How to create a Membership Referrals (Refer a friend)

Overview

Membership Referrals lets you run a refer-a-friend programme where existing members share a unique referral code with friends. The referred customer receives a discount at checkout, and the referrer earns a reward. You can have one active referral promotion at a time.

Before You Start

The following will need to be completed before setting up a referral programme:

Video walk through

Steps

1. Open Membership Referrals

1. Go to Promotions > Membership Referrals

The Membership Referral Details page displays with a status of Inactive.

2. Set the Referred Customer Discount

This is the discount a new customer receives when they enter a referral code at checkout.

1. Discount amount: Enter the discount value in pounds (minimum £1)

3. Choose a Reward Type

Select how the referring member is rewarded when their code is used to purchase a membership. You must choose one of the two options below.

Option A: Membership Credit

1. Select Membership Credit
2. Credit amount: Enter the credit value in pounds (minimum £1)

The credit is automatically added to the referrer's account and redeemed against their next Direct Debit payment.

Option B: Custom (Offline) Reward

1. Select A custom (Offline) reward
2. Reward description: Enter a description of the reward that customers will see

Use this option for rewards you manage outside of Flow, such as free guest passes or merchandise.

Important: The Save and publish button remains disabled until a reward description is entered.

4. Exclude Membership Groups (Optional)

Exclude specific membership groups from the referral offer. Referred customers who belong to an excluded group will not receive the discount at checkout.

1. Click the Search membership groups field
2. Select one or more groups from the dropdown list

Note: Leave this blank to make the referral offer available to all membership groups.

5. Publish the Referral Offer

1. Click Save and publish

The page switches to a read-only summary showing the active referral details, including the referred customer discount, reward type, referrer reward description, and any excluded membership groups.

Result

When published, your referral programme is live and existing members can share their unique referral codes with friends by either copying the code from their account or using native share functionality on their device:

Option A: Membership Credit	Option B: Custom (Offline) Reward

You can monitor the programme from the Membership Referral Details page and review past offers through View History.

Unpublishing a Referral Offer

You can deactivate a live referral programme at any time. This archives the offer immediately and invalidates all existing referral codes.

1. Go to Promotions > Membership Referrals
2. Click Unpublish
3. Read the confirmation message
4. Click Unpublish now

Important: Unpublishing archives the offer immediately. All referral codes become invalid until you publish a new offer. This action cannot be undone.

The page returns to the inactive form. Previous values are not retained — you will need to enter new details to publish again.

Viewing Referral History

You can review all previously published and archived referral offers.

1. Go to Promotions > Membership Referrals
2. Click View history

The Membership Referral History page displays a table with the following details for each archived offer:

• Unpublished by — the staff member who archived the offer
• Created date — when the offer was published
• Archived date — when the offer was unpublished
• Referral offer — the discount amount for referred customers
• Referrer Reward — the reward amount for referring members
• Excluded membership groups — any groups that were excluded

Click Back to membership referrals to return to the main page.

Troubleshooting

Why is the Save and publish button greyed out? 
Ensure you have entered a discount amount (minimum £1), selected a reward type, and — if using a custom offline reward — entered a reward description. All three are required before you can publish.

Can I edit a live referral offer without unpublishing? 
No. You must unpublish the current offer first, then create and publish a new one. The previous offer is archived in View History.

Why does the discount amount show an error after clearing the field? 
The discount amount is required and must be a number. If the field is emptied, a validation message appears: "Invalid input: expected number, received undefined". Enter a value of £1 or more to resolve this.

Can I have more than one active referral offer? 
No. Only one referral promotion can be active at a time. Unpublish the existing offer before creating a new one.

How do users apply the code online?

If the user share the link then the code will automatically be applied and be visible in the cart for the user.

If the user share the code, then the new member should enter the code when prompted on the Step 5 "Review & select dates" in the existing "Add promo or referral code" field:  

How do I apply a referral code via front of house? 

The membership referral code can be added via the existing "Add promo or referral code" entry on the "New membership summary and costs" step of the process:

How do I report on the success of the campaign? 
A dedicated data source called "Referral Campaigns" is available to create your own reports for Membership referrals with the following data:

How do I see all of my Membership Groups?

The search results is limited to 25 items, and they are shown in alphabetical order, with live search available to refine the search results in the input as required.

What's Next?

• How to create a Promo Code
• How to create a Package