Managing Families

A family in Trio groups students together for billing and member-portal access. The Families page lists every family in your studio and is where you add, edit, and invite the adults attached to each one.

Header and Add

The page header reads Families with an Add Family button on the right. Add Family opens a dedicated form for creating a family without going through the Add Student flow. The form has three sections - Family Information (family name, required), Address, and Notes & Preferences - and creates the family record on its own.

Search and View

Below the header:

• Search families... - filters the list by family name.
• View toggle - switch between table view and card grid.

Family Detail

Click a family to open its detail page. The header shows the family name and address with Edit Family and delete actions. Below it you'll find:

• Adults / Guardians - the parents and guardians attached to the family.
• Students - students in this family, each with their active billing plan or a button to start one.
• Emergency Contacts - non-portal contacts to call in an emergency.
• Notes - free-text notes about the family.
• Family Documents - files on file for the family.
• Billing - the family's balance, overdue invoices, and billing controls.
• Makeup Credits - credit balances broken out per student.

Adding Adults and Contacts

In the Adults / Guardians section, use Add Adult to open the Add Adult / Guardian dialog. Enter a first and last name, an email (required), and optionally a phone number. Set the Relationship (Parent, Guardian, or Other) and a Role:

• Family Manager - can add or remove other adults in the family.
• Family Member - can view the family but not change its roster.

Toggle Primary Contact to mark a main point of contact. In the Emergency Contacts section, Add Emergency Contact captures a name, phone number, and relationship for someone outside the portal.

Sending Member-Portal Invitations

When an adult has an email address, a Send Invite button appears next to them. Sending an invitation emails the adult a link to sign in to the member portal. Each adult shows one of three account badges:

• Trio Account - the adult has accepted their invitation and has active access to your studio's member portal.
• Invitation Pending - an invitation has been sent but not yet accepted. The Resend Invite button is available to send it again (resending also extends an expired invitation). An adult can show Invitation Pending even if their account was pre-created when the invite was sent - the badge reflects acceptance, not whether a sign-in record exists.
• No Trio Account - no account and no pending invitation. Use Send Invite to invite them.

A prior sign-in date is shown only as supplementary activity information; it does not by itself determine whether an adult has a Trio Account.

Anyone with an accepted Trio account also gets a Message button on their row, which opens the Messages composer already addressed to them. Adults and students each get their own button, so you can reach a student directly when they hold the account or their guardian when the guardian does. People who are only invited, or who have no account, get no Message button.

Messaging or Inviting from the Families List

You do not have to open a family to reach it. Each row on the families list carries one action:

• Message Family - someone in the family has an accepted Trio account. This opens the composer addressed to them, preferring an adult and falling back to a student who holds the account.
• Invitation Pending - nobody has accepted yet, but an invitation is outstanding. Resend it from the family's detail page.
• Invite to Trio - nobody has an account and no invitation is outstanding. One click sends the invitation to the primary contact's email. Owners and admins see this button; if the primary contact has no email on file it stays disabled.

Family-Level Billing

Invoices are issued per family, not per student, so one invoice can cover several students in the same family - one statement, one payment. The Billing section on the family detail page shows the outstanding balance, overdue invoices, next due date, and last payment, plus the family's recurring fee assessments from the past year - each labelled Pending, Assessed, or Waived - and per-family overrides for autopay, reminders, and late fees. From here you can also create an invoice by hand or Generate invoice from the family's plans and lessons for a period. See Invoices for details.

Family Documents

The Family Documents section lists files on file for the family - waivers, photo-release forms, school authorization letters, and similar. Click a document name to open it. Documents are private to the family and the studio.

Related

• Managing Students - manage students within families
• Invoices - issue invoices to families
• Parent Portal - what families see after accepting an invite
• Applications - where new families come from