Changes to Camp Planner, Quartermaster, Hall Manager, Leader Compliance and Fundraising — newest first. Only things you'd actually notice are listed here.
Missing something you need? Suggest a feature — most of what's below started as somebody asking.
113 changes.
What's new and Feature requests now open inside whichever app you're using, with its menus still there, instead of taking you off to Camp Planner's site. Open them while you're in a group (or a camp in Camp Planner) and the side menu stays too. What's new starts on the app you're in, and you can still see every app's changes. Ideas you suggest start on that app, and you can vote and comment from any of them.
With the full Leader Compliance, you can print a report for each leader of what they still have to do: references, disclosure and confidential enquiry checks, the welcome conversation, the declaration and Core Learning, plus DBS and learning that has expired or is due in the next 60 days, and permits ending soon. Below that are their roles, learning, DBS and permits, and Wood Badge progress as optional. Open it from Compliance reports on the Leaders page, or Report on a leader's card. Narrow it to one unit or to leaders with something outstanding, and print it, or download a PDF per person.
A District can now pay for a linked group's tools, one at a time or all seven, at the same price the group would pay. The District's owner offers from Groups you pay for on the District's page in Camp Planner, and the group's owner accepts on theirs. If the group already pays for it, it keeps the year it has paid for and the District takes over from the renewal date, so nobody pays twice. If the District stops, the group keeps it for at least 30 days and can subscribe itself to carry on. Paying gives the District no access to the group.
District access now works in Quartermaster as it does in Hall Manager. The District makes a code on its Members page, the Group's owner enters it on theirs and chooses what the District can do: See everything, Help with kit, loans, inspections and stock takes, or Manage. Never the Group's members, billing or payment accounts. The District's Your groups page shows how much kit each Group holds, what's out on loan, and what's overdue or needs repair. Anything it changes is marked in the Group's log with the District's name. It's free for the District, which used to need its own paid plan, and See now includes loans and photos, not just the kit list.
Your minibus can now have compliance checks like your hall's. On Compliance, choose it under For in Add from the standard list and pick from the walkaround check, a monthly check, the safety inspection by a mechanic, MOT, service, vehicle tax, insurance, fire extinguisher, first aid kit, the not-for-profit Section 19 permit, a wheelchair lift's examination, and each driver's licence check and MiDAS. They come from the government's guidance for Section 19 permit holders, DVSA's walkaround guidance, the MOT rules and Scout Groups' own checklists, each saying where its interval comes from. Log each one, get reminded when it's due, and find it in the audit pack.
A District can now look after its Groups' halls and minibuses in Hall Manager. The District makes a code on its Members page and the Group's owner enters it on theirs, then chooses what the District can do: See, Help with bookings and checks, or Manage, which includes fees and invoices. Never the Group's members, billing or payment accounts. The District gets a Your groups page with one calendar of every Group's bookings, each in its own colour, and what needs doing in each. Anything it changes is marked in the Group's log with the District's name. The Group can change the level or unlink at any time. Free for both.
When a trial ends without a subscription, the paid features you switched on during it now pause too, as well as the free plan's limits coming back. A public hall calendar goes offline, compliance reminder emails stop and hall usage fees aren't collected. Nothing is deleted: subscribe and everything carries on as it was, at the same links. The trial reminder emails now say so.
Every app now handles District links the same way: a Group links with a code from its District, and only the Group's owner links, chooses what the District can see, and stops sharing. In Trustees that used to be any Trustees leader. What the District sees in Quartermaster (your kit list) and Trustees (your board summary) hasn't changed.
Badges now keeps what OSM sends for up to five minutes, so printing a report, downloading its PDFs or sending parent emails straight afterwards doesn't ask OSM for everything again. That's quicker, and it stops busy end-of-term printing running into OSM's limits. It's kept only for the leader whose OSM connection asked for it, and then it's gone. Parents' contact details are still never kept. Changed something in OSM? Refresh from OSM on the Badge reports page reads it again straight away. The privacy notice says so.
A County's trustee board (an Area's in Wales, a Region's in Scotland) can now choose County in Trustees' Settings. It gets its own responsibilities, including how its Districts are getting on and inviting its Nominated Members on the Council of The Scout Association to meetings, and an AGM year that sends the report and accounts to UK Headquarters and its Regional Lead Volunteer, ScoutsCymru or Scouts Scotland. Each District can choose to share a summary of its own board with its County, by a code the County makes: counts and dates, never names, and nothing about its Groups. The County's Our Districts page is part of its paid plan; sharing is free for the District.
