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USA Softball: How to upload (transfer) your league's players and coaches to USA Softball

  • Updated

To register your league's players and coaches with your USA Softball association, export them from your league's TeamSideline site with the USA Softball Player Registration Export and the USA Softball Volunteer Registration Export. Then upload each file on your association's registration portal with the USA Softball Enrollee Registration Import and the USA Softball Volunteer Registration Import. The portal builds your league's invoice from what you upload.

Applies to: League admins (registrars) whose USA Softball association uses a TeamSideline registration portal · The USA Softball Local module on your league's site (the Administrator and Registrar roles include the exports) · Youth and adult player and volunteer registrations

Portal Sites have been set up for direct access to registering your players with USA Softball. 


Before you start

  • Get admin access to your association's portal. Fill out the portal's Request League Access form. Your association's commissioner approves it and gives you access to your own league. You request it once: the access stays from season to season unless your association removes it.
  • Collect what the upload needs. Each player needs a birth date and a gender, and each family an email address and a street address; each coach needs all four. For coaches, the export reads an enrollment field named Gender and a Date field named Date of Birth, DOB or Birthdate on your volunteer registration, and otherwise the coach's own account.
  • If your league doesn't register on TeamSideline, skip Steps 1 and 2: build each file yourself with the column headings under What's in each file, and start at Step 3.

Step 1: Export your players

  1. On your league's TeamSideline site, go to Reports > Report Exports and click USA Softball Player Registration Export.
  2. In Program, check this season's program.
  3. In Enrollment Type, choose Player for youth players, General for adult players, or All for both.
  4. In Date Range, choose Custom and pick a start and an end date that cover your whole registration period, or a range such as This Year. The range is matched against the date each registration was placed.
  5. Under Enrollment Status, leave only Include Accepted checked.
  6. In Output Type, choose CSV.
  7. Click Export and save the file, for example as "(league name) Players.csv".

What you'll see: a CSV file with one row for each registration, starting with the account's primary adult (the parent or guardian); the player's name comes after. Phone numbers are already written as (area code) number and birthdays as MM/DD/YYYY, and Enrollment Type is Y for a youth player or A for an adult.

Step 2: Export your coaches

  1. On Reports > Report Exports, click USA Softball Volunteer Registration Export.
  2. In Program, check the same program.
  3. In Date Range, choose Custom and pick both dates, or a range such as This Year. This export needs a date range too.
  4. Leave only Include Accepted checked, choose CSV in Output Type and click Export.
  5. Save the file, for example as "(league name) Coaches.csv".

What you'll see: one row for each volunteer registration. The Offering column holds an age group, 6u, 8u, 10u, 12u, 14u, 16u or 18u, taken from the start of your offering's name: 14u/16u becomes 16u, and any other name becomes 18u. Volunteer Type is Board Member for that type and Coach for every other type.

Step 3: Upload the files on your association's portal

  1. Sign in to your association's registration portal and go to Administration > Import Data.
  2. Under USA Softball, click USA Softball Enrollee Registration Import for the players file.
  3. In File Name, choose the file, and leave Includes Headers checked.
  4. Choose your league's Program, and your league in Associated Organization.
  5. Click Next Step.
  6. On Step 2 of 2: Review and Confirm, read the messages. When it says "No errors were found. File is ready for upload. Click on Queue Import button to complete import process.", click Queue Import. If it lists errors, see If it doesn't work.
  7. Repeat steps 14 to 18 with USA Softball Volunteer Registration Import and the coaches file.

What you'll see: "Your import has been successfully uploaded and will be processed shortly." and the Status page. When an import shows Import Complete, click the arrow at the left of its row to see "Processed (number) records: (number) imported, (number) skipped." and a Row and Message for each skipped row. Find out why any row was skipped before you create your invoice.

Step 4: Create and pay your invoice

  1. On the portal, go to Reports > Report Dashboards > Invoices.
  2. Click Generate Invoice, choose your league in Associated Organization and click Process.
  3. Click the invoice's Download Invoice icon. Pay by card with the payment link on the invoice, or mail a check to the USA Softball office named on it.

What you'll see: "Invoice generated successfully for (league)" and the invoice in the list, with its Invoice Number, Invoice Total and Paid columns. A card payment marks it paid right away; your association marks a check paid when it arrives. Each person is invoiced once a season: a coach listed more than once counts once, and someone already invoiced through another league isn't on your invoice, even though their upload worked.

