Class waitlists that tell players when a spot opens
The list of people to ring if a spot opens, kept on a phone that is also coaching
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TL;DR
The 'I'll let you know' list on WhatsApp, or a waitlist on AllSquads
- The manual list is whoever the coach remembers asking; the AllSquads list is everyone who joined, in the order they joined, per session.
- A full session opens its waitlist without anyone switching it on, and the roster shows the queue beside the confirmed players.
- When a place frees up everyone waiting is notified by email and in the app, and booking it removes them from the waitlist automatically.
- Places are strictly first come, first served: no hold, no expiry, and a player who misses out goes back into the queue for the next opening.
- Anyone who joins a waitlist becomes a contact the club can message, which is the whole point of knowing who wanted in.
Every popular class has one: the mental list of players who asked after the class was full. It is usually accurate for about a week. AllSquads keeps that list for you, in join order, and does the ringing: a full session opens its waitlist on its own, everyone waiting is told the moment a place frees up, and booking it takes them straight off the list.
Try it on this term's class
1st month free. A card is required to start, and nothing is charged until your free month ends. The free profile and free tiers never need one.
How most clubs run a waitlist today
The class is full, so the coach says they will let people know. Some of those people are written on a note in the phone, some are a thread in the group chat, and some are a parent who mentioned it at pickup. When a regular pulls out on Monday night, the coach posts that a spot has opened and the first person to reply gets it, whether or not they were the first to ask. Nobody knows how long the list really is, so nobody knows whether a second class would fill.
- The list lives in one person's head and a few screenshots, and it evaporates when that person is away.
- The spot goes to the fastest thumb, not to the person who has been waiting since February.
- The club never learns how much unmet demand it has, because it never counted.
Where the mental waitlist breaks
A waitlist kept by memory is fine for one class that fills once a year. It breaks the moment a club has several full classes and any turnover at all.
- Empty places in a full class: a cancellation on Tuesday morning leaves a paid-for gap on Tuesday night because nobody remembered who to ring.
- The fairness argument: the family who asked first watches a newer family get the place because they saw the message sooner.
- The list that stopped being true: half the people on it have found another club since they asked.
- No record of demand: the committee is asked whether a second class would fill and answers from feeling rather than from a count.
- Lost leads: the players who wanted in are never contacts, so the club cannot message them when it opens a new time.
- The coach as switchboard: every opening is a burst of texts to manage on a phone that is also running the session.
- Double-booking: two people are told the place is theirs because two people were asked at once.
A full session opens its own waitlist
Capacity is set per class, and a session can carry its own override when one night needs more or less room. When a session reaches capacity it shows as full and the waitlist activates: the setting is on by default for full sessions, so there is nothing to remember. A player joins the waitlist from the class page the same way they would book, and their position is recorded. The coach and club are notified when a class hits capacity, which is the earliest useful signal that a second class might be worth opening.
Who is told when a place frees up
When a booking is cancelled, the waitlisted players for that session are notified by email and in the app, in the order they joined. The offer carries the class, the session date and time, the full venue address and a link to book. Places are strictly first come, first served: there is no hold on the place and no expiry to police. A player who books a session they are waitlisted for is taken off that session's waitlist automatically, so nobody appears on both the roster and the queue.
Losing the race is not a dead end
If another player books the open place first, the player who missed out is not silently dropped. Their waitlist entry returns to waiting, so they are eligible for the next notification on that session, and re-joining the list is harmless if they want to be sure. A player who already holds a seat on a session is told so if they try to join its waitlist, rather than being added twice.
The waitlist is a contact list
Joining a waitlist adds the player to the club's contacts, the same as a booking does. From the session's waitlist panel the club can message a waitlisted player directly, and there is no time limit on that: a club can message the waitlisters of a session that has already run to offer them a place in a newly opened one. Analytics track the waitlist conversion rate, so the committee's question about whether a second class would fill has a number behind it.
Where waitlists apply
Waitlists work on the class types that have a per-session capacity: recurring group lessons, term classes, social sessions, holiday camp days and retreats. A drop-in player on a term class waits in the same queue as anyone else for that session. Private lessons are booked against a coach's availability rather than a capacity, so they do not carry a waitlist, and court hire is booked slot by slot against the court's calendar.
