Martial-arts schools and family gyms have always had the same workaround for kids: give each child a membership of their own — usually a $0 one — just so they can be booked in and checked in. That meant fake plans, $0 invoices in the reports, and an email address invented for a seven-year-old.
Now a membership can simply be shared with family.
Switch it on per plan. Any membership plan gets a Shareable with family toggle. Everyone in the holder's family can check in and book classes and appointments on it, and they all draw on the same usage limit — a 10-session family card is 10 sessions between the lot of them.
Children join as dependents, with just a name. From a member's profile, create a family and Add dependent: full name, optional date of birth, done. A dependent is a real member — profile, QR code, PIN, attendance history — but has no email and no login. Anything emailed to them, from booking confirmations to your broadcasts, reaches the parent instead, and a family gets each broadcast once. Existing members can be linked too: a spouse, or a teenager with their own account.
Book and check them in like anyone else. Wherever staff pick a member, the memberships offered are the ones that cover them — so a child on a family plan is booked into a class, enrolled in a series or booked for an appointment exactly like an adult, and siblings can each take a place in the same class on the one membership. At the desk, the child checks in with their own code; the visit is recorded under the child and counted against the family plan. Eligibility is checked on the child — a blocked child stays blocked while the parent is fine — and freezing the parent's plan pauses the whole family.
Parents run it themselves. In the app and on your gym's site, Family lets a member start a family, add and edit dependents, and remove people. Whoever manages the family gets a Your family panel on every class: one row per relative with their state — Not booked, Reserved, #2 in line — and the one action that fits: Book, Cancel, Check In, Join waitlist, Leave waitlist. Booking yourself never takes anything away from the panel. Appointments ask Who is it for?. The Reservations and Visits lists show one person at a time, with a You / Emma / Noah picker at the top, so nobody turns up to a class meant for their child.
Holding the plan and managing the family are separate. The membership belongs to whoever bought it, as always; managing is a role you grant (Make manager on the Family card), and it is the only thing that lets someone act for the others — so a parent whose plan has lapsed, or who set the family up before buying, still runs the household and books the kids on the other parent's plan, while a teenager who buys their own plan does not.
Staff see the whole picture. Members → Families lists every family, who manages it and who is in it, and flags one that nobody manages. A dependent's Membership tab shows Covered by a family membership, naming the plan and who holds it. Dependents count as Active in the members list and in the Has active membership and Membership plan filters, so children never land in your win-back campaign.
Nothing to migrate: existing members and plans are untouched until you switch Shareable with family on.
Read more in the family memberships guide.