A big step . . . finally

Starting next week, CLC will be able to accept online credit cards or electronic checks for event registration payments through our website. This is a big step in the right direction for us, although it's definitely long overdue.

We've been using ServiceU Corporation's product EventU now for several months for facilities management and our web calendar. More on our experiences in upcoming posts.

If you want to accept registration payments in EventU, you need the add-on TransactU. I finally got approval to add it to our system last week. It took a few days to set up a merchant account to process credit cards and e-checks. Within a week of getting the approval, I'm already prepared to train our staff and launch this on the website. Because we do so many different types of events and payment structures, I was a little worried that we'd run into issues. Now that I've been working in the new system, I know it will be able to handle anything we can throw at it.

I've actually been quite impressed with TransactU. It's a great product - setting it up is simple, it's easy to customize, and most importantly the end user's experience is excellent. In addition, ServiceU provides great support for their products. I've had to call and email them several times this week with questions, and they are always available and helpful. Admittedly, I'm pretty tough to impress, but so far they've done it.

We used EMS for several years in an attempt to get a handle on our event and facilities management, but room and resource requests for events were still done using a paper form. That form had to be processed manually and compared to the EMS database. If the request was rejected, the form would go back to the requestor and they would have to figure out a different meeting time/place. In addition, if the event required AV support or food services, there was a whole other set of forms and procedures. Once the event was finally approved, it was manually entered into EMS. Then, every approved event had to be individually entered into our website calendar so it would be displayed publicly. The entire process was extremely inefficient, required a full-time position to manage it and included lots of room for errors.

The staff at CLC is now effectively using internet-based EventU for every event request. It's taken us a while to get to this point, but it's not because there was anything wrong with EventU. In fact, I can't say enough good things about the product. We had everything set up and working in a few weeks. It's just always difficult to introduce change into a process that's been in place for years. Some people accept change better than others, and I think others fear it.

I can elaborate later, but the product has more than proven itself. Our facilities/room requests, website calendar and event registrations are now online, simplified and easily accessible.