Choose your country in Trustees' Settings and everything follows it: the regulator, POR's rules, the accounts thresholds and the deadlines. Scottish boards get OSCR's annual return nine months after the year end, Regions instead of Counties, and a Charity page that explains registering with OSCR is the Group's choice and what it means for Gift Aid. Northern Ireland boards get CCNI's Annual Monitoring Return, and the reminder that every Group and District must register. Both get POR's own examiner and audit lines.
Send parents and supporters a link and they put their own names down to help at an event. Open it from the event's Sign-up sheet panel once you've listed the jobs. Helpers see each job with how many places are left, never who else has signed up, give their name and email, and get the details by email; they appear in your list marked signed up themselves. A full job takes no more names, and the sheet closes itself once the event has happened. Part of Fundraising's paid plan.
On a section's Email to parents page, turn on Remind me a week before each term ends and Badges emails you a week before the term ends in OSM, with a link back to that page for the term. Nothing goes to parents until you check it and press Send, as before.
Send each young person's badge report straight to their parents. Choose Email to parents beside a section in Badge reports: everybody is listed with their primary contacts from OSM, so you can see who has an address. Add a note, choose where replies go, preview one family's email and send yourself a test, then send. Parents get a short summary, with what they've earned this term and what's coming up, and the full report attached as a PDF, from your group via Badges. Every email has a link to stop them. Parent emails are part of the paid plan, £20 a year or in the £50 bundle, which now includes Badges; reports themselves stay free.
Spelt your name wrong when you signed up, or go by something shorter? You can now change it at the top of your Account page, under Your name. It changes everywhere other leaders see it, in every Tools for Scouting app. Lists your group keeps about people, like the trustee board, are separate and stay as they are.
Every Tools for Scouting app has been updated to the latest version of the framework it's built on, which fixes several serious security issues reported this week. There was no sign any of them affected us, and nothing changes in how the apps work.
Badges now lists sections only from the OSM group your group is linked to, so if you help in more than one group you won't see another group's young people here. If your group hasn't been linked yet, Badge reports asks a leader in Badges to choose its OSM group, right there on the page, and it applies to every leader. If your OSM account only sees one group, it's already picked: one tap.
Every leader's Scouts membership number now shows beside their name on the dashboard, and as its own column in the CSV export. It's read during the leader sync, so update the browser extension (version 0.16.0, now on the Chrome Web Store and Firefox Add-ons) and sync again to fill them in. It also means the learning import can match most people to their records automatically.
Fundraising now has a giving page: an appeal with a target and a progress bar that you share with parents and supporters. They can give monthly by Direct Debit or once by card or from their bank, straight into your group's own account with nothing taken. Supporters can add Gift Aid, and you can download a schedule for your HMRC claim. It needs your charity number and an online payments account connected; the page tells you what's missing.
Leader Compliance now has a menu down the side, the same as the other apps: Leaders and the Wood Badge report, with Sync below. Hide it down to a strip of icons for more room; on a phone it's a single Menu button.
A camp's thirteen tabs have become a menu down the side, grouped into People, On site, Food and Planning, the same as in the other apps. Hide it down to a strip of icons for more room; on a phone it's a single Menu button.
The Leader Compliance browser extension is now on Firefox Add-ons as well as the Chrome Web Store, so you can sync your leaders and import their learning from Firefox. Install it from the extension page. In Firefox, the learning import needs learn.scouts.org.uk open in a tab and signed in.
The row of tabs across the top has become a menu down the side, the same as in the other apps. Hide it down to a strip of icons for more room; on a phone it's a single Menu button.
The row of tabs across the top has become a menu down the side, the same as in the other apps. Hide it down to a strip of icons for more room; on a phone it's a single Menu button.
The row of tabs across the top has become a menu down the side, the same as in the other apps. Hide it down to a strip of icons for more room; on a phone it's a single Menu button.
The row of tabs across the top has become a menu down the side: Responsibilities at the top, then The board, The year and Records, with Settings and Members at the bottom. Fold a group you rarely use, or hide the whole menu down to a strip of icons for more room. On a phone it's a single Menu button.
The row of tabs across the top has become a menu down the side: Calendar and Requests at the top, then The halls, Safety and Money, with Members at the bottom. Fold a group you rarely use, or hide the whole menu down to a strip of icons for more room; the count of requests waiting still shows either way. On a phone it's a single Menu button.
There are now short videos to watch before you start: a walkthrough of Camp Planner's First camp guide, for being assessed for your Nights Away Permit, and walkthroughs of Trustees and Badges. You'll find them on each product's home page and in the help. Nothing loads from YouTube until you press play.
