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Chapter Management Software
Chapter management software for federations and multi-chapter networks. Each chapter runs its own memberships and banks its own dues, and the parent organization sees member numbers across all of them without asking anyone for a spreadsheet.
Why federations use Communal for chapter management
Built for federations, umbrella organizations, and associations with local chapters
Parent and Chapter Structure
The parent sees members across the network. Each chapter keeps control of its own members, dues, and bank account.
Live Member Numbers
Membership totals across every chapter, read from the chapters' own records instead of emailed spreadsheets.
Dues Paid Where They Belong
Each chapter's Stripe account pays out to its own bank, and the federation fee reaches the parent at the point of sale.
Members Routed by Address
Draw each chapter's boundary on a map, and a new member is pointed to the chapter that covers their address.
Network view
Every chapter adds into one dashboard
Member numbers from every chapter, in one dashboard
A federation office usually learns its membership count by emailing every chapter and waiting. In Communal, the parent organization's dashboard adds up active members, new members each week, and program signups across all its chapters. The figures are read from the chapters' own records as they change, so nobody compiles them.
- Active members totalled across every chapter
- New members each week, network-wide
- Program signups charted across chapters
- Read live from chapter records, not emailed in
Chapter-run
Local admins manage their own list
Each chapter runs its own membership
Every chapter, league, or affiliate gets its own Communal site with its own web address, logo, membership types, and prices. Local volunteers sell memberships and look after their own members without waiting on head office, and the parent's view of chapter records is read-only.
- Its own site, logo, and web address
- Its own membership types and prices
- Its own admins and member list
- Read-only access for the parent organization
Own bank account
Payouts land with the chapter
Each chapter's dues go to its own bank account
Each chapter connects its own Stripe account, so membership dues are paid out to that chapter's bank account instead of being pooled at head office and split later. If the federation charges a per-member fee, set it once on the parent. It is added to each chapter membership sale and transferred to the parent automatically.
- A Stripe account and bank payouts for every chapter
- A per-membership federation fee, collected at the sale
- Chapters or membership types exempted from the fee where needed
- No year-end tally of what each chapter owes the federation
Chapter filter
One chapter, or all of them
Member lists by chapter, with the same forms everywhere
The parent's member and membership lists have an Organization filter: every chapter, one chapter, or the parent's own records, and exports follow the filter. When the federation needs the same information from every member, it creates the form or profile field once and pushes it to the chapters, where forms stay locked so the questions match.
- Members and memberships filtered by chapter
- CSV exports that follow the filter
- Forms pushed from the parent and locked in each chapter
- Shared profile fields, reportable across the network
Choose chapter software around money and access
Before choosing, check where dues land, what head office can see, what chapter volunteers control, which profile fields the parent can standardize, and how members find the right chapter.
Each Communal chapter runs its own membership types, prices, site and Stripe account. The parent sees member totals and chapter-filtered exports. Its view of finances covers its own transactions and federation fees rather than every chapter's revenue.
Managing one small professional or member-based association? See membership software for small associations. Comparing a full AMS? Review our MemberClicks alternatives.
See Chapter Management in Action
How the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues sees membership across its leagues while each league runs its own.
Powering 500+ community organizations
Frequently asked questions
Federations of community leagues, umbrella organizations, and associations with local chapters or affiliates. The Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues runs its 163 leagues on Communal.
The parent's dashboard totals active members, new members, and program signups across its chapters, and its member and membership lists can be filtered by chapter and exported. The figures are read live from each chapter's records, so nobody has to compile a report. Chapter finances stay with the chapter: the parent sees its own transactions and the federation fees it collects.
Yes. Each chapter has its own Communal site with its own membership types, prices, logo, and web address. The parent can push shared forms and profile fields to every chapter, but each chapter sets up its own memberships.
Each chapter connects its own Stripe account, and dues are paid out to that chapter's bank account. If the federation charges a per-member fee, it is added to each chapter membership sale and transferred to the parent automatically, so there is nothing to reconcile between parent and chapters at year end.
Yes. This is the multi-chapter banking setup most federations want: every chapter, league, or affiliate has its own payment account and its own bank payouts. The parent keeps its network view without every chapter sharing one operating account.
Yes. Each chapter can draw its boundary on a map and attach it to its membership plans. When someone enters their address, Communal finds the chapter whose boundary contains it and sends them there. More on region-specific memberships.
The Communal team sets up the new chapter's site under your federation, and it shows up in the parent's dashboard and chapter filter from the start. Membership types and prices are not copied from another chapter, so each new chapter sets its own, with our help if it wants it.
Your data is stored in a secure database that is not accessible to anyone. Users' credit card information is not stored on our platform. We utilize Stripe to process payments, learn more about how they store their data here.
You can! Our team is happy to help migrate data from an excel spreadsheet or an existing platform you utilize today. Contact us for more questions.
Communal directly deposits into your bank account. We do not hold any funds on our platform.
Yes, Communal is fully PCI-DSS compliant as we partner with Stripe as our payment processor. Stripe has been audited by an independent PCI Qualified Security Assessor (QSA) and is certified as a PCI Level 1 Service Provider. Communal does not have access to see or store any credit card data as all transactions are sent directly to Stripe.