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Check a child out

A parent is at the door for their child. You need PTRS to record that the child has left and who took them, and you want PTRS to stop you if that person is not allowed to collect them.

What you need​

  • The child must be checked in today at your site.
  • The person collecting must already be on the child's authorised pickup list. PTRS refuses anyone else, and there is no override.

Steps​

  1. Open Attendance.
  2. Find the child in the arrivals feed and click their row. Their drawer opens.
  3. At the bottom of the drawer, press Check Out followed by the child's name.
  4. The list is headed Picked up by. It shows only the guardians marked as authorised pickups, each with their relationship and phone number. Choose the person at the door.

A message confirms the check-out.

If the list says "No authorized pickup guardians on file", nobody can collect this child through PTRS until someone with access to member records adds an authorised pickup to the child's record.

Do not use the kiosk to check anyone out

Scanning the badge of a child who is already checked in makes the kiosk try a check-out, and that check-out is always rejected. You see "Check-out failed". Worse, if the kiosk has lost track of today's session it skips the request and still shows its checked-out screen, confirming something that was never recorded.

What PTRS records​

  • A leaving time on the child's check-in.
  • An entry in the audit trail naming you and the guardian you chose.
  • A live update to everyone who has your site open, and a headcount one lower.

When PTRS refuses​

What you seeWhat it meansWhat to do
Guardian '…' is not on the authorized pickup list.The person you chose is not an authorised pickup for this child.Do not release the child. Confirm the arrangement, then have someone with access to member records add the guardian.
No active check-in found for member '…'.The child is not checked in, usually because they have already been checked out.Look at the arrivals feed. If they were checked out, nothing more is needed.
Attendance session with ID '…' was not found.There is no open session for the child's site today.Launch the kiosk once for that site to open today's session.

Two things the screen gets wrong​

The confirmation ends "Guardian notified." No message is sent to anyone, and nothing on the record says one was. Contact the guardian by your usual means.

The Check Out button does not disappear after a successful check-out. The drawer decides whether a child has left by looking for a check-out entry in today's feed, and PTRS does not create one. A check-out adds a leaving time to the existing check-in instead. Pressing the button again gets "No active check-in found", and that message is your confirmation that the first press worked.

For the same reason a child who has left still appears in the arrivals feed with their arrival time, and the feed's Check-outs only filter always shows nothing.

At the end of the day​

Check every child out one by one. Nothing does it for you. No scheduled task clears open check-ins overnight, and closing a session would not do it either. A child left checked in is still counted as present the next morning.

Checked against PTRS on 7 September 2026.