Member Import

Member import brings an established community and its existing details into Hubbaly. People whose rows pass the checks can join without applying, and a hub owner or admin can choose whether Hubbaly emails invitations.

Each person becomes a member when they sign in with the exact imported email, review their details and the hub’s terms, and choose to join.

Before You Start

Open Hub -> Admin -> People -> Member imports. Only hub owners and admins can open an import or see its private results.

Prepare one of these sources:

A UTF-8 CSV file,
A UTF-8 text file with one email address per line,
A list of email addresses to paste into the importer.

One import can contain up to 5,000 non-empty rows. A CSV can also contain optional information such as a name, phone number, organisation, or another hub-specific detail.

Only import contact and member information that your hub is allowed to use. Check the file before uploading it and remove columns that are not needed for the joining process or hub operations.

Import Existing Members

1. Add People

Choose a CSV spreadsheet, plain text file, or pasted addresses, then choose Continue. For a CSV, leave The first row contains column headings on unless the spreadsheet has no heading row. Text files and pasted lists always treat every non-empty line as an email address. The source stays in this browser tab while you review it, so leaving the page means starting the preview again.

2. Map Columns

Choose the one column that contains the account email address. Ignore every column the hub does not need.

Every other column has three choices.

Member detail. The information becomes one of the person’s own Shared details. They review it, and they can change or remove it later. If any column is mapped this way, Shared details will switch on automatically when the import is committed. A new detail created by the import remains optional for joining, registering interest, and ticket checkout. You can make it required later as a separate decision in Details to collect. If a column heading exactly matches a detail your hub already has, Hubbaly reuses that detail instead of creating a duplicate.

Hub record. The information is kept as your hub’s own history instead. This suits old application answers and similar notes you want to keep but that are not the person’s to edit. Give each one a short name of 1 to 100 characters; it starts from the column heading and you can change it before you continue. Only hub owners and admins can see a hub record. The person cannot change or remove it in Hubbaly, and it is kept until an owner or admin deletes it, including for someone who declined the invitation or never joined. Anyone can ask you for a copy of what you hold about them or ask you to correct it, and you can export or delete it from their person page.

Do not import. The column is ignored.

New fields are lasting hub fields even if you later stop the remaining people joining. Review each field’s name, type, privacy classification, and which hub admins can see it before continuing.

To add information for people who have already joined, turn on Use this file for current members too. Hubbaly then fills only details they have left empty and never replaces anything they have already saved. This is off by default.

3. Review

Review the complete result before importing. Search or filter the rows to check:

People who can join after the import,
People who are already members,
Duplicate or skipped rows,
Invalid addresses or details that need correction,
Rows that cannot be imported safely.

Download the correction file when you need row numbers and plain-language reasons. It does not copy unsafe source cells into the download. Correct your original list and start a new import when needed.

The preview lasts for two hours. If it expires, or the source or hub fields change, review the import again so the final action always matches what you can see.

4. Choose how long people can join and whether to email them

Choose one of these options:

No, just import the list lets each eligible person join without applying, but sends no invitation emails. A person who already uses Hubbaly may still find the invitation in Invitations or on the hub’s join page.
Yes, send invitations gives people the same joining access and asks Hubbaly to email each person who is still eligible when delivery runs.

Not sending emails is the default. If an ordinary member invitation is replaced by the import, the old invitation stops working and Hubbaly does not send a replacement message.

Choose how long people should have to join. The default is 365 days and the allowed range is 30 to 730 days. You can give them more time later, but never beyond 730 days from the original import.

Read the final counts and confirm that your hub has authority to use the information before starting the import. A committed import is processed in the background. Invitation delivery begins only after the rows are safely ready.

How a Person Joins

An invitation link opens a private review page. The person can sign in or create an account, but they can join only when their current verified Hubbaly email is the exact imported email address. The invitation cannot be transferred to a different account.

When the person follows the invitation from their email, Hubbaly fills in the invited address and locks it to prevent typing mistakes. Opening that valid email link proves access to the address, so a new account goes straight back to the invitation after the person chooses their username and password. It does not send another verification email. If an email-only guest ticket record already uses the address, Hubbaly upgrades that record instead of asking for another email link.

Someone who already has an account must still sign in with their password or passkey and complete multi-factor authentication where it is on. The invitation link is not a sign-in link. Use a different email leaves this invitation account-entry journey and restores the ordinary editable email field.

