Stack, Affinity, and eTrainU

Help Prepare: Please Update Your Regional Boards from inLeague!

While we prefer screenshots to 'under the hood' updates, this is a big one: we're replacing all of the eAYSO integration developed between 2018 and 2020 and updating our player and volunteer registration systems to communicate with Affinity, the association-level management platform operated by Stack Sports on AYSO's behalf. We've been working closely with Stack's product team for the last several months to integrate player and volunteer records.

Regional Board Listings: To facilitate the transition to Affinity, AYSO has asked for current board rosters from all inLeague regions. Update your board roster from Utilities --> Board and Administration. Please update your board roster no later than Sunday, December 5th, 2021.

We'll have more to announce about this change in early 2022, but here's a brief preview:

(Dec 2021 - Jan 2022) AYSO ID: All existing AYSO IDs will be retired; volunteers will receive new IDs
(January 2022) Training: Volunteers will sign on to eTrainU directly from inLeague. No credentials will be required (no more forgetting or syncing your AYSOU password!)
(February 2022) Certifications: inLeague will receive certification data from eTrainU and updates should appear inside of inLeague
(Jan-Feb 2022) Background Checks: inLeague's integration with Sterling will be updated to use a fixed eligibility time frame and grace period instead of being tied to Membership Years; we will also send results to and receive results from Stack for existing volunteers to avoid duplication when an AYSO volunteer from a Stack region moves to an inLeague region, or vice versa.
(Mar - April 2022) Registration: Player and volunteer registration for MY2022 on the forthcoming inLeague registration platform will use a simplified electronic waiver system instead of Yozons.

Stripe Fee Visibility & inLeague Fees

Stripe Fees Available in the Transaction Ledger & Report Builder

We're pleased to announce that Stripe's per-transaction merchant processing fees are now visible from inLeague from the transaction ledger report and from the report builder. inLeague regions enjoy a discounted rate of 2.7% + 30 cents per transaction; these fees are charged and collected entirely by Stripe.

The Future of inLeague Fees (Collected by Stripe!)

At inLeague, our pricing structure hasn't changed in over a decade, but the market has. Soccer programs around the country have become smaller but more numerous, more expensive, and more involved, particularly where security and integration are concerned. As out customers' requirements have evolved, our business model remains strong -- as does the pressure to automate what has always been the somewhat labor-intensive process behind our billing.

Stripe gives us a mechanism to do that: adding our 'application fees' (in their terminology) to the transactions we already facilitate via inLeague. These are calculated at the time the transaction is submitted for processing and reserved from the transaction total prior to the league's receipt of the funds. We are in the process of reviewing transaction data from the last year to determine how best to implement this system on our new registration platform with a target launch date of March or April of 2022.

Finally, we are insulated from but not immune to inflation. Almost all of our operating expenses go to people who design and develop our software. inLeague's size and already-remote office mitigated the impact of COVID-19 on our business, but the major US markets in which we compete for talent are quite hot (particularly Austin!) and we are a 100% American company, which in this context means that our prices are going to rise next year.

Our customers are nonprofits that are less insulated from inflation than we are, and we are doing everything we can to absorb the higher cost of doing business. You can help: now that inLeague is formally authorized by AYSO as a registration service provider, the easiest way to keep our prices down is to refer us to your neighboring regions! We were fortunate in 2021 to add thousands of new players from Regions 13 and 425, and we've re-invested that revenue into our upcoming 2022 launch of our redesigned registration platform. inLeague waives part of our annual hosting fees for regions that refer new customers to us, and it only takes a couple to make a difference!

We will be contacting each league in late December or early January with specific details on our pricing structure once we have completed our analysis of the transactions moving through our software.

Happy Holidays from inLeague

As we approach our 20th year serving AYSO, we are grateful to the many volunteers in that time who have devoted their free time to helping us better serve youth sports. We've never run a soccer league -- and it's only recently that we had any youth kicking soccer balls -- so we're grateful to the coach and referee administrators, schedulers, commissioners, CVPAs, and (especially!) registrars who have invested their energy and expertise into making inLeague and the soccer programs we support the best that they can be.

inLeague will be closed from Monday, December 20th, through Tuesday, December 28th. Emergency support will be available as usual.

Happy Holidays from everyone at inLeague!