Send welcome message at signup date, not membership 'start date'

Question

I want to do something pretty simple, but it seems surprisingly hard to do.

When a member joins, they should receive a) A receipt and b) A welcome email.

A) Works Fine. B) Is a problem.

Memberships for this client are all dated from 1st of the year, so the 'start date' is always 1st January.

It is easy to set a 'reminder' to send the welcome letter on the membership start date, but if a new member signs up on 16 July, the welcome letter will never send, because the start date is 6 and a half months earlier than the sign up date.

Can somebody suggest a way to send the welcome letter at the membership sign up time, not the membership start date? Obviously I could edit the receipt to include the welcome email, but that's not the way the client wants it to work.

Answer 1

When a membership is created there is both a 'join date' (member since) and a 'start date'

You should be able to set up a scheduled reminder to be triggered based on the 'join date' and you should get what you need.

Answer 2

Another option if you are using civicrm v4.6 or higher would be to use the date of the activity type "Membership Signup" to trigger a 'reminder'.

Answer 3

Actually the answer is simple, but a little counter-intuitive.

Membership reminders need to be set up under 'Contributions' and not 'Memberships'. So, create reminder for "Contribution Type - Member Dues", sent 'O hours after Receipt Date' in the Schedule Reminders screen.