Every app now has an Account link beside Sign out, so it's easy to find where to set up two-factor sign-in, forget remembered devices or close your account. Before, it was only reachable by clicking your name, in Camp Planner. There's a new help article on two-factor sign-in too.
When you refund a payment made by bank, our fee on the refunded part now comes off our fee on your next payments, so you aren't charged for money you gave back. GoCardless keeps the fee itself, so this is how it reaches you; by card it comes back with the refund, as before. The refund panel shows how much before you send it. The person paying always pays the same.
A new Wood Badge report lists everyone in your synced team working towards a Wood Badge: which one, how many skills they've met, what's left and their latest skill, nearest to finishing first, with a filter for two or fewer to go and a CSV download. Which Wood Badge each person is on now comes from My Learning instead of being guessed from their role (update the extension to 0.14 and import again). Optional learning on each leader's card shows the month it was completed, and the CSV gains a Latest optional learning column.
Card payments to your hall, or for a camp fee, can now be refunded from the app, in full or in part, and our fee on the refunded part comes back to you. Refunds you make in your own Stripe account are picked up too, and a card payment charged back by the payer's bank shows as unpaid again, going back to paid if you win the dispute. In Hall Manager, card isn't offered on a booking with a damage deposit, since the deposit is covered by a Direct Debit.
You're now emailed 90 days before one of your leaders' permits runs out, alongside the DBS and training reminders. Each leader's card shows only the permits that matter now: the one they hold, or a lapsed one if they hold nothing current, never old applications. Nights Away, which is granted once per category, shows its categories together. In Camp Planner, a permit holder with several Nights Away categories is offered the one that covers your camp.
Leader Compliance now syncs each leader's permits from the membership portal: Nights Away, with its category, and Adventurous Activities permits, with their expiry dates. They're shown on each leader's card and in the CSV, with a note when one has expired or runs out within three months. They don't count towards anyone's red, amber or green, because most leaders don't need one. Update the browser extension to version 0.13 and sync to see them. Camp Planner's First camp tab uses them too: if you sync Leader Compliance, it offers the on-site permit holder's category and expiry, with a Use these button.
On the First camp tab, record the on-site permit holder's permit category and expiry date. You'll be warned if their permit doesn't cover the kind of camp you're running, such as a Campsite permit on a greenfield site, or if it runs out before the last day of camp.
The First camp tab now has Your plans, for your first aiders, emergency plan (including what happens if the permit holder has to leave), InTouch, site visit, transport, local facilities and fuel, each shown beside the checklist item it answers and in the evidence pack. Logs at camp keeps an inspection log and a medication log; only leaders who can see medical details see the medication log, and it's never shared with your assessor. And every camp's programme can now have an If it rains alternative for each activity.
On the First camp tab you can now create a link for your Nights Away Assessor. They can open it without an account, see your preparation against the checklist with the programme, menu, kit list, risk assessment and budget, and comment on any item. You're emailed when they comment and they're emailed when you reply. It never shows a young person's details, and you can switch it off at any time. There's also an evidence pack to print or save as a PDF.
Being assessed for your Nights Away Permit on a camp? Tick "This is my first camp" when you create it, or open the first camp guide from an existing camp. A First camp tab walks you through the permit scheme in order, lines up each item on Scouts' assessment checklist with what your camp already shows, such as your ratios, health forms, kit lists, menu and risk assessment, and lets you note what you're ready to talk through with your assessor. Choose your permit category and items that don't apply to it drop out. It counts down to your Nights Away Notification and reminds you 14 and 8 days before camp if no reference is recorded. It helps you prepare: your Nights Away Assessor assesses you, and only your Lead Volunteer can grant a permit. Free on every plan.
The Joining In award now shows how many years it's for, like Joining In 4, on each report, and in the section overview's awards to present, so you know which one to hand out.
Reports now include what each young person earned in earlier sections, under Earned as a Beaver (or as a Squirrel, Cub or Scout), as long as you can see those sections in OSM. Choose This section instead for just what they've earned since joining it: staged badges and awards like Nights Away from before they joined are left out.
Badge reports now lists the section you last opened a report or overview for first, marked Last used, with the term you picked already chosen. It's remembered on each device you use.
Reports now show when a camp or trip a young person is going to (or invited to) covers something they still need, as well as meetings. Badges your leaders have marked in OSM as ones to do at home have a small house beside them, so parents know where to help. In full wording, each badge they've started lists what they've already done and where. The Chief Scout's Award counts their activity and staged badges against what it asks for, which OSM doesn't tick for you. And if you help in more than one group, Settings can link this group to its OSM group so only its sections are listed. To see events, connect Online Scout Manager again once.
