	Recognised by Sport England as the Governing Body for Pool in England

RackEmApp for County Matches

This page gives guidance on how to use the RackEmApp for Intercounty fixtures and is split into 2 sections:

EPA Database Requirements.
Guidance on using the App.
Adding a New Player or Non-Playing Captain.

EPA Database Requirements

More detailed information can be found for County officials in the 'Main Menu → Admin → Database User Guide' or by clicking here. The information here is only what affects player's interaction with the RackEmApp.

The RackEmApp reads registered players from the EPA database and populates them into the team lists for the sections that they are eligible for under EPA age and gender rules.

No player will appear on the app if they are not registered to their county for the current season, either fully or provisionally.

No player will appear on the app if this option on the right side of their personal profile record is not set to Yes on their personal database record:

It is each county's responsibility to ensure that their player personal records are in a good shape on the EPA database. If you find a name is missing on the app, then your county officials have to make an edit here, the app will also updated very quickly on refresh. The 2 systems talk to each other.

The RackEmApp reads very basic information from the EPA database that is used to figure out which EPA Intercounty team sections each person is eligible to play in. This information is:

Name
EPA Membership Number
Registered Section (Men, Ladies or Juniors)
Age Qualifies for Under 18's section (True or False)
Age Qualifies for Under 23's section (True or False)
Age Qualifies for Over 50's section (True or False)
Age Qualifies for Over 50's section (True or False)

Please understand that the EPA database (and therefore also the RackEmApp) has no knowledge of who is in which team. So, if you are the Open A team captain, do not complain that there are Under 18's, Ladies and B team players are also in your team list on the RackEmApp, because all of these players are 'eligible' to play for your team under EPA rules.

EPA rules require new players to be registered on the database within 7 days of playing in an Intercounty fixture (or being a named reserve). This means that they may not yet be on the EPA database on the day of the match, and therefore will not appear in the team lists on the RackEmApp. This is NOT a problem on a match day with the app, and there are ways to add new players to teams that comply with the EPA rules for membership. This method is described in the next section on using the app.

Guidance on using the App

General info …↑

The RackEmApp requires an internet connection to work properly. Without one, it will not be able to communicate with the servers and the device from the opposing team.

If you have the text display options on your device set to large due to finding it hard to read things on the small screen, this can cause the texts on the screen inside the RackEmApp to become jumbled up and out-of-place. This has been reported to the development team for a fix, but it doesn't affect the functioning of the app.

Anyone in the team can use the app to see the match card, see the match cards of other sections in their county and even see the match cards of other counties at other venues in their region.

Only people who are assigned Captain's Rights on the RackEmApp can fill in match cards, set players and add results etc. The regional RackEmApp admin is the only person who can assign these rights to players. Any changes made here on request to the admin will be updated almost immediately on the app itself.

There is no limit to how many people in a team can have Captain's Rights. People with Captain's Rights do not have to be the actual Captain of the team, they can just be a helper, vice-captain or assistant, call it whatever you will. There can be multiple people with this role to help when someone is playing or refereeing or is away on holiday etc.

All result inputs (this is for every frame result and the final match card submission at the end) follow the same logic − it is always the HOME side that submits the data/result first, and the AWAY side that confirms the entry. If there is any disagreement, please fix it between yourselves before the away team accepts and confirms the input.

There cannot be 2 different versions of a match card using this system. If there is a mistake on the home team captain's phone, then it will also be on the away team's device. Both devices are reading, using and saving the same data.

Getting going …↑

Once you are logged into the RackEmApp, you will see something like this on the main screen:

This 'Play' option only appears if you have Captain's Rights. Click this to go into the match card to setup and control your match.
If you are eligible for more than 1 team, and/or if you also use the RackEmApp for your own local weekly league or some other pool event, then you will be able to switch between them here.
When switching teams using option 2, be careful to select the right team here. It can sometimes be easy to accidently select the wrong one, particularly when there are A and B teams here. One thing to be very careful of, is when the county has for example Under 23 A and B teams, it is common for the A team to be just called '[County Name]', and the B team to be called '[County Name] B'.
The RackEmApp is not a web page, it is a dedicated installed app, but this button here is very useful when navigating the different screens because it behaves the same way as the 'Back' button on your web browser.

