Put the domain, hosting, email and every login in the organisation's name with role-based addresses, keep a one-page handover note for each new board, and use a supplier who stays when volunteers change.

The volunteer who knew the logins

At this time of year, plenty of associations, clubs and non-profits start their season with new faces on the board. Someone who looked after the website for three years has stepped down, moved away or simply had enough.

The knowledge leaves with them: the hosting login, the domain renewal date, the password for the page that lists the season's dates.

Often nobody notices until something breaks. The domain lapses, the site goes down the week registration opens, and the renewal notices turn out to have gone to a former treasurer's personal email.

Nobody is at fault. It is what happens when the people change every year and the accounts never do.

Where the website's pieces sit

The first is the one that can cost the organisation its own name. Whoever is listed as the registrant controls the domain.

If that person cannot be found, or will not cooperate, getting the domain back can take months, and sometimes it cannot be done at all.

Every account in the organisation's name

The fix is simple to state. Every account the website depends on should belong to the organisation, not to whichever volunteer set it up.

The domain's registrant should be the organisation itself, and a .ca domain can be registered to it directly. Hosting should be billed to the organisation's own card or by invoice.

And no account that matters should be owned by a personal email address. When the person behind a personal address leaves, so does everything attached to it.

Role addresses, not personal ones

Accounts need an email address, and the right one belongs to a role rather than a person: president, treasurer, registrar, webmaster, each at the organisation's own domain.

Each role address forwards to whoever holds the job this year. When the volunteer changes, the forwarding changes, and every receipt and renewal notice keeps arriving in the right place.

Give every important account two administrators as well, so one departure never locks everyone out.

The one-page handover note

The note that saves the next board is short. One page, kept with the minutes, updated each year.

List each account and what it is for, the address used to log in to it, who currently has access, when it renews and what it costs, and who the supplier is.

Say where the passwords are kept, but never put them in the note itself. Add two or three lines on the routine jobs: what changes each season and who usually does it.

A worked example

A youth orchestra society runs three ensembles for players from about eight to twenty, with weekly rehearsals in a school band room, two concerts a season and auditions each June.

A parent whose daughter played cello built the site. He registered the domain in his own name, put the hosting on his credit card and kept the only admin login.

When his daughter aged out, he left the board. The next spring the site went offline two weeks before auditions, because the renewal reminders went to an old work email and his card had expired.

The new president tracked him down, and he was glad to help. The domain was renewed and transferred to the society, the hosting moved to an account in its name, and two new logins replaced his.

The board then asked a local web company to look after hosting, updates and renewals under a yearly agreement with the society, so the site no longer depends on which parents happen to be on the board.

A one-page handover note now sits in the binder passed to each new president.

A supplier who stays

Volunteers rotate by design. A supplier's relationship is with the organisation, and it carries on whoever chairs the meetings.

A good one keeps the renewals, updates and backups running, holds no account in its own name, and can brief each new board in half an hour. The agreement itself belongs in the handover note.

That continuity is most of what an association pays for. The technical work matters, but the memory matters more.

Put the costs in the budget

Websites fail quietly when their costs live on someone's personal card. The volunteer leaves, the card expires, and the renewal fails without anyone on the board seeing a notice.

List the domain, the hosting and the supplier as lines in the annual budget, paid by the organisation and approved like any other expense.

For most associations the amounts are small. Putting them in the budget makes them visible to every treasurer who follows.

Make it part of the annual meeting

Put the website on the agenda of the annual general meeting, or of the first board meeting after it.

Review the note, confirm who holds each role address, and remove access for anyone who has left. A former volunteer who can still log in is a risk nobody chose.

Ten minutes once a year keeps the note true, and a note that is true is the only kind worth keeping.

The counter-case

A small club with one page and a Facebook group has fewer accounts to track. It may need only the note and its accounts in the club's name this year, with outside help later as the site grows.

A volunteer who has held the job for a decade is an asset, not a problem. But even the most reliable person moves on eventually, and the note costs nothing.

Whatever the size, keep every account in the organisation's name, write the note, and work with someone who stays when the board changes.

At the next board meeting

  1. List every account the website depends on.
  2. Find out whose name each one is in.
  3. Move each account into the organisation's name.
  4. Set up role email addresses for the board.
  5. Give two people access to everything.
  6. Write the one-page note and file it.
  7. Remove access for anyone who has left.

Step three gets harder with every year it waits. Moving a domain out of a volunteer's name is easy while they are friendly and reachable, and very hard once they are not.

What the website itself should offer families is covered in what a youth soccer club website needs.

Frequently asked questions

Why do association websites suddenly go offline?

Usually because a renewal notice went to a volunteer who has left, or was charged to a card that expired. The accounts stayed in one person's name.

Whose name should the domain be in?

The organisation's. Whoever is listed as the registrant controls the domain, and recovering it from a departed volunteer who cannot be found can take months or fail entirely.

What is a role email address?

An address for a job rather than a person, such as treasurer at the organisation's domain, forwarding to whoever holds that role this year.

What goes in the handover note?

Each account and its purpose, the login address, who has access, renewal dates and costs, the supplier's details, and where passwords are kept, but never the passwords themselves.

Why use an outside web supplier?

Volunteers change every year, but a supplier's relationship is with the organisation. It keeps renewals, updates and backups running and can brief each new board.

What should happen at each annual meeting?

Review the handover note, confirm who holds each role address, and remove website access for anyone who has left the board or stopped volunteering.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

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