OSM keeps a young person who has left in the section until the end of term. Badges now leaves them out as soon as they have an end date, as OSM's own Due Badges does, so the awards to present match OSM's count and nobody gets a report after they've gone.
Each section now has an overview for leaders: everybody against every badge, the badges waiting to be presented with how many to order and who for, and who is closest to their Chief Scout's Award. It downloads as a spreadsheet too. And each young person's report now says when an upcoming meeting in your OSM programme covers something they still need to do. To see that, connect Online Scout Manager again once.
Badges is new, and free. Connect Online Scout Manager, pick a section and print a report for each young person: the badges they've earned with the dates, a progress bar and only the requirements left for each badge they've started, the Challenge Awards still to start, and other badges to try. Short requirement names or OSM's full wording, your group's name and logo at the top, and each young person on a new page, as one PDF or a PDF per person, or just one young person's report. It reads badge records only, and never stores them.
If you sync Leader Compliance, you can now choose to share your group's trustees' own records with the trustee board: their Trustee Board roles and dates, trustee check, "Being a Trustee in Scouts" and the learning everyone needs. Only people with a current role in the Trustee Board you pick, never DBS or contact details, and separate from sharing the totals. In Trustees, The board suggests linking each trustee to their record, adds anyone missing with one click, and shows what the membership system says beside each person. Nobody is flagged for something the membership system says is done, and the date they were appointed can be copied across.
A meeting's agenda can now be emailed to the trustees straight from the meeting. Tick who gets it (everybody on The board with an email address is ticked to start), add a note for the top if you like, and send. The agenda is in the email itself, so trustees who never sign in can read it, with any agenda or papers attached to the meeting as attachments. Everyone gets their own email, and replies come to you. The meeting shows when it was last sent. You can still print the agenda or save it as a PDF instead.
Each board meeting now has Files, where you can attach the agenda you sent round, the signed minutes and any papers tabled, as PDF, Word or a scan. The title fills itself in from the meeting's date. They're private to people with access to Trustees, and appear in Documents too, linked back to the meeting. Signed minutes can be attached after they've been approved.
The risk register can now be downloaded as a proper Excel file, with the headings frozen, text wrapped, scores coloured by how high they are and real dates, as well as the CSV it had before. There's also a printable version on landscape A4 for the AGM pack, the District or a board meeting: press Print and choose Save as PDF to keep a PDF. Both list the highest risks first.
Every Tools for Scouting app has been updated to the latest version of the framework it's built on, which fixes several security issues reported this month. There was no sign any of them affected us, and nothing changes in how the apps work.
Already keep your risk register in Excel? On the Risk register page, Import from a spreadsheet reads an Excel (.xlsx) or CSV file and shows you what it found before anything is saved. It works out which column is which from your headings, including Scouts' own template, and you can correct any it gets wrong. Scores can be numbers or words, a five-point scale is fitted to Scouts' four, owners are matched to your board, and risks already in your register are skipped. A risk with no scores comes in marked for review today, so nothing is guessed quietly. The file stays on your computer: only the risks you've checked are saved.
If you use two-factor sign-in, ticking "Remember this device for 30 days" now covers every Tools for Scouting app on that browser, not just the one you were on. Before, signing in on one app and then opening another could ask for your code again. Forgetting all your devices, or turning two-factor off, still makes every app ask again.
Figures shared from Leader Compliance now show on the "Volunteers' learning and disclosures" card in Trustees' Responsibilities straight away, instead of only once you opened Record done.
A new Charity tab. It tells you whether your Group has to register with the Charity Commission (a Scout Group only does over £100,000 of income, or £5,000 if it owns land or buildings), walks you through registering and getting HMRC recognition for Gift Aid, and keeps one list of everything the board reports and when: the accounts, the Trustees' Annual Report, the AGM, the copies to your District, and the annual return if you're registered. Most of it reads from the AGM page and your responsibilities, so nothing is ticked twice; when a trustee joins or leaves it reminds you to update the Commission's register. There's also a register of where the deeds and other original documents are kept. Give your income in Settings to get started. Free.
The AGM page warned that small groups lose the Scrutineer's report after 2026. Scouts' rules now ask every Group for an Independent Examiner and say it's essentially the same job with a new name, so the page now says that. It also now works from your actual income rather than a band, and notes charity law's new thresholds for years ending from 30 September 2026. Independent Examiner appointed at the AGM is now a step in the AGM year.
