Two days before the gala, someone asks for the registrant list “alphabetical by last name, with guests under their host, grouped by table.” The list on the event record in Altru gets you part of the way there, and a query gets you the rest. What follows is how to get registrants sorted the way the person asking actually means it, and the details that tend to trip people up.
Start by pinning down what “sorted” means
“Sort the registrants” can mean very different lists depending on who’s asking:
- Check-in staff want last name A to Z, one line per person, big enough to scan quickly.
- The event lead wants hosts with their guests grouped underneath, often by table or seating area.
- Development wants registrants ordered by giving level, membership status, or amount paid.
- Finance wants registration date or payment status so outstanding balances are easy to spot.
Ask which of these they need before you build anything. A list that’s “correctly sorted” for one group is useless to another.
Sorting on the event record itself
The registrant list on an event in Altru is fine for a quick look, and you can usually reorder it by clicking column headers or filter it down. The catch is that you’re limited to the columns that grid shows, and how it handles sorting on names and guest relationships may not match what you want. Exactly which columns can be sorted, and whether that sort carries into a print or export, depends on your version and setup. Check it on a small test event before relying on it for a large one.
For a one-off glance (“how many people registered last week?”), the event record is enough. For anything you’ll print, hand to volunteers, or rerun, use a query.
Building a registrant query you can sort any way
An ad-hoc query on event registrants gives you full control over output columns and sort order, and you can save it and reuse it for next year’s event.
- Pick the registrant-based source view. Start from the event registration or registrant source, not from constituents. Starting from constituents makes it harder to pull one row per registration and easier to miss unnamed guests.
- Filter to the one event. Use the event name or ID as a filter. If the event has several parts or sub-events, decide whether you want all of them or just the main one.
- Add separate name fields. Output last name and first name as their own columns instead of relying only on a full display name. Sorting by a display name like “Dr. Jane Smith” sorts on “Dr.”, which is the most common reason a list comes out “wrong.”
- Add the fields you’ll sort or group by. Registration date, price or registration option, attended status, host or “guest of” information, and any seating or table field you use.
- Set the sort order in the query. Put the primary sort first (for example, table), then the secondary (last name), then a tiebreaker (first name). Multi-level sorts are where a query clearly beats the event grid.
- Save it with a clear name and reuse it. Something like “Event registrants – check-in list” makes it easy to find next time. Change only the event filter.
If you need even more control, such as color-coding VIPs or splitting the list into A–M and N–Z tables, export the query results to Excel and do the final formatting there.
The details that cause bad lists
Unnamed guests
Guests registered as “Guest of Jane Smith” without their own constituent record have no last name to sort on. In an alphabetical list they cluster together or sink to the bottom. Either sort by the host’s last name so guests stay next to their host, or ask the host for guest names before the event and update the registrations.
Households and couples
If a couple registered as two people, they’ll appear as two rows sorted independently. If they share a last name that’s usually fine. If they don’t, check-in staff may look for one name and not find the other. Sorting by the host or registering constituent keeps pairs together.
Cancelled or declined registrations
Make sure your query filters out cancelled registrations, or at least shows status as a column. A name on the check-in list for someone who cancelled confuses everyone at the door.
Duplicate constituents
The same person entered twice will show up twice, sometimes under slightly different spellings that sort apart. Scan the sorted list for near-matches before you print, and merge the records in Altru afterward.
Quick answers
Can I sort by last name if the list only shows full names?
Not reliably. Add last name as its own output field in a query and sort on that.
How do I keep guests with their host?
Include the host or registering constituent as a field, sort by the host’s last name first, then by guest name. Test it on a real event, since how guests link to hosts can vary with how they were registered.
Will the sort hold if I export?
Sorts set inside a saved query generally carry into the export. If a sort set by clicking a column header in a grid doesn’t carry over, rebuild it as a query sort instead of fixing it by hand in Excel each time.
