You will need the Check-In permission to manage message templates, and the station PIN to send a message from a station. Your church must also have texting enabled. See How do I enable text and voice messaging?
You can text a child's guardian straight from the check-in station: to ask for help, to say a child is doing great, or to call someone back for a diaper change or a bathroom break. The message goes to the family's authorized people, so a volunteer never needs to look up a phone number.
Set up your message templates
Volunteers pick from a list of saved templates rather than typing free text, which keeps messages consistent and quick to send. Manage the list at Events > Check-In > Messages.
One Church comes with a starter set. You can edit or delete any of them and add your own with + Add Template. The listing shows each template's Name, its Message text, whether it is Enabled?, and how often it has been used and by which station.
Tip: Templates can include variables such as {person_nickname}, which the station replaces with the child's name when the message is sent. Keep templates short, because text message content restrictions and costs apply. The Messages tab links to the details.
When the option is available
Send message only appears when all of the following are true. If any one of them is not, the option is absent rather than shown and disabled:
Texting is enabled for your church.
Texting is enabled for the station.
Texting is enabled for the session. When no session is in use, texting is on by default. When you are using check-in sessions it has to be switched on deliberately. Edit the session on the event and tick Send Text Messages?
At least one checked-in person on the family board can be messaged about. You cannot text about someone who has not checked in yet.
Tip: If a volunteer reports that they cannot find the option, work down that list in order. The session setting is the most common cause, because it is off by default whenever sessions are in use.
Send a message from a station
In the new check-in experience the three staff actions live together in the family board's ⋯ menu, rather than as a separate icon on each person's row.
Find the family and open their board.
Tap the 3-dots menu (⋯) on the board's title line and choose Send message.
Enter the station PIN when the keypad appears.
Pick the person the message is about. Template variables are filled in from whoever you pick here.
Pick a template. A preview shows the finished message with the variables filled in.
Check the recipients. The family's authorized people are listed, and the person who checked the child in is selected by default.
Tap Send and confirm. The station asks to confirm with Send to Jane Doe? and then reports the result either way.
A recipient with no mobile number on file is shown in the list marked missing mobile number rather than being silently dropped. If the person you need to reach is marked that way, add a mobile number to their profile and send again.
What else to know
Messages are about a checked-in person and go to that family's authorized people. Authorized people are managed on the person's profile. See Check-In Station Tutorial.
Sending a message changes no check-in state. The child stays checked in.
A station that is offline cannot send. Texting needs the server.