Notifications and emails
Kanu sends email. It does not have a notification inbox or a bell icon. Inside the volunteer platform you see a short message on screen after you act, and that is all. Anything that needs to reach you later arrives by email.
Find your role, then read down to the email you are asking about.
Every email from the volunteer platform comes from noreply@kanuhawaii.org. Opportunities from a
Mālama Hawaiʻi certified organization are sent under the name Mālama Hawaiʻi, everything else
under Kanu Hawaii. Replying to noreply@ goes nowhere.
Volunteers
Sent by needs.kanuhawaii.org , to the email on your signup or account. Guests get the same emails as people with an account.
| When you get it | Can you turn it off? | |
|---|---|---|
| You’re signed up: … | Right after you sign up and a spot is confirmed. A signup for several dates sends one email listing all of them. | No. It is your receipt. |
| You’re on the waitlist: … | Right after you sign up for a full opportunity and join the waitlist. | No. |
| A spot opened up: … | Someone cancelled and you moved from the waitlist to confirmed. | No. |
| Sign-up cancelled: … | You cancelled a signup, or the organizer cancelled it for you (the email says which). Cancelling several dates at once sends one email. | No. It is your receipt. |
| Cancelled: … | The organizer took down an opportunity you are signed up for, before your date. Don’t go. | No. |
| Your volunteer hours were approved or were not approved | An organization, or Kanu for an unlisted organization, reviewed hours you reported or checked in for with a QR code. A “not approved” email gives the reason if the reviewer wrote one. Hours approved automatically, or recorded by the organizer, send nothing. | No. |
| Welcome to Kanu Hawaii | You finish setting up your profile. Sent once. | No. |
| Reminder: … is coming up! | About 24 hours before the opportunity. For repeating opportunities, the day before any date you signed up for. Only if you ticked Send me event reminders and follow-up emails when you signed up. | Yes. |
| Mahalo for volunteering at …! | The morning after, once an organizer marked you as attended. | Yes. |
| Confirm your email, Sign in to Kanu Hawaii, Reset your Kanu Hawaii password, Confirm your new email | When you create an account, ask for a magic link or a password reset, or change your email address. | No. You asked for it. |
| You’ve been invited to Kanu Hawaii | An administrator invited you to the platform. | No. |
Reminders go out on the hour, so one can arrive a few hours either side of exactly 24 hours before the start. Thank-yous go out once a day around 10 AM Hawaiʻi time. Each is sent once per signup, even if the system checks twice.
Turning off reminders and thank-yous
Two ways, both with the same result:
- The unsubscribe link at the bottom of the reminder or thank-you.
- Email Preferences, the last tab on your profile. Switch off Event reminders, Post-event thank-yous, or All emails.
All emails stops reminders and thank-yous. It does not stop the receipts, cancellations, hours decisions and account emails in the table above, because each is about something that just happened to your signup or account.
Not ticking the reminders box at signup is the third way: no reminder is sent for that signup. The thank-you does not look at that box, so switch it off in Email Preferences if you do not want it.
Mailing lists
At signup you can tick Add me to [organization]‘s mailing list. That records your permission for the organization. The platform does not send those emails: the organization writes to you itself. You can see and withdraw each one under Organization mailing lists in Email Preferences.
Organizations
Sent to the contact email on your organization’s profile, unless noted. Keep that address somewhere somebody reads.
| When you get it | Can you turn it off? | |
|---|---|---|
| New volunteer: … or New waitlist sign-up: … | A volunteer signs up for, or joins the waitlist of, one of your opportunities. | Yes. The unsubscribe link in the email turns it off for your organization only. |
| Volunteer cancelled: … | A volunteer cancels a confirmed spot on one of your opportunities. Not sent when you cancelled it yourself. If you have a waitlist, the next person is moved in automatically. | Yes, with the same unsubscribe link as the new-signup emails. |
| N volunteer hours claims to review | Once a day, around 8 AM Hawaiʻi time, while hours volunteers reported are waiting for your approval. Goes to your organization’s site coordinator if one is on file, otherwise to the contact email. | Yes. The unsubscribe link turns it off for your organization only. |
| You’ve been invited to join [organization] | Goes to the person you invited, not to you. See invite your team. | No. |
| [Organization] joined [campaign] or Update on your request to join [campaign] | A Kanu administrator approved or declined your request to join a campaign. Includes their notes. | No. |
| Your progress report for [campaign] | A Kanu administrator reviewed a number you reported toward a campaign goal. | No. |
| [Organization] is Mālama Hawaiʻi certified, We need a few changes to your Mālama Hawaiʻi application, or Update on your Mālama Hawaiʻi application | A Kanu administrator decided on your certification application. Goes to the contact email on the application, or your organization’s email if that is blank. Includes the reviewer’s notes. | No. |
New signups and attendance are also on your dashboard, so nothing depends on the email arriving.
