Phone notifications
Spotter can show notifications on your phone, iPad, or computer, the same way other apps do. Parents can turn them on too. Notifications go out for:
- Messages: when the front desk writes to a family (New message, a statement, a note from class, or an approved message from the morning handoff), when the front desk replies to a parent’s question, and when a parent sends a question to the front desk.
- Studio notices the front desk sends with Notification on the Messages page, like a cancelled class.
- Spotter news about new features.
Turn them on
Open your notifications
Staff: open Settings and look at Your notifications. Parents: open the Family tab in the parent app.
Turn on Notifications on this device
Tap the Notifications on this device switch and allow notifications when your browser asks. Tap Send a test to check that it works.
Each phone, iPad, or computer has its own switch. Turn it on for every device where you want notifications.
iPhone and iPad: notifications only work in the Spotter app on your Home Screen, and need iOS or iPadOS 16.4 or later. In Safari, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen. Open Spotter from your Home Screen and turn the switch on there.
Message notifications
When notifications are on, a second switch, Message notifications, controls notifications about messages. It’s on unless you turn it off, and it applies to all your devices. Studio notices and Spotter news still come through when it’s off.
- Owners, admins, and front desk staff get a notification when a family sends the front desk a question. It shows the parent and family, and the question. Tap it to open Questions from families on Today with that question open. If you work at more than one studio, Spotter switches to the right one first. Instructors don’t get these.
- Parents get a notification when the front desk writes to their family or replies to their question. It shows who wrote and the start of the message. Tap it to open the message, or the conversation in Ask the studio. A parent with families at two studios gets each studio’s messages on that studio’s family.
You never get a notification for a message you sent yourself. If you’re already looking at that conversation, your phone doesn’t buzz.
When several messages come in a row in the same conversation, you get one notification right away. Anything else in the next 30 seconds updates that same notification with the newest message, instead of buzzing again for each one.
Notifications to families are part of the Spotter plan, like family emails. See Spotter plan.