This year, as we announced previously, we are going to move away from paper based sign up to a fully online system.   We want to ensure, that those signing up have the maximum flexibility.   This is very new, we have tested it but you may find issues.   If you do, please drop an e-mail to web@downsman.com.

We want this to be a tool that makes your life easier, if you have any feature requests or suggestions please drop us an e-mail or use the feedback form on the web site.

Most fields should be pretty intuitive, however this document gives you some simple guidance to interact.

Registration

You can register right from http://signup.downsman.com (if you forget your password then drop an e-mail to web@downsman.com) once registered you can login.  Please double check your contact information is right,  if you get it wrong let us know and we will fix it for you.  We will not store your information after the hike, we will not contact you unless we have a specific query about your team.

Team Entry

To add a team click Add Team from the main screen.  It will be given a team name of Default,  initially this is all you need to enter to register your team, it’s saved already!  We hope you will do this so that we can get an early idea of the number of teams that may be entered.  You can change the team name later, so don’t be shy.  You can come back and fill the rest of the form when you are ready.  Add the number of teams you think you will entering just as soon as you have an idea, you can always change your mind!

The first section asks for information about you and asks you to make some choices.  Most of it should be pretty obvious.

Group Name is optional and is there to capture any unique naming you have, typically Explorer groups may have names.   There are two checkboxes, the first asks if the team is committed to running, per rules here if your team wants to run they must have appropriate equipment and are signing up to these rules.   You must notify us here.  The second checkbox is for any team entering class A or B that would like to sleep over at the start, we will be in touch!

Hike class changes some rules within the form so choose carefully, for information about the different class see this page.

The next section gives personal information about your Scout team, feel free to add as many Scouts as you like, you can slot individuals in here as you train.  You can use this as a bit of scratch while you setup your team.

The checkbox for Scout Leader should ONLY be used to indicate the Scout Leader that will be walking with an open team for THIS leader date of birth (DOB) is not required.  Leaders that enter longer classes should NOT click this and must enter a DOB so that hike conditions can be checked.

The DOB is used to check the age of the Scout, note age is calculated on the day of the hike.  Read the class rules to understand how this is used.

If there are any medical conditions we may need to know please add them.

The next section captures the phone number the team will be using on the hike.  Feel free to enter this as late as required (Before you submit though!).  Don’t forget which is active and which is backup!

All we need for ‘support’ is the name and number, however if you have more than one support vehicle then it’s useful to know how they hand over so indicate when they are supporting.  This can be using a time or a location.

Finally, enter the information for the home contact,  please double and triple check this information is correct.

Validation

At the bottom of the form (you may need to scroll) are buttons to pay, validate, submit and save.   The form will be smart and will save itself when it thinks it can to avoid losing data and to make things work as you would expect, however do click save when you are done entering data.  Once you think the team is as you like, click validate and it will give you feedback on the compliance of your team to specific hike class rules.  This same validation is done when you submit.

Payment

We are not processing online payments at this time, this is because this system is new and we want to minimise failure modes.  If you click on the pay button on the site it will give you a popup with our bank information please arrange a bank payment, attach a reference with the team information and we will mark those teams as paid.

Submission

You can only ‘submit’ teams once we have marked you as paid.  You are free however to build up the team information and the validation tools for ensuring the teams comply with the class rules are available.  Once you have submitted a team you can’t change it.  You can withdraw a team and then resubmit,  this is to ensure that once a team is submitted it is a valid team to enter the event (changes may invalidate a team).

As the event gets close we will ‘lock’ the system to prevent changes this is so that we can arrange details like order trackers, print sheets for checkpoints.  If you have to make changes at that point email info@downsman.com for help.

Security

All data will be removed from our databases at the end of the event, the only information retained will be the contact information for the winners (so we can get the trophies back!).

All data is stored in a secure database with no public access.

All password data is hashed, so no password information are stored directly, though obviously don’t reuse passwords.

Updates

This is new software we will make updates, over time.  If we need to make an update the software may stop working for a short time.   This should be no more than a few minutes.   So if you can’t get access, just try back shortly.  If we have an outage of more than a few minutes we will let you know via the website and Facebook.   Let’s be positive though – that is NOT going to happen!