A member pulls up their card in Apple Wallet at the entrance, and they’ve brought a friend. The member scans fine. Then the friend’s admission turns into a conversation about which benefit applies, whether the member has used their guest passes this year, and where the paper voucher went.
Getting guest passes onto a phone sounds like one feature, but it’s really two decisions: what a guest pass is in your Altru setup, and how that pass is delivered. Settle the first one and the second gets much simpler.
First, decide what kind of guest pass you offer
Organizations tend to use one of two models, and they behave very differently on a phone.
Model A: guest privileges attached to the membership level
“Member plus one guest every visit” or “family level admits two guests.” The guest benefit isn’t a separate object. It comes with the membership, so the member’s own card is the pass. Front desk staff see the level and admit the right number of people.
This is the easiest model to go digital, because there’s nothing extra to deliver. If the member’s card is in their wallet and it shows (or links to) the membership level, the guest privilege travels with it.
Model B: a fixed number of single-use guest passes
“Your membership includes four guest passes a year.” Each pass is used once, may be handed to someone who isn’t with the member, and needs to be tracked so it can’t be reused. This is the model that creates paper vouchers, envelopes, and arguments at the door.
Putting these in a phone wallet means each pass needs its own scannable identity and a way to mark it redeemed. That’s a bigger job than a membership card.
If you’re redesigning benefits anyway, it’s worth asking whether Model A would serve members just as well. It removes most of the tracking problem.
How single-use guest passes are usually built in Altru
Altru doesn’t have a dedicated “guest pass” record that we’re aware of, so organizations approximate one with tools they already have. Common approaches:
- Complimentary tickets. Issue a zero-dollar admission ticket for each guest pass, tied to the member’s constituent record. The ticket has a barcode, shows up in sales history, and is marked used when scanned. This gives you the cleanest redemption tracking.
- Discount or promo codes. Give the member a code that makes a guest admission free, either online or at the desk. Easy to hand out, but harder to limit to one use per pass unless your discount setup supports that. Test it before you promise it.
- A tracked benefit with manual counting. Record the guest allowance on the membership and have staff note each use. It works at small volume and depends heavily on staff consistency.
Whichever you pick, confirm the details in a sandbox or with Blackbaud support before rolling it out: how the pass is linked to the member, whether it can expire, and how you’ll report on unused passes at renewal time.
Getting passes onto the phone
Here’s where expectations need to be honest. As far as we know, Altru doesn’t natively generate Apple Wallet or Google Wallet passes. If you’ve seen otherwise in a recent release, verify it in your own environment.
That leaves a few realistic paths:
- Wallet membership card (covers Model A). A third-party tool creates a wallet card from the member’s Altru data. The guest privilege rides along with the membership.
- Emailed eTickets for single-use passes (covers Model B). If guest passes are complimentary tickets, deliver them the way you deliver purchased tickets: an email with a barcode. Members can forward one to a friend who’s visiting without them. It isn’t technically a wallet pass, but it does live on the phone and scans at the door.
- Both together. The member’s card in their wallet, plus guest tickets by email. For most organizations this is the practical answer today.
Don’t skip the door
A digital pass only helps if the entrance can read it. Before you launch, check:
- Your scanners or scanning devices read barcodes from a phone screen, including at full brightness in sunlight.
- Staff know what a valid guest pass looks like versus a member card, and what to do when one won’t scan.
- A redeemed pass actually shows as used in Altru, so the same screenshot can’t get someone in twice.
- There’s a fallback, such as looking up the member by name, for dead phones and bad signal.
Tell members how it works
Most guest pass confusion is a communication problem. Put the rules in the welcome email and on your membership page: how many guests, whether the member must be present, when passes expire, and how they’ll receive them. If passes arrive by email, say so, so members don’t go looking for them in their wallet app.
Where Social Good fits
Our Digital Membership Cards put Altru membership cards into Apple Wallet and Google Wallet, which covers the level-based guest model above. Single-use guest passes still need to be set up in Altru using one of the approaches described here.
Quick answers
Can a guest use a pass without the member present?
Only if your passes are separate items, like complimentary tickets. A guest privilege attached to the membership level needs the member’s card at the door.
How do I stop screenshots being reused?
Use passes that are marked redeemed when scanned, such as tickets, and scan every pass rather than eyeballing it.