A District trustee board can now see how its Groups' boards are getting on, on a new Our Groups page. Each Group chooses whether to share, with a code from the District, and can stop at any time. The District sees counts and dates only: whether the AGM was held and the accounts examined, whether there's a Chair and a Treasurer, how many trustees are past nine years or haven't declared they're eligible, how many responsibilities are overdue, when the board last met, and learning and DBS figures if a leader shares them. Never names, conflicts, minutes, risks or documents. Groups needing attention come first, and go on the District's next meeting agenda. Part of the paid plan for the District; sharing is free for the Group.
A District trustee board can now use Trustees for itself: choose District in Settings. It gets the same responsibilities as a Group board, plus checking how its Groups are getting on at every meeting and networking for Group trustees, and its AGM year sends the report and accounts to the County Treasurer and names its County Scout Council representatives. County boards are coming next.
The camp Documents page said files could be up to 10MB, but anything over about 1MB failed to upload. Scanned permission slips, risk assessments and site maps up to the full 10MB now upload properly. Camp documents are also now only visible to people with access to Camp Planner itself, the same as the rest of a camp.
If you sync Leader Compliance, you can now choose to share three totals with your group's trustee board: how many volunteers, how many are up to date with the learning everyone needs, and how many have a DBS in date, for the units you pick. Never a name, a date or a membership number. They refresh every time you sync, and are deleted as soon as you stop sharing. In Trustees they appear on the learning and DBS duty with one button to use them, and on the next meeting's agenda. Nothing is shared unless you switch it on.
Anybody who leads in Trustees, including a trustee who isn't a leader, can now invite more trustees from The board, and see and cancel the invites still waiting. They can only invite trustees, who use Trustees and nothing else; inviting leaders still needs a leader or the owner.
Keep the board's records in Trustees, where the next trustees can find them: the constitution, accounts, insurance certificates, the fire risk assessment and the rest, private to people with access to Trustees. Give each one a renewal date and it's flagged as it nears and goes in the weekly email; give it a keep-until date and it's flagged when it can be deleted. Responsibilities now also shows what your other apps say about things the board answers for: building checks from Hall Manager, kit and inspections from Quartermaster, grants and Gift Aid from Fundraising, and upcoming camps without a risk assessment from Camp Planner. Figures only, never people's details. The document store is part of the paid plan; the figures from your other apps are free.
Create a board meeting and its agenda drafts itself from Scouts' meeting prompts: apologies and interests, the last minutes, open actions, the every-meeting duties, anything else due before the next meeting, the risks to discuss and the AGM steps coming up. Change it as you like, then write the minutes against each item. Minuting an item can record the duty as done, the risks as reviewed or an AGM step as done, all dated to the meeting. Actions carry to every agenda until they're done, and approved minutes are locked. Print the agenda to send round and the minutes to sign. Part of the paid plan.
Keep the board's risk register in Trustees, following Scouts' own model: six categories, impact and likelihood scored 1 to 4, and the score worked out for you before and after controls. Start by ticking Scouts' example risks that apply to your group, then make each one yours with its controls, further actions, an owner and a review date. A heat map shows where your risks sit, and a To discuss list gathers the high ones, anything changed since the last meeting and anything past its review date. Download it as a spreadsheet for the District or the AGM. Part of the paid plan.
A new app for your Trustee Board, built from Scouts' own Trustee Board description. Responsibilities lists about thirty recurring duties, from the reserves policy and insurance to safeguarding and the fire risk assessment, with each one's due date worked out from your year end, overdue first. The board page records who's on it, the nine-year limit in a role, eligibility, mandatory learning, induction and a conflicts-of-interest register. The AGM year sets out Scouts' preparation timeline counted back from your AGM, within the six-month deadline, and says what independent check your accounts need, including the end of Scrutineer's reports after 2026 year ends. All of that is free; a weekly reminder email is part of the paid plan.
When you invite somebody, you can now invite them as a trustee who isn't a leader. They can use Trustees fully and see nothing in the other apps: no camps, no young people's details. They're shown as Trustee on the Members page everywhere, and the owner can give them more access later, the same as anybody else.
There's a new "Meter readings" check in the standard list, under Meters, for logging the hall's electricity, gas and water meters — monthly to start with, but you can change that. Read whichever meters you have and leave the rest blank. Each entry in the log then shows how much was used since that meter's last reading, and how much a day, so a sudden jump stands out: a dripping overflow, or heating left on all summer. A reading lower than last time is flagged instead of being counted, since that usually means a new meter or a typo.
