/Portal Docs

Inquiry Form

The public Request Information flow at /inquiry/ is for families who want to talk before committing. It asks about interest and never quotes a price.

The steps

A short multi-page flow, each page saving as it goes:

  1. Contact (contact.php) — parent name, email, phone, newsletter opt-in, SMS consent. The submit is protected by invisible reCAPTCHA (Enterprise, score-based; skipped entirely when no keys are configured). Passing it writes a row to incomplete_inquiries.
  2. Address (address.php) — mailing address (nullable by design; the form tolerates non-US addresses). Updates the same row and bumps last_step_completed to 2.
  3. Student (student.php) — the student’s name, age, and whether they are a new or continuing student. Completing this step promotes the uncompleted row into a real lead (leads with source='inquiry', plus a lead_students row) and deletes the incomplete_inquiries row.
  4. Details (details.php) — which term they’re interested in (a free-text label from the inquiry_semester_options setting), instruments of interest, instruments the family owns, prior musical background, interest in the free theory program and current theory knowledge, how they heard about BCM, and any questions or comments.
  5. Done (done.php) — confirmation.

Drop-off capture

The two-table design exists so that a family who starts the form and walks away is not lost. A row in incomplete_inquiries always means “this family gave us contact info but never told us about a student.” Staff see these in Admin > Leads > Uncompleted Forms, can add append-only notes while chasing them, and when the family eventually finishes the form, those notes are carried onto the resulting lead as a single note — the record of the chase survives the promotion.

Emails

Finishing the form sends two emails, both rendered from admin-editable email templates:

  • inquiry_family_confirmation — to the family, echoing back what they told us and giving the office phone number.
  • inquiry_staff_notification — to the address in the inquiry_notification_email setting, with the full submission and a direct link to open the lead in the portal.

What happens next

The lead sits in Admin > Leads with status new. An admin contacts the family, records notes, and — once instrument, length, and schedule are agreed — converts the lead into a real family account. Because an inquiry decides nothing up front, the admin picks the actual instrument and lesson length at convert time.