Manual vs AllSquads
| A note in the phone and a group-chat post | AllSquads | |
|---|---|---|
| Getting paid | The new player pays after they turn up, if they turn up | The waitlisted player books and pays for the place before it is theirs |
| The roster | Confirmed players plus a separate list of hopefuls | The queue shown beside the confirmed roster for each session |
| Cancellations | A cancellation leaves a gap until someone remembers the list | A cancellation notifies every waitlisted player straight away |
| Reminders | The person offered the spot is reminded if the coach thinks of it | The booked player gets the standard reminders a day and an hour out |
| Member pricing | Whatever rate the coach quotes when offering the spot | The class's member price applies at checkout like any booking |
| Waitlist | Fastest reply wins, whoever asked first | Strictly first come, first served, in join order, per session |
| Payouts | Cash on the night, outside every record | The waitlisted booking lands in the same weekly payout as the rest |
| Records | A screenshot of a thread from last term | Every waitlisted player is a contact with a history the club can message |
Where the mental waitlist is fine
If one class fills, one person asks, and the coach genuinely will remember them until a place opens, no software beats a note in the phone. The manual list becomes a problem at the second name, the second full class, or the first week the person holding the list is on holiday. Most clubs pass that point in their first busy term without noticing, because each step is small.
Which waitlist setup fits your club?
One or two classes fill every term and the rest do not
Good fitWaitlists are on by default, so the full classes queue themselves and the others never show one. The useful part is the count: when the same session waitlists five or six players every week, that is your evidence for a second time slot, and those players are already contacts you can message about it.
A junior program where the parent asks, not the player
Good fitA parent joins the waitlist for their child from the family account, and the notification goes to the parent's email and app. When they book, the child is placed on the roster by name, the same as any other family booking, and the parent comes off the waitlist for that session.
You want to offer the place to your regulars before newcomers
Worth knowingThe waitlist itself is strictly in join order and will not skip a newcomer for a regular. What you can do is message a regular first from the session's contact panel before the cancellation is processed, or raise that session's capacity by one with the per-session override and place them yourself. The queue then handles everyone else honestly.
Your full sessions are private lessons or court bookings
Worth knowingNeither carries a waitlist, because neither has a capacity to queue against. A private lesson is booked into the coach's availability windows, so opening more availability is the lever, and a court is booked slot by slot against its calendar. For a coached session with a headcount, run it as a group lesson and the waitlist applies.
You would rather open a second class than keep people waiting
Good fitDo both. Leave the waitlist on so the first class stays full and fair, and use the capacity-reached notification and the waitlist count as the trigger to duplicate the class into a second time slot. Then message the waitlisted contacts with the new link; they are already in your contacts because they joined the list.
Choose AllSquads, or keep the note in the phone
Choose AllSquads if
- A place has ever gone empty in a full class because nobody remembered who asked.
- You have ever been accused of favouritism over who got a spot.
- More than one class fills, or more than one person keeps the list.
- You want to know how many people wanted in, not guess.
- You would like the people who missed out to become contacts you can message later.
Stick with WhatsApp if
- One class fills, one person asks, and you will genuinely remember them.
- Places never free up because nobody ever cancels.
- You prefer to pick who gets the spot yourself, every time.
Rather have it walked through?
A free 30-minute call. Two minutes to book, no pitch.
Turn the list in your phone into a real one this week
There is nothing to configure: the waitlist is on by default for every class with a capacity. The switch is mostly about moving the people already waiting onto it.
Create the class with its real capacity
Set the capacity you actually coach to. A session that hits it shows as full and opens its waitlist without any further setting.
Import the people who already asked
Contacts, then Import, with a CSV of their names and emails, so you can message them the class link and let them join the waitlist themselves in the order they respond.
Post the class link where the 'let me know' requests used to arrive
Players book if there is room and join the waitlist if there is not. Either way they become contacts and the coach stops being the switchboard.
Watch the queue on the roster
Each session's roster shows the confirmed players and the waitlist beside them, so you can see unmet demand per night rather than per term.