Connect your own Stripe account and every payment link offers a card as well as (or instead of) bank transfer. Same deal as GoCardless: the money goes straight to your own Stripe account, not ours, and our platform fee is the same either way — Stripe charge their own published rate per card, which is theirs, not ours. Bank transfer is offered first when both are connected, since a card costs you roughly double what a bank payment does on anything but a small amount. A card payment confirms in seconds rather than the few working days a bank payment takes to clear. Connecting one doesn't require the other, and if you connect neither, nothing changes.
The busy/free calendar and the hire portal don't have to be links people click away to — either can sit inside a page of your own website. Most website editors have an Embed, HTML or Custom code block, and there's now a help article with the line of code to paste and a height to start from. It also covers the parts that catch people out: why the request form is better as a link than an embed, why a plain button often works better on a phone, and the fact that regenerating your public link breaks the embed along with it.
Each product's support page used to be a single scroll with no way to jump around. Now every product has its own search box, categories, and one page per topic — search Hall Manager's for "GoCardless" and it finds Getting paid online even though the word isn't in the title. Every article is wider and easier to read, with the rest of its category one click away down the side. Nothing about what's covered has changed, just how you find it.
All five products have a new look: cooler off-white paper instead of the old cream, a serif for headings instead of a generic sans everywhere, and three sizes of rounded corner instead of one stamped on everything — pill-shaped buttons, softer panels, calendar and tent-board cells left almost square so a grid still reads as a grid. Status now shows in shape as well as colour in a few places it didn't before — a stale cron job, a partly-available item — so the difference holds even if two colours look alike to you. Nothing about where anything lives or how it works has changed.
A grant tracker raises a question it can't answer — you were awarded £4,000, but did it turn up? There's now a short record of money coming in, linked to a grant, an event, both or neither. A grant page will say "£3,500 of £4,000 received" once you've recorded the payments, which usually just means instalments — and it says so when more arrives than expected, which is worth a look rather than a cheer. Totals are shown by tax year (6 April to 5 April, not the calendar year, because that's what your treasurer is asked for), and cash and contactless entries are flagged since those are the only ones the Small Donations Scheme covers. It's a record of money arriving, not your group's books.
Until now a role covered your whole group: make somebody a Leader and they were a Leader everywhere, including in Camp Planner where Leaders can see young people's medical, dietary and consent details. So letting a treasurer near the money meant handing them a child's medication as well. Now the owner sets what each person does in each app separately, on the Members page — Leader in one, Helper in another, No access to a third. A treasurer can lead Fundraising and only help in Camp Planner: able to work on camp budgets, unable to see medical details. Most people hold the same role everywhere and the list just says "Leader in everything", so nothing changes unless you want it to. Everyone keeps at least one app — somebody with none could sign in and see nothing, so that's refused.
Record a fundraising event, list the jobs that need covering, and put names against them — helpers are just a name and a contact, no account needed. The useful part is what comes after: the Small Donations Scheme covers cash and contactless card donations only, not bank transfers or anything paid online, which is the opposite of what most people assume. So the bucket at your summer fair may be eligible where an online donation isn't. To claim on it your treasurer needs the amount, the date collected, the date it reached the bank (the one everyone misses), the postcode and roughly how many came — the event page asks for those and tells you which are still missing. We record; your treasurer claims, and the rules are linked from gov.uk rather than repeated here.
A fifth tool joins the set. It tracks the grants your group is looking at, has applied for, and has been awarded — and, more usefully, what each award commits you to afterwards. That second part is what catches groups out: a spend-by date or a report a funder wants, missed, can mean paying the money back, and nothing most groups use records it. Put an application's expected decision date in and we'll flag it as worth chasing once that date passes with no answer. We'll email a reminder while something you promised is due within the month, and weekly once it's overdue. The grant tracker is free with no limit on how many — same sign-in and same group as the other four tools, so there's nothing to set up.
The support pages now explain something that surprises people: Leader Compliance is the one tool where your role in the group makes no difference. What you see is built from your own sync — the people your own membership account can see — not from the group's records, so two leaders in the same group can each see a different list, and nobody else can see what you've synced. That's also why there's no Members page here: there's nothing group-wide to manage.
Leaders can see young people's medical, dietary and consent details, so making somebody a Leader is now something only the group owner can do — whether by promoting an existing member, which was already the case, or by inviting them, which wasn't. Leaders can still invite Helpers and Viewers as freely as before, so you don't need the owner for every addition; if you need another Leader, invite them as a Helper and ask the owner to promote them. Invitations are now recorded too, alongside role changes and removals: who invited whom, at what role, and who cancelled an invitation.
