WA hub uses Envibe to lift online game and improve recreation access

Bunbury’s South West Sports Centre is making it easier for locals to get active and enjoy recreation by using the online functionality in Jonas Leisure’s Envibe leisure management software to make booking simple and give customers more control over how they interact with the centre.

With 3,000 members on the books and hundreds of thousands of people visiting each year to get their recreation fix, the community hub has become a popular meeting place for activities and events catering for everyone from school children to senior citizens.

City of Bunbury Acting Team Leader Sport and Recreation Shane Cristaldi says South West Sports Centre has used Envibe for the past five years and he appreciates the way the platform is continually updated to make it more effective.

Shane says Envibe’s online portal saves time and takes pressure off staff by giving customers the power to sign up for memberships online, book group fitness classes and check availability of courts, pool spaces and meeting and function rooms.

South West Sports Centre’s recently revamped website is fully integrated with Envibe and features data updated in real time to show how many people have signed up for group fitness classes and how many spaces are left which is handy for customers, he says.

“Right now you can jump on the website and check different classes to see if there are any spots left.”

Other highlights of Envibe for Shane include its simple but effective point of sale functionality and its booking management features that allow staff to easily manage customer bookings and book time slots for facilities such as basketball courts or meeting rooms.

Shane says in the near future the centre is considering adding Envibe’s Paperless Sign-up module to reduce staff processing time for new memberships. The module gives staff the power to sign-up new members anywhere they choose from any online device, removing the need for a customer to fill out their details on a paper form that a staff member then has to manually enter into the system later in the day.

While some customers love to come in and have a chat with the team, it’s great to be able to cut out unnecessary processing time and use it to improve the services they offer where they can, Shane says.

South West Sports Centre boasts three multipurpose indoor courts for basketball, netball, volleyball, indoor soccer and badminton, a 25- and 50-metre pool, function rooms for hire and a stadium that can be hired for large events and expos.

The centre aims to be a hub for community activity, hosting a range of events including swimming carnivals for local schools and senior citizen information days, as well as welcoming casual users to drop in to attend a recreation session, grab a coffee and get to know the locals.