Chapters and your network

If your organization has local affiliates, state chapters, or any other kind of sub-unit, OrganizeOS can model them as chapters: each one is its own workspace with its own subdomain, but your organization -- the network's parent -- can see their data, set their resource limits, and configure how money moves between you. Manage chapters from Settings, then Chapters. Only owners and admins of the parent workspace can reach this page.

Creating a chapter

Click Create Chapter and fill in the form. The only required fields are the chapter's name and its workspace address.

• Chapter name and Workspace address. The address becomes the chapter's own address.organizeos.org site and is suggested from the name as you type. Availability is checked while you type; if the address is already in use, the form offers the nearest free alternative so you can accept it with one click.
• Chapter level. Pick from the levels your network already uses, choose one of the common suggestions, or enter your own label. This is a display label so your network can use its own vocabulary instead of a fixed hierarchy.
• Details. An optional description, city, state or region, and public contact email. These appear on the chapter's public site and can be changed later from the chapter's own settings.
• Coverage area. The territory the chapter serves. Choose a state, then either cover the whole state or add any number of its counties; repeat for another state if the chapter crosses a state line. A chapter can serve one county, several counties, or an entire state. If another chapter in your network already covers one of the same counties, the form points that out, but overlaps are allowed: a county chapter inside a regional chapter is a normal structure.
• Starting structure. The departments and roles the chapter begins with. If your organization already has departments or custom roles, Copy your organization's structure is selected by default and the chapter starts with the same ones (people are not copied). You can instead pick a template for your kind of organization or Start simple with no departments or roles. The form shows what each choice creates, and everything can be changed later from the chapter's own Access area. If the structure cannot be created, the chapter still exists and you are told so.
• Chapter lead. Optionally enter an email address to invite someone as an admin of the new chapter. They receive a standard team invitation. You can add more people later from the chapter's Team page.

The new chapter inherits your organization's type and branding as a starting point. It also inherits your organization's verification standing, so a chapter of an active organization is ready to use right away rather than starting its own setup from scratch.

A new chapter starts with an empty prepaid balance. The starting credit that a brand-new organization receives does not apply to chapters. For how the prepaid balance works, see Billing and your plan.

The chapters list and network overview

The Chapters page shows a Network Overview with totals across every active chapter -- chapter count, members, emails sent, SMS sent, storage, and phone minutes -- plus a list of each chapter with its level badge, subdomain, and join date. From a chapter's row, Manage opens its detail page; Remove takes it out of your network (it becomes an independent organization; this doesn't delete any of its data).

Coverage area

Open a chapter and use Coverage area to record or change the counties and states it serves. The chapter's row on the Chapters page shows a short summary of its territory, and the chapter's public About page shows a "Serving ..." line so visitors know which area it covers. Recording territory is optional and has no effect on billing, limits, or who can join.

Per-chapter resource allocation

Open a chapter and use Resource Allocation to set monthly limits for that chapter alone: email sends, SMS, storage, phone minutes, video hours, staff accounts, and member count. Leave any field blank to let that chapter draw from your network's shared pool instead of a fixed cap.

To edit every chapter's limits from one screen instead of opening each chapter individually, use Manage allocations from the Chapters page. It's a table with one row per chapter and inline-editable limit columns; change several chapters' numbers and click Save changes once to apply them all.

Donation splits

Also from a chapter's detail page, Donation Splits lets you automatically share donations made through that chapter's fundraising pages with your parent organization. Turn on Enable donation splitting, set the parent's percentage (the chapter keeps the rest), choose whether the split applies to all donations, one-time gifts only, or recurring gifts only, and optionally allow the chapter to adjust its own split within the range you set.

Network billing

Network billing, linked from the Chapters page, controls how your organization bills its network as a whole: which billing model you use, how many chapters are included before extra ones cost more, whether resources like email and SMS are pooled across the network or capped per chapter, what happens when a chapter exceeds its allocation, and, for networks that charge chapters a flat per-member fee, optional per-capita dues with a billing frequency.

Viewing and acting in a chapter

As a parent admin, you can open any chapter's workspace directly (through the chapter switcher in your sidebar) to view its data -- events, contacts, donations, and more -- automatically, without any extra setup. A banner at the top confirms you're viewing the chapter as a parent admin, with edits disabled in this mode. To make changes inside that chapter, click Switch to acting mode; a warning-colored banner then confirms you're acting in the chapter and that edits are being logged, with an Exit acting mode button to end it. Acting sessions end automatically after a period of inactivity if you forget to exit.

Why this matters

Chapters let a multi-level organization run as one network instead of a collection of disconnected accounts. Read access flows down automatically so parent staff always have visibility, while acting mode keeps a clear, logged boundary around who made changes inside a chapter and when. Per-chapter allocations and donation splits mean your national or state organization can support local affiliates with real limits and real revenue-sharing, not just an honor system.