Open a second slot when the count says so
Duplicate the class into a new time and message the waitlisted contacts with the link. They joined the list, so the club can reach them.
What to try with a full class in your first week
All of this is inside the free trial and takes less than an hour. Each item ends in something you can see on the roster.
Set a test class's capacity to two, book two players, then try a third.
The session shows as full and the third player is on its waitlist in position one.
Cancel one of the two bookings.
The waitlisted player receives an email and an in-app notification that a place has opened, with a link to book.
Book that open place as the waitlisted player.
They appear on the roster and disappear from the waitlist for that session automatically.
Open the session's waitlist panel and send a message to a waitlisted player.
The message lands in their inbox and the player is visible in your Contacts list.
Give one session a capacity override of three from the Bookings tab.
That session takes a third booking while every other session in the class keeps the class capacity.
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Why clubs and coaches run on AllSquads
One platform for the whole operation: bookings, payments, courts, members and messages, built for racquet clubs and the coaches who run them.
Every class type on one timetable
Group classes, terms, camps, private lessons, socials, court hire and retreats all live on one schedule, with one roster per session.
Every way to pay
Upfront, weekly or monthly subscriptions, drop-ins, memberships, session packs and term instalments, collected online and paid out to your club every week.
Court hire with cost splitting
Players book one court or several in a single checkout and split the cost between up to eight people, so nobody chases anyone for their share.
A CRM with every channel
Every player and parent has a contact record, and you reach them by email, in-app message, push notification or broadcast. Paid plans add SMS for cancellations, reminders and payment requests.
Team scheduling
Coaches set their availability, you assign a head coach to each class, and a substitute takes a single session without rebuilding the class.
Admin that runs itself
Reminders go out before a session and before every subscription charge, the waitlist tells everyone waiting the moment a place opens, and cancellations turn into account credit under your own policy.
Promo codes and a pro shop
Discount codes at checkout, and a pro shop with member pricing and online or cash sales that land in the same weekly payout.
An AI agent on both sides
The Club Agent answers questions about your bookings, members and money from the dashboard, and the Concierge helps players find and book the right class.
Analytics you can act on
Revenue, bookings, attendance, court use and member trends, with weekly, monthly, quarterly and financial-year reports you can drill into.
Coming soon: Competitions: leagues, ladders and tournaments; The AllSquads app on the App Store and Google Play.
What AllSquads is
AllSquads is booking, payments and admin software for sports coaches and clubs. Players find your classes, book and pay online, and get reminded before every session. You get the roster, the money and the contact record in one place, with a payout to your bank every week. It runs term programs, casual classes, camps, private lessons and court hire side by side, so the whole operation is in one system rather than a booking tool plus a spreadsheet plus a payment app.
- Over ten thousand
- bookings taken
- Thousands
- of players
- Hundreds
- of classes live
- A growing group
- of Australian clubs
Less admin
Automated booking confirmations, 24hr and 1hr reminders, waitlists, credits, and cancellation management. Stop chasing people.
Get paid weekly
Players pay online at booking, via payment links, or you manage payments manually. Payouts are paid weekly, for the week ending Sunday, direct to your bank account.
Player contacts & CRM
Every booking adds a player to your contacts automatically. Import your existing list via CSV. Track membership, booking history, and notes.
Messaging & group chats
Message players one-on-one or in groups. Class group chats created automatically. Broadcast announcements to all followers.
Analytics built in
Track revenue, bookings, and player retention over time. Coach view, club view, and court hire stats — all in one dashboard.
“I had all of term 1 paid in the first week. 75% less admin, 100% fewer late cancellations, and 80% fewer emails and phone calls.”
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Frequently asked questions
Where this comes from
- Waitlists are strictly first come, first served, with no hold
- Help centre: Player guide
- Booking a waitlisted session removes the player from its waitlist
- Help centre: Player guide
- Waitlist on by default; per-session capacity override
- Help centre: Coach guide
- A waitlist join creates a contact the club can message
- Help centre: Contacts
- Waitlist spot notifications go by email and in-app
- Help: Notifications
- Waitlist conversion rate in the analytics dashboards
- Help centre: Analytics
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