Kanu staff
Administrators get a short email whenever something is waiting for a decision. Each one links to the matching tab in the admin panel at needs.kanuhawaii.org/admin .
| When | Who gets it | |
|---|---|---|
| Campaign match: ”…” matched N campaigns | A newly published opportunity matches a campaign’s keyword rules and needs approving. Sent once per administrator per opportunity. | Every administrator |
| New organization: … | Someone registers a new organization and it is waiting for approval. Organizations an administrator creates in the admin panel do not send it. | Every administrator |
| Campaign join request: … | An organization asks to join a campaign. | Every administrator |
| New Mālama Hawaiʻi application: … | An organization submits the certification form. | Every administrator |
| New embed domain request: … | Someone asks for a website to be allowed to use the embed widget. | Every administrator |
| New off-platform hours claim from … | A volunteer reports hours for an organization that is not listed. Only unlisted organizations send this one: a claim against a listed organization goes to that organization’s own queue. | volunteer@kanuhawaii.org |
“Administrator” means anyone with the administrator role on the platform. Whoever holds it gets every row above marked “Every administrator”.
Other Kanu sites
These send from www.kanuhawaii.org , the main site. Each form emails staff, and also sends the person who filled it in a short “Mahalo, we got it” note. Replying to that note reaches the staff inbox the form went to. The note never repeats what the person typed, so the forms cannot be used to send someone else a message.
| Sent when | Goes to | |
|---|---|---|
| Donation receipt | A gift succeeds, one-time or recurring. Not sent for older recurring gifts that WordPress still receipts, or for small renewals below the IRS threshold. | The donor |
| Contact form: … | Someone submits the contact form. | The @kanuhawaii.org inbox for the topic they chose. Reply goes to the sender. |
| Application: … | A job application. | Kanu staff, at the info inbox |
| Student Ambassador application: … | An ambassador application. | Kanu staff, at the info inbox |
| Partnership inquiry: … | The partner form. | Kanu staff, at the partnerships inbox |
| Student Dashboard beta: … | The student waitlist form. | Kanu staff, at the info inbox |
| Mahalo, we got your message (and one per form) | Any of the five forms above. Not resent when someone updates an existing waitlist signup. | The person who filled in the form |
| Recurring gift payment failed: … | A monthly or yearly gift’s card is declined. Sent on the first failure only; Stripe retries the card and reminds the donor itself. | Kanu staff, at the donations inbox |
| Recurring gift ended: … | A recurring gift is cancelled, by the donor, by staff, or because every retry failed. Says which. | Kanu staff, at the donations inbox |
| Password reset | A staff member uses Forgot password on the main site’s admin. | The staff member |
Kanu Studio sends one email of its own: You’re invited to join Kanu Studio, to the person an administrator invited.
The pledge site and the map send no email. A pledge does not get a thank-you email on purpose, so that the pledge form cannot be used to send mail to other people’s addresses.
Changing who gets what
| I want to… | Do this |
|---|---|
| Stop reminders or thank-yous (volunteer) | Unsubscribe link, or Email Preferences on your profile. |
| Stop new-signup and cancellation emails for my organization | The unsubscribe link in one of them. |
| Change where my organization’s emails go | Edit the contact email on the organization profile. |
| Change who gets staff alerts, or where they go | Ask a Kanu administrator. |
Receipts, account emails, and decision emails cannot be switched off from any setting. If you need one stopped for a specific person, ask a Kanu administrator.