Every place you pick somebody's role now explains what it gives them, and updates as you change it — including when you change an existing member's role, which never said anything at all. The wording is the same in all three apps, because a role is one setting for the whole group: making someone a Leader in Hall Manager makes them a Leader in Camp Planner too, where Leaders can see young people's medical, dietary and consent details. Each of the three used to describe the same role differently, and only Camp Planner mentioned the medical part. There's also a "What the roles mean" summary on the Members page covering all four.
Inviting somebody from Hall Manager or Quartermaster now sends them an email, the way Camp Planner always did. Until now those two only created a link for you to copy and send yourself — same button, same group, quietly different behaviour, and easy to miss if you didn't read the note. You'll also see a "Bounced" badge against an invite whose email didn't get through, so a mistyped address shows up straight away instead of when the person never appears.
Managing who's in your group is now a page of its own in Camp Planner, at Group settings → Members, matching where it already lived in Hall Manager and Quartermaster. Everything is together: the people, the pending invites, what each role means, and handing the group on. Transfer ownership has also been added to Hall Manager and Quartermaster — it was only ever in Camp Planner, so an owner using either of the others had no way to hand their group to a successor.
If you were invited to a group and finished signing up somewhere other than in that group, the invitation is now waiting for you on your dashboard with a Join button — on whichever of the four tools you happen to open, on any device. Previously the link between your new account and the invitation could be lost between signing up and confirming your email, most often when the confirmation was opened on a different device, in a private window, or inside a mail app. Nothing was wrong with your account; there was just nothing on screen to tell you an invitation existed.
Hall Manager now keeps a Recent activity list at the bottom of the Members page, visible to owners and leaders: compliance items, halls and bookings that have been deleted, who did it and when. It matters most for compliance — deleting an item takes its logged checks with it permanently, so if a year of fire alarm tests disappears, this is the only record they were ever there. Archiving is the gentler option if you only want the list tidied.
Compliance checks that hinge on a value now ask for it — the hot and cold temperatures at an outlet, which call point you tested, the duration your emergency lighting reached, a certificate number. "Done" is a tick; "hot 51°C, cold 19°C at the kitchen tap" is evidence, and it also shows a slow drift towards a temperature legionella likes. Never more than two or three questions, and no more than two on a weekly check.
You can now name the keyholder who actually performs a compliance check. They show against the item and get the reminder email themselves, alongside your leader team — reminders previously went to every owner, leader and helper, which is how a job that's everyone's becomes nobody's. Naming someone adds them rather than replacing anyone, so if they're away the check doesn't quietly become nobody's problem.
A reminder now goes to the group owner a week before a trial ends, and again two days before — so the date doesn't arrive unannounced. Both say the same important thing: nothing is deleted when a trial finishes. Everything you've set up stays exactly as it is, you simply go back to the free plan's limits and can't add beyond them. If you'd rather do nothing, the trial lapses on its own and you won't be chased again.
In Hall Manager, the keyholder directory, compliance tracking, Protect Duty and hall fees are part of the paid plan — but nothing said so until you'd filled in the whole form and pressed save. Each page now tells you up front, while leaving everything visible so you can see what it does before deciding.
Messages about free-plan limits used to say "upgrade" without naming a price or a way forward. They now tell you what it costs (£20/yr for one tool, £50/yr for all four) and what you can do without paying — archive a camp you've finished with, or remove equipment you no longer hold. Camp Planner also shows how much of your free allowance is in use before you run into the limit rather than after.
Group owners can now start a free 30-day trial of all four tools from their group page — no card, nothing to cancel, and it simply goes back to the free plan at the end. Previously the only way to get one was to email and ask, which meant almost nobody did. One per group; if you need longer, just ask.
The free plan covers one camp at a time, but it used to count every camp you had ever made — so a group that used Camp Planner for last summer's camp couldn't plan next summer's without deleting the one that worked, losing the roster, menus and budget with it. Camps that have already ended no longer count, and archiving a camp frees the slot while keeping everything in it. Your group page now shows what you've used before you run into it.
Rather than starting from an empty page, Hall Manager can now add from a list of 39 recurring safety checks drawn from the Scouts' own Safe Scouting Premises Audit — fire alarm servicing, PAT, gas, legionella, asbestos, ladders, play equipment and the rest. Tell it whether your hall has a kitchen, showers or grounds and it only offers what applies. Each check shows where its interval comes from, whether that's an Act, a British Standard or just common practice. If you rent your hall, tick the box and you get the much shorter list of certificates to ask your landlord for.
