How does the Substitute Finder work?

The Substitute Finder is one of the most powerful and useful features of We Adore Him.

When an adorer needs a substitute for their adoration commitment, in most cases, the Substitute Finder will do the heavy lifting to send substitute invitations, find a substitute, and notify everyone involved when a substitute is found.

Here's how it works:

  1. An adorer requests a substitute.
  2. When it's time to send substitute invitations, a list of all eligible substitutes is assembled.
    • Only adorers flagged as a substitute are included.
    • For a specific adoration date, only adorers with the corresponding substitute time period enabled on their account are included.
    • If the hour requires a male adorer and no male adorer has yet signed up, the list is further filtered to only include male adorers.
    • Also, the following adorers are never invited: blocked adorers, the adorer who requested the substitute, adorers who already have an adoration commitment for the requested date and time, and adorers previously invited to this specific date who have not yet answered.
  3. An adorer is selected randomly from this list and sent an invitation via email, text message, or phone call, depending on the adorer's notification preference. If the adorer doesn't answer immediately, the next invitation is sent after a brief delay (by default, 15 minutes). If an adorer declines an invitation, the next adorer is invited right away.

    Customize this interval with the Delay between substitute invitations field at Admin » Settings » Substitutes.

  4. When an adorer accepts a substitute invitation, several things happen:
    • A one-time substitution commitment is created for the new adorer.
    • The original adorer's substitute request is marked as claimed.
    • The original adorer is notified that a substitute was found.
    • Admins and captains are notified that a substitute was found.
    • Adorers who did not respond to their substitute invitations are notified that a substitute is no longer needed.

All of this happens automatically in the background so that the fewest number of adorers necessary are invited for each substitute request, each of your adorers is invited in an unbiased order, and very little work is required from adoration coordinators.

In fact, an adoration coordinator will only need to get involved if the system runs out of time to find a substitute (by default, three hours before the adoration date) or if all of the substitute adorers were invited and nobody accepted.

Customize this time frame with the Threshold for notifying admins field at Admin » Settings » Substitutes.

Note: the Substitute Finder takes a break during overnight hours to help adorers get a good night of sleep.

Still stuck? How can we help?

Back to Help Center