Viewing as a parent or staff member

Sometimes the quickest way to help a family or staff member is to see Campfront the way they do. The Impersonate action signs you in as that person, so you land on their dashboard and see their exact enrollments, forms, payments, and messages. It's the fastest way to sort out problems like "I can't find my invoice" or "the form won't let me submit."

You stay in control the whole time. A warning banner sits across the top of every page while you're viewing as someone else, and one click returns you to your own account.

What viewing as does

When you view as a parent or staff member, Campfront signs you in as them for the rest of the session. You see their portal, their records, and their options, just as they would. It's the difference between guessing what a family sees and looking at it directly.

This is a support tool, not a way to edit records. If you want to change something, it's usually clearer to do it from the admin area. Save viewing as for the moments when you need to see through someone else's eyes.

Who you can view as

You can view as any parent or staff member who has set up their account, as long as they aren't also an admin somewhere. People who've been invited but haven't claimed their account yet can't be viewed as, since there's no login to sign in to. Neither can someone who is also an administrator, at your camp or, if they share a login across camps, at another one. That account carries admin-level access of its own.

Viewing as a parent needs permission to edit campers, plus the Impersonate accounts capability on your role. Viewing as a staff member needs permission to edit staff, plus the same capability. Owners and Admins have it by default, and you can grant it to other roles from Camp settings > Roles. If you don't see the Impersonate option, or using it doesn't sign you in, check both the feature permission and the capability.

Starting a session

Open the profile of the person you want to view as, then choose Impersonate from the actions menu. You'll find it in a few places:

• A camper's enrollment profile, which views as the family's main parent

• A family profile, or a family member's row

• An enrollment contact

• A staff member's profile, which views as that staff member

You can also start from the command bar. On an enrollment profile, open it with Cmd + K (Mac) or Ctrl + K (Windows) and choose Impersonate.

Campfront opens the portal that matches where you started. Start from a camper or family and you land in the parent portal. Start from a staff profile and you land in the staff portal. If someone is both a parent and a staff member, where you started decides which portal you see.

The impersonation banner

While you're viewing as someone else, a highlighted banner sits across the top of every page: You're impersonating [name]. It stays there so you always know whose account you're in. If you've hopped from one account into another, the banner shows the chain you came through.

What your changes do

You're signed in as that person, so treat the session as look, don't touch unless you mean to act on their behalf. Anything you do while viewing as them, like submitting a form, making a payment, or updating a detail, is saved as if they did it and shows up that way in the activity feed.

Time you spend viewing as someone doesn't count as their own activity, so it won't change when they last signed in.

Returning to your account

Click Stop impersonating in the banner to return to your own admin account. You'll land back on the page you started from. Campfront checks with you first, so you don't drop out of a session by accident.