If you don't want your system emails to come 'from' Affiliate Address.  You can now rename the sender name to something friendlier and more recognizable, i.e. From:  HandsOn Atlanta.  This requires a quick update by your system administrator.  Here's how:

Go to Setup and type "Organization-Wide in the search box"  click on the link for "Organize-Wide Addresses"

Click on edit next to the organization-wide email address with the display name "Affiliate Address"

Here's where we'll edit the Display Name from "Affiliate Address" to HandsOn Connect Demo.

Retain the option to "Allow all Profiles to Use this From Address"

Click Save to save the edited Organization Wide-Email Address.  Take note of the exact name and spelling of the Display Name you've chosen.  You'll need that for the next step.

(Note: If you do not have a display name for 'Affiliate Address" - you can create a new organization-wide email address using these settings and the email address you want to use as your general default email address).

You need to enter this display name in the control panel, so the system knows which organization-wide email to use for trigger-generated emails.

Now you need to adjust the email alerts that are workflow actions, so that these emails come from the new default email address, instead of from the current user.  (Since emails sent 'from' @yahoo.com @aol.com or @gmail.com will be blocked and not received.

Go to Setup / Build / Create / Workflow & Approvals / Email Alerts.

The following email alerts should be edited to change the "From Email Address" from 'Current User' to your default "Organization Wide Email Address" you defined in steps 1.2 and 1.3 above.

• Connection Cancellation Notice
• Connection Notice of Occurrence reschedule
• New Organization Registered
• New Self-Reporting Connection to Existing Organization
• New Self -Reporting Connection to Outside Organization
• Opportunity Sign-Up Confirmation - Affiliate Managed - Date and Time Specific - Expess Interest
• Opportunity Sign-up Confirmation - Affiliate Managed - To Be Scheduled - Express Interest
• Registration Confirmation
• Request Hours
• Teams - Invitation to join Team
• Teams - Notify member they have been removed
• Teams - This team has been disbanded
• This email is sent to a volunteer when a connection for an individually scheduled opportunity is administratively set to declined
• Volunteer Interest Notification
• Volunteer Status has been confirmed
• Volunteer Status has been declined

The following email alerts should optionally be edited if you have any partners who are using @yahoo, @aol, or @gmail.com email addresses to log into the partner portal.  (They do not need to be edited IF the partner portal users all use their own domain names in their email addresses)

• Occurrence Approval Requested
• Organization Profile updated Notification
• Recurrence Approval Requested
• Volunteer Opportunity Information Edited

Click on EDIT next to each email alert listed above.   We'll show this for the first 'Connection Cancellation Notice"

Note:  If any of your internal users (system admin, staff) is using a @gmail.com, @yahoo.com, or @aol.com email address for their Salesforce login), you need to update EVERY email alert that uses 'current user' as the from address - as your internal emails will not be sent either. We assume however that most SF users are using their organizations domain name for their Salesforce login.)

Unless someone has changed it, the 'from' listed on each of the email alerts above will be "Current User's Email Address".  

Change the "from email address" from Current User's email address to the new default organization-wide email address you defined in steps 1.2 and 1.3 above and click Save.

Now repeat this for all the email alerts listed in step 1.4.

Your emails will now all go through and not be blocked.  (We've updated all the trigger-managed emails that are sent out to use the new default email address you set in the control panel).

Self-Reported Connections will now appear in the connection grid for the occurrences of Self-Reported Volunteer Hours.  Because self-reported connections are always for past dates - look for them in the "Attendance Due" tab.  (After you verify them as attended or not attended - they will appear in the :Attendance Reported" tab.

We've also updated the new "One Step Volunteer Attendance Reporting" page so that it includes all Self-Reported Connections that have not yet had attendance reported (HOC-447),  

Note:  partners only see their own self-reported opportunities.  Staff and Administrators will see unreported attendance for ALL occurrences across all partners.  You'll need to know which occurrence ID is associated with your organization's self-reported volunteer hours and the one for all non-partner organizations if you wish to report only your affiliate's self-reported volunteer hours from the one-step volunteer attendance reporting grid.

By popular demand - the waitlist tab is back for Date and Time Specific Express Interest occurrences and To Be Scheduled Opportunities.   (Last month, the waitlisted volunteers tab only appeared for full sign-up opportunities.)  

Several HandsOn Connect customers expressed concerns that 'some of our connections are not appearing in the new connection grid".  Well - while we thought we had built tabs for everything, we hadn't considered a tab for connections with bad data :-(         Here's an example that was reported.  One affiliate had a lot of TBS connections that were saved without a start date and time or an end date and time.  With these fields missing, these connections have no way of showing up as scheduled, attendance due or attendance reported.  They had no relation to time at all.  

We recommend that you and your partners should always enter a start date and time for connections, but for connections with awkward, bad data in them, we've added the "Other" Tab, so that you can edit the connections from within the connections grid, save the changes, and then have the connection moved to the correct tab based on whether its a future connection or a past one.   Can't find a connection?  Look in the "Other" tab :-)

In the screen shot below we see what happens if someone confirms Valerie Volunteer for a TBS opportunity but removed the Start Date, Start Time and End Time.  If you want to resurrect this connection, enter a start date, start time and end time, and click 'Save changes".  The connection will then be moved to the appropriate tab (scheduled, or Attendance Due".  In the attendance due tab you'll be able to mark the connection as attended or not attended.  (Note: It's not possible to verify attendance for a connection that doesn't have a start date and time and end time.)

If you see a lot of connections showing up in the "Other Volunteers" tab -- you may want to talk to your partners about how to correctly confirm and schedule a TBS connection.  (Better yet -- switch to the new Individually Scheduled Opportunity type - where the date, start time and end time are already filled out for you by the volunteer who expresses interest! )

In the basic portal - some of the tabs in the connection grid rendered a bit oddly.  This has been fixed and now the tabs appear more legibly.

You can create multiple connections for a volunteer by doing the following:

1. This section tells you the details of the volunteer opportunity you've selected, including its schedule and start and end date.

2.  Use the lookup icon and choose the volunteer you wish to schedule

3.  Pick a Day of the week, Start Time and End Time for the connections you wish to create.  

4.  Click the "Add Day & Time" button to add that day of the week to the schedule you are creating which appears below (5).   You can add additional days and times to the schedule by picking additional days and times, and clicking on "Add Day & Time" each time until you have the full weekly schedule for the volunteer.  

Note: Even though the published scheduled here is for Mondays and Friday only, you can administratively create connections for any day of the week, giving you the flexibility to schedule volunteers outside of the published weekly schedule.

6.  Indicate the start date and end date of the recurring connections defined in 5.  

Note: You can create connections that occur in the past or in the future or both at once.  But you cannot choose dates that fall outside the start date and end date of the volunteer opportunity / occurrence as shown in the summary in section 1.  If you wish to schedule outside those dates, you'll need to go to the occurrence record and adjust the start date and/or end date of the opportunity/occurrence.

7.  Click "Create Connections" and the connections will be created for you and appear in the connections grid.  All connections created will be in 'confirmed' status.  Those for future dates will appear in the "Scheduled Attendance" tab, or any past connections will appear in the "Attendance Due" tab where you can then mark the volunteer as attended.

Note: You cannot create more than 50 connections at one time.  If you need to schedule a volunteer for more than 50 connections at once, create 50 and then create 50 more separately.