Compliance items now keep a dated record of every check, instead of overwriting the last one. That matters for the weekly things like flushing taps and testing the fire alarm, where the run of dates is what an insurer or inspector actually asks to see. You can record a check as fine or as having found a problem — and a problem deliberately doesn't clear the item, because something that failed its check isn't finished. Checks can also repeat weekly now, not just monthly or slower.
A new Audit page finds the questions in the Scouts' premises audit that your own records already answer — who holds keys, who's on the premises and when, whether there's an agreement with hirers, whether your compliance records are current. It doesn't complete the audit for you, and it says so. Two downloads sit at the top: a printable evidence pack laid out to follow the audit's own sections, and the full check log as a spreadsheet.
If you were invited to a group and created your account from that invitation, you could end up signed in with an account belonging to no group at all — with nothing on screen to explain why. The invitation is now carried through the email confirmation step, so you land in the group you were invited to.
You can now transfer a group to someone else on your leader team — when you step down, or hand over to your successor. You stay on as a leader with full access. Paying is separate and deliberately so: a Direct Debit keeps renewing from the bank account that set it up, so the new owner is prompted to take over payment, and until they do the page tells you plainly that you're still the one paying.
Camp Planner now has a recipe book. Build a recipe once with its ingredients, attach it to any meal on any camp, and it scales to the numbers actually attending. The shopping list is then built from the recipes — combining the same ingredient across different meals — without losing the prices and ticks you've already put against your list. Allergens are checked against recipe ingredients, so a clash with someone's dietary needs surfaces while you're planning rather than at camp.
Suggest a feature and you'll now get an email when someone comments on it or its status changes, so you find out it's been built without having to check back. There's an opt-out on the request itself if you'd rather not hear about it.
A handful of places showed two words stuck together — "Growing Rootslearning", "5th Billericaycooks at camp". All fixed, and we now check for the whole class of them automatically so they stop appearing.
Leader Compliance now imports the additional learning your team has done towards a Wood Badge, alongside the compulsory Growing Roots modules it already showed. It's listed separately, so what's required and what's extra never get confused. The browser extension fetches it during a normal sync — there's no file to download and upload.
Every help page now has a contact form at the bottom. If you've read the documentation and still haven't found your answer, you're exactly the person who needs it, and you shouldn't have to go hunting for an address.
If you only belong to one group, you're taken straight to it instead of being shown a picker with a single option on it. And if your confirmation email never arrived, you can now send yourself another one rather than being stuck.
The free tier of Leader Compliance now shows five leaders rather than two — enough to see whether the sync is genuinely useful for your group before deciding anything.
Hall Manager can now give you a link to share with people outside your group. They see what's free, ask for the slot they want, and never see who else has booked what. You approve or decline.
The minibus, the trailer, and your Quartermaster equipment can all be booked out the same way a hall is, with their own prices. One availability view covers camps, loans and hires together, so nothing gets promised twice. Bookings can now run past midnight and across several days. Kit that's overdue an inspection, failed a PAT test or isn't in good condition can't go out at all.
If you've got twelve mess tins, you can now lend four of them and keep the rest available, rather than the whole line going out at once.
You can set a damage deposit per hall or per asset. Nothing is collected up front — the hirer's Direct Debit is held, and damage is charged against it up to a cap they agreed to. That way nobody is out of pocket for weeks waiting on a refund, and your group never holds money that isn't yours.
A hirer who books again is recognised, and their existing Direct Debit is reused rather than asking them to set up another one for every series.
Groups with several leaders were showing a duplicate dashboard card for each co-member. One card per group now, as intended.
Leader Compliance now shows every role a person holds — with the unit and team it belongs to and the dates — rather than just their main one. For anyone still Provisional, you can see exactly which references, declarations and checks are outstanding.
The section tabs used to disappear once you moved off the first page, leaving you to find your way back. They now stay visible throughout Hall Manager and Quartermaster, matching Camp Planner.
If you look after several groups — a district role, or you're a leader in two — Quartermaster can now show you across all of them rather than one at a time.
When something comes back broken, you can record what happened to it rather than just changing its condition — so there's a history behind why a tent was retired.
Electrical safety certificates can be tracked against equipment, with the test date and result. And the whole inventory exports as an asset register, which is what your treasurer wants once a year for insurance.
Build a list of what's going to a camp, check it off as it's loaded, and check it again on the way home.
Equipment can carry a QR code you scan to pull it straight up, with a printable label sheet. Whoever takes kit out can sign for it on screen. And anything with an inspection due sends a reminder before it lapses rather than after.