster is approaching capacity
  • Adjust roster capacities and open and close rooms to check-in at the touch of a button
  • Balance class sizes and teacher-to-student ratios with the ability to move volunteers and students from one class to another
  • Move between Coordinator and other FellowshipOne apps and websites

KidCheck

KidCheck has a passion for child safety and the role technology can play in helping churches. Their focus is on providing full-featured, easy-to-use children’s check-in software and equipment solutions. Solutions that improve child security, streamline the check-in process and create a positive parent and visitor experience—all at an exceptional value. KidCheck is a stand-alone children's check-in software, not a full church management system, so it does have some advantages and some disadvantages. From $25–60 per month, small churches to multi-site mega churches use this software to ensure the security of the children they serve.

Shelby Arena

A browser based solution for Check-In (and more importantly, Check-Out) procedures that are administratively controlled, accommodating your ministry needs and ensuring best practices for child safety.

It provides the most common options for central kiosk setup as well as multiple kiosk use. A large selection of accessories are available, including kiosk furniture, touch computers, barcode scanners, cameras, biometric scanning, label, wristband, and receipt hardware.

Shelby also offers ShelbyNext Membership platforms whose latest updates offers check-in stations and label printers to manage safe and secure check-in along with proximity check-in from within 500 ft. of the church.

SimpleChurchCRM/ChurchOfficeOnline/Elexio

[All three software solutions offer the same functionality, as they are all owned by Ministry Brands, in addition to Fellowship One and Shelby mentioned above.]

All three of these church management software providers offer check-in apps, label printing, multiple check-in station options, and much more.

Check-In > App: Allows for Proximity Check-in as parents/guardians approach the church building.
After checking the Use for Checkin? checkbox on the Edit Group page and saving your changes, the Number of Child Labels to Print and Number of Extra Guardian Labels to Print Per Child drop-down lists appear. These options set the defaults for when you are checking in individuals for that group on the Check-in page and also when using the iOS and Android App Check-in utility.

Check-In > Check-In Stations: Added an Upload A Background Image For Kiosk Mode option. A background image can now be uploaded for each check-in station, which displays when in kiosk mode. This allows you to customize and create themed stations.

Check-In > Check-In Stations: Added an option Only Allow Guardian Searching By The Last Four Digits Of The Phone Number. If this option is enabled, you can only search by the last four digits of the home/cell phone number. If this option is disabled, you can search by first and last name or the last four digits of the phone number. This applies to all web (non-iOS) stations.

Check-In > Kiosk Mode: Reduced the vertical space required for Check-In when using Kiosk Mode to aid those with smaller screens or touch-screen computers using the on-screen keyboard. The list of people in the family now displays horizontally across the screen, and not vertically. Additionally, the settings for number of labels to print appear horizontally instead of vertically.

IN ADDITION – There is integration between Protect My Ministry and SimpleChurchCRM where background checks can now be ordered and managed directly from the Admin of SCCRM.

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Lastly, we worked together with KidCheck several years ago to publish a VERY helpful ebook on children's check-in security practices. Please take a moment to read this post and download the free 40-page ebook.

If you'd like to recommend other check-in systems, please leave a comment below.

Lauren Hunter
Lauren Hunterhttps://laurenhunter.net
Lauren Hunter is a writer who loves the big picture of God’s journey we are all on together. In 2007, she founded ChurchTechToday, a website for pastors and church leaders to harness technology to improve ministry. Married to her high school sweetheart, Lauren lives in Northern California with her husband and their four children. Her latest book is Leaving Christian Science: 10 Stories of New Faith in Jesus Christ. She can be found online at https://laurenhunter.net.

6 COMMENTS

  1. Has anyone tried this? https://www.simplesigninonline.com/ It looks like exactly what we would want…I realize it is web-based, so if the Internet wasn’t working, we would have to resort to pencil and paper, but all we need are a couple of tablets and a label printer. And it is pretty affordable, and looks easy to use…I would love to know if anyone has had any experience using it.

  2. Hey Lauren, Paul from the KidMin App here!

    Great list! If you get a minute you should definitely take a look at our check-in system too!

    We are one of the fastest growing check-in systems and we’re designed exclusively for Children’s Ministry.

    A few reasons why churches love us:

    •We have mobile apps for parents that let parents check their kids before they step foot in church. We don’t charge extra for this feature and don’t require any proprietary hardware.

    •Mobile apps designed to make volunteers life easier.

    •There is also a built in volunteer scheduler to save KidMin Pastors tons of time each week.

    •We don’t charge you more if you want to add additional check-in stations.

    •Kiosk mode is included for free.

    Feel free to give me a shout and I’d be happy to give you a guided tour!

  3. Thanks Lauren, I can’t believe how fast two years has gone by. A lot has changed since then. KidCheck now offers Express Check-In (parent-directed check-in from a mobile device) which takes the mobile check-in experience to a whole new level by eliminating the need for check-in station equipment, it also shortens lines and check-in time, reduces manual involvement, and gives parents the flexibility and convenience expected in today’s mobile world. Additional information can be found at http://bit.ly/2dH9QWe

    Thanks again for including KidCheck in your round up. It’s always appreciated.

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