Find a replacement for an assignment
If you cannot serve an assignment you have been given, you do not have to work through a phone list. You hand it over in the app: CongPlan asks everyone who may take it over, or one person you choose, and whoever says yes first is in the program. This guide shows when that works, how to send a request, and what to do when nobody says yes. The page Hand over & take over describes every button and setting. The feature page on congplan.app (opens in new tab) covers the same ground for readers who do not use CongPlan yet.
When handing over fits, and when it does not
You can hand over your own technical assignments and, if the congregation allows it under Hand over meeting parts, your meeting parts.
CongPlan refuses a request instead of sending one nobody could answer: when nobody qualifies, when the meeting has already started, or when the congregation has switched off handing over that part. You get the reason back.
For a long-term change, such as a role you can no longer hold at all, talk to the coordinator instead. A hand-over request moves one assignment on one date.
Sending a request
- Open the meeting program with your assignment.
- Tap Hand over next to it.
- Under Who do you want to ask?, choose Everyone who may take over this assignment or One specific person.
- Check the summary and send the request.
Asking everyone is faster than asking one person after another: the request reaches all of them at once. Asking one specific person lets you agree on a return assignment: tick Take over one of …'s assignments in return and pick one of that person's upcoming assignments of the same kind.
The request runs until the meeting starts. On your assignment, the button then shows Hand-over pending.
Who is asked
When you ask everyone:
- For a technical assignment: everyone listed for this assignment who is not absent that day and has no other technical assignment at this meeting.
- For a meeting part: everyone who can be assigned to this part, is not absent that day and is not already on this part.
Show who will be asked lists the names before you send. Recipients get a notification and see a banner on the meeting. If one of the conditions changes while the request is open, for example the person records an absence, taking over fails instead of creating a conflict.
Take over, decline, withdraw
- Take over says yes. The first person to say yes gets the assignment; everyone else then sees that it has been taken.
- Decline answers without taking it. While the request is open, Take over after all is still possible.
- Cancel request is the requester's side: it withdraws a request that is still open, and the assignment stays with you.
If everyone declines, the button shows Nobody said yes – ask again. Ask again ends the old request and lets you ask again.
When a take-over needs approval
For meeting parts, the congregation can switch on Approval needed. The person who says yes is then only in the program once the overseer of the meeting, the Coordinator of the Body of Elders or another planner approves the take-over. Until then your name stays. If the take-over is rejected or not approved before the meeting starts, the assignment stays with you. See Approving a take-over.
Where you find your requests
Every request you are involved in stays on Me > Hand over & take over, split into To me and From me, and into Open requests and History. Each finished request carries a short note such as You took it over, Taken over by someone else or Not answered in time. Once one of your own requests is taken over, you see who took it over, by name.
Deleting a notification never deletes the request behind it. The page is where you find it again.
What coordinators see
Anyone with the Technical Assignments edit permission or a permission to edit meetings can open Congregation > Plan > All hand-overs of the congregation. It lists the hand-overs for meetings from today on that they may plan, with For approval, Open requests and History. Each card shows:
- the assignment and the meeting date
- who asked, and when
- every person who was asked, by name, with their answer
The same overview opens from Me > Hand over & take over through the All hand-overs of the congregation button, which only holders of those permissions see.