What's in each file

If you build a file yourself, make it a CSV file with these headings in the first row, spelled exactly like this. Every column needs a value except the phone columns and Volunteer Type.

File Columns
Players (USA Softball Enrollee Registration Import) Primary Adult First Name, Primary Adult Last Name, Primary Adult Street Address, Primary Adult City, Primary Adult State (two letters), Primary Adult Zip, Primary Adult Phone 1, Enrollee First Name, Enrollee Last Name, Offering, Primary Adult Email, Enrollee Birthday (MM/DD/YYYY), Enrollee Gender (Male or Female, or M or F), Enrollment Type (Y for youth or A for adult)
Coaches (USA Softball Volunteer Registration Import) Volunteer First Name, Volunteer Last Name, Street Address, City, State (two letters), Zip, Phone 1, Email, Offering, Gender (Male or Female, or M or F), Volunteer Type (such as Coach), Volunteer Birthday (MM/DD/YYYY)

The exports also add an Associated Organization column at the end. The import doesn't read it: everyone goes into the league you choose in Associated Organization.

If it doesn't work

Exporting

  • "Both the Start and the End date are required." Pick a Date Range with both dates. Both exports need one.
  • "You must select at least one program." or "You must select at least one enrollment status to include." Check a program, and Include Accepted.
  • The USA Softball exports aren't on Report Exports. Your league's site needs the USA Softball Local module (contact TeamSideline Support), and your admin role needs USA Softball Registration Export; the Administrator and Registrar roles have it. After a role change, sign out and back in.
  • Your program isn't in the Program list. It's archived, and archived programs can't be exported. Export before you archive the season.
  • The file has more rows than you have players or coaches. Each row is one registration, so someone registered in two of the programs you checked is listed twice. Export one program at a time, with only Include Accepted checked.
  • A coach's Gender or Volunteer Birthday is blank. Rename your volunteer enrollment fields Gender and Date of Birth (a Date field), or add the gender and birth date to the coach's account, and export again.

Uploading

  • "The file you have chosen to upload does not contain the same number of columns in every line (failed on line: (number))." A value in the file, such as an address or an offering name, contains a comma. Open the file in Excel or another spreadsheet, use Find and Replace (Ctrl+H) to replace every comma with a space, save it as CSV, and upload it again. Do this in a spreadsheet, not a text editor, so the commas between columns stay.
  • "The following required headers are missing:" and a list. A column heading was renamed or deleted. Use the headings exactly as exported, or as listed under What's in each file.
  • Review and Confirm lists errors and has no Queue Import button. Each error names the Row and Field, and nothing is uploaded until all are fixed. Fix them on your league's site and export again, or fix the file, then upload it.
    • "Value is invalid (blank when required, too short, too long, invalid format, etc)." A name, address or offering is blank or too long, or a State is longer than two letters.
    • "Value too long. Maximum length allowed is 100 characters." on an email column: the email address is usually blank. It's required.
    • "The email address '(address)' has an invalid format." Correct the address.
    • "Invalid date format. Dates must be formatted MM/DD/YYYY or M/D/YY and the separator can either be a forward slash, a dash, or a period." A birthday is missing or isn't a date.
    • "Invalid value. Must be set to Male, M, B, Female, F, G, Other, O, Non_Binary, or N (Case Insensitive)" A gender is missing.

On the Status page

  • "No Enrollment Created: Already exists - (name)" The person is already registered in that program and offering on the portal, for example from an earlier upload. Nothing more to do.
  • "No Update: More than one account for (name) found." The portal has more than one account that matches this person. Ask your association to merge them, with the person's first name, last name and correct email address. Then upload the file again; people already added are skipped.
  • "No Enrollment Created: Offering '(offering)' not found and no default offering exists." Your league's program on the portal has no offering for that person. Contact your association.

Invoicing

  • "No new enrollments found to invoice." Everyone uploaded is already on an invoice, or nothing has been imported yet. Check the import Status first.
  • The invoice's amounts look wrong. Contact your association before you pay.

Good to know

  • Photos and documents, such as birth certificates, aren't part of the upload. They're added again on the portal, on each player's account, when they're needed, for example for All-Stars.
  • After late registrations, export and upload again. People already on the portal are skipped as "Already exists", and the next invoice includes only the new ones.
  • Background checks and SafeSport are handled outside TeamSideline, in the system USA Softball's national office requires (RegisterPlay). Ask your association's USA Softball commissioner about them.

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