how it works
One weekend, from open spots to paid refs
Assignary is where a club, league or association assigns its referees and judges, records the work and pays for it. A league or an association is a club here too. Here’s one weekend on Assignary, in seven steps that run to the end of the season. Each step has a drawing beside it.
- 4 games on Saturday
- 9 seats to fill
- 4 venues
Demo club — fictional people and games.
What does an assigner start with?
Four games on Saturday at four venues have nine spots to fill. They’re all on a group text and a spreadsheet. Each spot is a seat: one official’s place on a game’s crew.
How do I get the league’s schedule in?
Import the league’s .csv or .xlsx workbook, or write the games in. Either way, your club’s weekend ends up on one schedule.
| Start | Game | Seats | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8:00 AM | Comets v Eastside | Lead | East Field |
| 9:00 AM | Kestrels v Rooks | Lead, Assistant 1, Assistant 2 | North Park |
| 11:00 AM | Titans v North | Lead, Assistant 1 | Memorial |
| 1:00 PM | Marlow v Oakwood | Lead, Assistant 1, Assistant 2 | The Bowl |
Demo club — fictional people and games.
How do I see who can work each game?
For each seat, you see everyone who can work it. They’re free, close enough, certified and cleared for the day of the game, with no conflict and no other game in the way. You also see why everyone else is out. You choose who to offer it to.
Try it in the demo club. It’s Thursday evening there, and a game is short of crew. Offer its open seat to someone who can work it, and watch them take it. The club and everyone in it are made up. Nothing you do there is saved.
| Official | Can they take it? |
|---|---|
| Imani Wallace | Yes: advanced · 2 min drive |
| Gus Marino | Yes: certified · 3 min drive |
| Five more | Yes, each farther away |
| Ryan Delaney | No. Has a conflict of interest: they declared North |
| Dale Whitlock | No. Holds another seat at this time, or too close to travel between: 12 min short of the drive between games |
| Marlene Kessler | No. Farther than they’ll travel: 168 miles away |
Demo club — fictional people and games.
How does a referee or judge accept a game?
An offer arrives by email. There’s no app to install. The offer’s link opens in the phone’s browser.
An official can say yes before anyone asks. When a matching offer arrives, the seat is theirs the moment it’s sent. It doesn’t wait for the offer’s time to run out.
Limits on saying yes ahead of time
- Only the levels they work
- Inside a radius they set
- Under a cap for the week
- Not on a weekday they keep for themselves
- At or above a fee they name
- Between two dates, or switched off entirely
It doesn’t change who gets offered a seat. It only changes how fast the answer comes back. With no limits set, it says yes to any seat they could already be offered. Each limit they set narrows that.
Sat · 9:00 AM · North Park
Demo club — fictional people and games.
What happens when someone can’t make it?
By itself. If someone turns an offer down, or lets it run out, it goes to the next person who can take it. Assignary asks the nearest first, and the better record of turning up breaks a tie. The game’s history shows that Assignary moved it. If an official says they’re out, their seats on games that haven’t started are offered to the next person the same way.
Never by itself. You send every first offer. You can turn off a game’s automatic re-offers. Then a seat that opens up on that game waits for you.
| What happened | Who did it |
|---|---|
| Offered to Ryan | Alex Carter |
| Turned down | Ryan Delaney |
| Passed on | Assignary |
| Offered to Charlene | Assignary |
| Accepted | Charlene Bishop |
Demo club — fictional people and games.
How are the refs paid?
Every accepted seat on a game that has started is paid. The seats left out are the ones marked a no-show or excused, and any whose official disputes the record. The treasurer pays the total through Stripe. Each referee and judge is sent the whole fee on their seat. How the refs are paid lists the three ways your club can pay, and how long the refs wait after each.
| Seat | Fee | Paid |
|---|---|---|
| Roy Tavares, Lead on Comets v Eastside | $40.00 | $40.00 |
| Dale Whitlock, Lead on Kestrels v Rooks | $55.00 | $55.00 |
| Charlene Bishop, Assistant 1 on Kestrels v Rooks | $35.00 | $35.00 |
| Trey Marshall, Assistant 2 on Kestrels v Rooks | $35.00 | $35.00 |
| Imani Wallace, Lead on Titans v North | $50.00 | $50.00 |
| Gus Marino, Assistant 1 on Titans v North | $32.00 | No-show |
| Marisa Holt, Lead on Marlow v Oakwood | $75.00 | $75.00 |
| Trey Marshall, Assistant 1 on Marlow v Oakwood | $45.00 | $45.00 |
| Dale Whitlock, Assistant 2 on Marlow v Oakwood | $45.00 | $45.00 |
| The crew | $412.00 | $380.00 |
| The payment’s lines | By card | By bank |
|---|---|---|
| To the crew, whole | $380.00 | $380.00 |
| Seat fees, $3.50 a seat | $28.00 | $28.00 |
| 3.5% of each fee by card, 1.25% by bank | $13.33 | $4.78 |
| The club pays | $421.33 | $412.78 |
Demo club — fictional people and games.
What records are there at the end of the season?
The Pay page shows what the club paid each official in a calendar year. It counts each payment on the date the money moved. It lists every payment between the dates you pick, with the seats each one paid. Each seat keeps a history of who offered it, who took it and who marked it.
| Paid for | To the refs | The club paid |
|---|---|---|
| Each of ten weekends, 40 seats | $1,400.00 | $1,557.60 |
| The season, 400 seats | $14,000.00 | $15,576.00 |
Helpers, and an official’s own record
If someone helps you assign
A helper or an AI uses a credential you issue for it. Helpers and AI lists the six rules it’s held to.
Officials carry their record
A referee or a judge can hand their next association a signed record of their own work. A record anyone can check shows how it’s read.
who it’s for
Who uses Assignary?
The assigner
You put the weekend in, send the offers, and mark who didn’t show or was excused. Only an owner can make a club’s payments, so the club makes its treasurer one of its owners. An owner can also assign and run the club.
The official
Referees and judges see the seat, the venue and the pay. They tap yes or no.
The association
A club, a league or a circuit for a judged sport keeps one schedule for everything it staffs. It keeps one record of who worked it, too.
refereeing and judging
Assignary staffs a referee crew and a judging panel the same way.
Refereeing
A referee crew works a match: a lead and their assistants. Each seat has its own fee and its own certification.
Judging
A judging panel works a division: five judges on Senior Level 5. Each judge is certified for the grade the division asks for.
try a weekend
Staff this weekend.
There are two demo clubs, Burrow County Officials and Burrow County Circuit. Each has four games. Each dot is a seat. Offer one to someone who can make the drive.
a referee crew on a match · start time · open seats
Burrow County Officials
Sat · 9:00 AM
Kestrels v Rooks
Competitive · North Park
Who can take Assistant 1
Assistant 1 · $35 · North Park. Who can make the drive?
Demo club — fictional people and games.