Help Center › Members & Profiles
Profile pictures for under 18s
Why it is your decision, not ours
A photograph of a child is your academy's responsibility. You are the one who knows the family, holds the signed form, and answers to the child protection rules where you train. MatPilot stores the picture for you and shows it to your staff inside the app. That is all it does with it.
So the setting starts off. An academy that never opens it holds no pictures of children at all, which is the only safe default. Turning it on is a decision you make deliberately, and MatPilot records that you made it.
Turn it on for your academy
- Go to My Academy, then the Settings tab.
- Find Under-18 profile pictures and tap the switch.
- Read the page that opens. It is short, and it is the part that matters.
- Tick I have read this and accept responsibility for these images, then tap Turn on.
The card then shows who turned it on and when, so anyone else with owner access can see the decision was made, and by whom.
Record consent for each child
Turning the setting on gives no child a picture by itself. Each one needs their own guardian's consent on file.
- Open the member, then the More tab.
- Under Photo consent, turn the switch on.
- Confirm that a parent or legal guardian has given written consent for that child. Keep the signed form with your records.
Until you do, their photo stays a silhouette, and tapping it tells you consent is what is missing.
Get the consent in writing
Your Photo and Media Consent document is where a guardian actually gives it. The default wording covers three separate things, so a parent can agree to one and refuse another:
- their child appearing in photos you post to social media and use in marketing
- a profile picture held on the child's record, visible to your staff
- a block confirming that the person signing for an under 18 is the parent or legal guardian
Create it under My Academy, then Documents and waivers, then New. You can edit the wording, and you can require it at signup so nobody joins without answering.
Signing the form does not flip the switch by itself, and that is on purpose. A signature records a choice, and the choice might have been no. You read the answer and record it.
When consent is withdrawn
Turn a child's photo consent off and their picture is deleted, not hidden. If they had one, MatPilot warns you it is going before it goes.
Turning the setting back off
Switching Under-18 profile pictures off deletes every picture your academy holds for a member under 18, and tells you how many went. It cannot be undone. That is deliberate: an academy that has withdrawn permission should not still be holding the files.
Members whose age you do not know
A member with no date of birth on file is treated as possibly under 18, so they get no picture either. Their own profile says so and offers to add a birthday. Adults with a date of birth are never affected by any of this.
What the member sees
A child looking at their own profile sees a silhouette and one line explaining why: either that their academy does not use profile pictures for under 18s, or that the academy needs a parent or guardian's consent first.
Class photos are a separate thing
Allow class photos governs the end-of-class team photo, and it warns your staff before posting one containing a child with no consent on file. It warns rather than blocks, because that photo is of a group. A profile picture is of one child, so it is blocked outright. The two settings share the same consent record and nothing else.