For the class parent organising
You volunteered to organise the end-of-term party, and the class group did the rest: everyone replies, nobody counts. One page turns that noise into a guest list.
Term-end parties are the easiest social event to plan and the hardest to close. The idea lands in the group on a Monday, forty messages arrive by Wednesday, and by Friday nobody can say whether it is thirty children or sixty. The hall booking, the snack order and the cake all depend on a number nobody actually has.
An invitation page gives the group something to forward instead of something to argue under. The details live in one place, every family replies on the page, and the guest list fills itself while you stay out of the thread.
Before you post the link into the class group, settle these on the page:
Parents forward the same link to aunts, nannies and co-parents who never joined the group. Every forward lands on the same page, so the reply list stays in one place regardless of who saw it first.
Put the reply deadline on the page itself. Parents who meant to answer but forgot are nudged by a countdown, and you can send one reminder to the names still waiting to reply.
Pin the message with the link in the group so the invitation outlives the daily lost-property chatter. The page does the counting; the chat can go back to discussing bake sales.
The real pressure point at a school hall party is catering maths. Thirty replies can mean thirty children, thirty children plus parents staying for tea, or forty-five because half the class brings a sibling. The reply form settles it: each family answers once, extras inside your limit, meals chosen, and the live list hands you the count whoever is buying juice boxes has to work from.
If the class runs a bring-list — ice cream, napkins, the music — guests can note what they are bringing alongside their reply, so the table on the day has owners and you are not chasing two families who both thought they were bringing plates.
Not every family reads the class group; some parents only ever check the school office. The link works anywhere: send it by SMS, put it in an email, or print the invitation's QR code on a flyer for the office door. Replies from outside the group land on the same list as replies from inside it.
How it works
Sign up and build the invitation in the web app, or message Jitabi on WhatsApp and describe the party: end-of-term treat, school hall, Saturday morning, the class and their families. Jitabi drafts the page for you to adjust.
Fill in arrival and pick-up times, the hall details and directions, the reply deadline, and the meal and allergy questions. Decide the limit on extra places before you publish, because that number drives the catering.
Publish, then forward the link to the class WhatsApp group and pin it there. Families outside the group get the same link by text or on a printed flyer.
Check the live guest list as replies arrive. A day before your catering deadline, send a reminder to the families who have not answered, then order the food to the number on the screen instead of the number you think you have.
Questions
That is the classic class-group failure. Invite the second parent in as a collaborator on the page instead of running two invitations; collaborators get their own access level, so one of you can manage replies while the other simply watches the guest list.
There is no app to install. Guests open the link on their phone and reply on the page, which works the same on an old handset as on a new one.
Yes, in practice. List the shared jobs on the page and ask families to note what they are bringing when they reply. It is not a shopping list, but it stops two people turning up with ice cream and nobody with cups.
You set the limit on extra places when you build the reply, so a brother or a grandparent only counts where you allow it. Say the rule plainly on the page — parents welcome to stay, or children only — and the form follows it.
The guest list belongs to your event, not to the noticeboard. Share the counts with the office and keep names behind the page; if names are genuinely required, decide as a class who may see them before anything leaves your phone.
Get Started
Build the invitation once, pin it in the chat, and let the replies come in while you go back to being a parent at the party instead of the only one counting heads.