If you scroll down a bit on this first page, you will see this option. Generally speaking, you don't need to worry about what's in here or doing anything with it, except in the situation where you need to add a new player who is just joining the county team today for example, as described in the first section of this page:

If you click into this option, you can add a new player by hitting the 'Register Player' button at the top. This will add a new player to the team for the match card that is currently selected.

Inside the match card …↑

This 'You must enter your reserves first. Add a reserve and then press the small green box with + icon to add another. Hit the 'Lok In' when you are done. You don't need to add a referee. It is optional and isn't really used on the EPA side, but it maybe useful to keep it for your own records. If you decide to use it, you should add here the name of the Senior Referee for the match, so to align with EPA rules.
Add your players to the first set and lock in when you are done. They will then be populated down the rest of the match card. If you want to make substitutions and bring in reserves, you MUST do this before locking in the section. When you have locked in your first set of players, they become visible to the other team Captain on their device.

Adding frame results …↑

Use the controls here to set who has won and if they dished. Only one region in the EPA currently uses the dish information, but this is an option open to all regions if they wish. As described above, this process of entering a frame result ALWAYS starts with the HOME team Captain, and then must be approved by the AWAY team Captain to become a part of the match card.
When you are ready and have made any reserve substitutions, you can lock in the next set.

At the end of the match …↑

The Captains must check and approve the final result. This process starts with the home Captain as always, here at the bottom of the match card, and then the away Captain will be prompted to do the same thing.

VERY IMPORTANT …↑

When all of the frames have been entered and the match card has been agreed by both Captains, it must be signed off to complete the data transfer to the EPA Regional Collator. This process is exactly the same as signing the paper sheet at the end of the match. Without the signatures, the result is invalid, just as it always has been.

The Captains will be prompted to do this by the app when the match card reaches the full number of frames, as always with the home team Captain first, then for approval by the away team captain. No physical signatures are required in the app, just acknowledgement that the match card is correct and ready to go to EPA processing for updates to the EPA website.

BOTH CAPTAINS MUST DO THIS TO COMPLETE THE SUBMISSION OF THE RESULT.

Some Considerations …↑

The RackEmApp can give you information about league tables and player rankings. These should be treated with caution and are NOT the defacto data that the EPA uses for intercounty positions and rankings that are used to offer England Team trials etc. You must consider ONLY what is published on the EPA website for this information as the single source of truth.

In a perfect world, the data will be the same, but the world isn't perfect and in situations like there has been a dispute about a frame result in the days or weeks after a match, or a player was not registered and deemed illegal so frames were reversed, these edits are done on the EPA side, and likely will not appear in the app, thereby skewing the results.

It is possible (recommended) to make these edits inside the RackEmApp admin controls by the regional admin so that everything aligns, which will then push a new data file to the Redseal ULM for update on the EPA side, but this needs to be done by the regional admin/collator.

Adding a New Player or Non-Playing Captain

Please see the section 'Getting Going' above about where you can add new people/players to your team on the RackEmApp.

Can you add a new player? Yes, just use the feature described above. Remember that if they play in an Intercounty fixture, then they have 7 days under EPA rules to get registered so as not to forfeit their frames won.

Can you add a non-playing Captain, maybe a parent for the Under 18's section? Yes, you can. You can add them as already described, but you cannot give them the Captain's rights. This same logic applies for anyone needing these rights − it must be done by the regional system admin. When they make the edit, the effect on the app is almost instant, so there is no delay technically with this process once the regional admin has done their stuff, provided you have an internet connection on your device.