Before joining, the person reviews any imported Shared details. They can accept or edit them, and they can clear optional values. They must also accept the hub’s current terms and supply any details that the hub currently requires for joining.

The final Join action creates the membership. A valid imported invitation skips the hub application questions and manual approval queue, including for request-only or invite-only hubs.

If the email does not match, the page does not reveal the address the organiser imported. The person can switch accounts or verify the correct email, or they can use the hub’s ordinary join route.

Understand the Results

The import results keep membership and email delivery separate. A failed email does not stop an eligible person joining, and a sent email does not mean the person has joined.

Membership results include Can join now, Joined from import, Already a member, Skipped, Needs attention, and No longer active. Invitation results include Not requested, Queued, Sent, Suppressed, Bounced, and Failed.

Search and filter the row list when you need to follow up. It shows each person’s email, membership and invitation outcomes, any issue, saved Hub record field count, and the actions currently available. Only owners and admins can use this private list.

Manage an Import

From the results page, an owner or admin can:

Retry or take over interrupted processing,
Send invitations or one bulk reminder after reviewing the current eligible count,
Resend an invitation to one eligible person,
Pause and review email delivery before resuming it,
Give people more time to join within the original 730-day limit,
Remove one person’s unused joining access,
Start a corrected import,
Stop remaining people joining to remove joining access from everyone who has not joined.

Cancelling remaining invitations never removes people who already joined or their saved Hub records. Correcting an imported email also needs a new reviewed import; an organiser cannot edit joining access in place.

Hubbaly rechecks membership, expiry, email preferences, and safety rules immediately before each message. A person can stop future member-import email from that hub without creating an account, and can later opt back in from their Invitations page after signing in with a verified email. This email choice does not change ordinary hub marketing preferences or block the normal join route.

The invitation names the organiser and community, explains that joining is the recipient’s choice, and lets them review the invitation before deciding. It does not call them “pre-approved”.

Delivery may pause after a hard bounce or complaint so an owner or admin can review it. Hubbaly also limits member-import email to 5,000 provider submissions per hub in each UTC day. Work that reaches the limit waits for the next available delivery window; eligible people can still join.

Privacy and Cleanup

The uploaded or pasted source is encrypted as a private temporary file while Hubbaly safely turns it into import rows. It is not available through normal file or image links. Hubbaly deletes it after successful processing. If processing is interrupted, a recovery copy is kept for no more than 24 hours.

Longer-term records keep the minimum typed information needed to preserve joining access, imported Shared details, outcomes, audit history, and safe retry behaviour. Imported details stay inside this hub; they do not change the person’s global Hubbaly profile.

After a row has joined or otherwise reached its final outcome, Hubbaly removes the full imported email and import-delivery metadata after 90 days unless another documented legal or safety reason requires it. The hub keeps bounded outcome and provenance records so its history remains truthful.

Hub records are separate from that clean-up. They are kept indefinitely until an owner or admin deletes them, so they survive a declined invitation, removed joining access, an expiry, a closed import, and the 90-day email clean-up above.

Applications and records on a person’s page

Open a person from People to see Applications and records. Owners and admins see every application that person made to this hub, with the answers they gave and the form they saw at the time, beside any hub records kept from an import. Managers do not see this section.

From there you can export the whole history as a spreadsheet file for a data request, or delete one hub record. Deleting a record does not change the import result, the person’s membership, or any application. Applications cannot be deleted here.

Common Questions

Does an import add people to the hub immediately?

No. It only creates the right for the matching verified account to join. The person must take the final Join action.

What happens if an invitation link is forwarded?

The link works only with the invited address and should be treated as private, just like an email verification link. Anyone using an existing account must still sign in to the account whose current email exactly matches that address. A different-email account cannot claim the invitation.

Does importing without emails hide the invitation?

No. It stops invitation email, but the matching signed-in person may still see the invitation in Hubbaly.

What if an invitation fails to send?

The person can still join. Review the separate delivery result, correct any address through a new import when necessary, or resend when the row is still eligible.

Can an imported field become required automatically?

No new detail created by an import is required automatically. Reusing a detail your hub already has keeps that detail’s current settings. You can make a new detail required later in Details to collect.

Does cancelling the remaining invitations remove members?

No. It removes joining access only from people who have not joined and leaves existing memberships unchanged.