Live Entertainment Onboarding FAQ

Overview

Q: What is Onboarding for Live Entertainment?
A: Onboarding for Live Entertainment is Cast & Crew’s digital solution built for the pace of live productions such as festivals, live venues, and sports leagues.

Q: How is Onboarding for Live Entertainment different from what Cast & Crew used to offer?

A: Previously, you had to manage crew onboarding and timekeeping through disconnected processes. Now, you can onboard crew, manage crew time, and submit to payroll in one seamless, web-based solution, fully integrated with CAPSPay.

Q: Who is Onboarding for Live Entertainment for, and what problems does it solve?

A: Onboarding for Live Entertainment is for our live event production companies looking to optimize their crew management and payroll strategy by streamlining crew onboarding and time management workflows, reducing manual tasks, and boosting the speed and accuracy of running payroll. Live event clients include:

Festivals
Venues
Music Tours
Production Support

Q: What are the top benefits to you from Onboarding for Live Entertainment?

A: Benefits:

Faster, Smoother Workflows

Simplifies and accelerates crew onboarding, reducing back-and-forth and bottlenecks across departments, plus mobile-friendly

Fewer Errors, Greater Accuracy

Built-in automation and payroll system integration reduce manual entry, helping prevent payroll mistakes and costly work

Seamless Support and Trusted Oversight

Combines modern technology with the personal service of Cast & Crew’s dedicated payroll coordinators, ensuring teams stay confident and supported at every step

Purpose-Built for Live Entertainment Production

Unlike generic payroll tools, this solution was designed specifically for the unique pace, scale, and complexity of live entertainment and productions.

Technology Meets Human Expertise

It’s not just software. Cast & Crew’s platform is backed by real people with decades of production payroll experience.

Smarter, Scalable Operations

Empowers you and your teams to scale efficiently with web-based workflows that eliminate delays and adapt to fast-moving production needs.

Q: What about accuracy, compliance, and scalability?

A: We’ve built Onboarding for Live Entertainment with accuracy, compliance, and scalability at the core:

Compliance

The solution supports jurisdiction-specific labor laws, union rules (e.g., Local 33 Local 768), and onboarding form requirements. Updates are made regularly to keep pace with regulatory changes. You can trust the system to meet both federal and industry-specific standards.

Scalability

Designed for productions of all sizes, the platform supports high-volume onboarding and cross-department permissions. It’s been tested in real-world scenarios with large-scale productions and is ready to support complex workflows.

Q: Is Onboarding for Live Entertainment integrated with MyCast&Crew?

A: Yes, if a crew member has a MyCast&Crew account, their info auto-populates in Onboarding for Live Entertainment.

Q: What is the PAI integration?

A: PAI (Payroll Automation Integration) has been connected to Onboarding for Live Entertainment, enabling more automated data flow between onboarding and payroll processing. If you have additional questions about PAI, contact your CRM or Product Solutionist for specifics on how it applies to your setup.

Q: Are there system requirements for Live Entertainment Onboarding?

A: Yes:

Devices Supported: Desktop, tablet, mobile
Browsers: The latest version of Chrome, Firefox, Safari
Connectivity: Stable internet connection required

Features

Q: What features are in the admin side panel?

A: Key admin actions, including signing paperwork, starting paperwork, managing crew roles, and viewing assignments, are available directly in the side panel.

Q: What is the Admin-Initiated feature?

A: Heads of Production want more control over the project details as they find that employees are not providing the correct information, resulting in more work afterwards. With the Admin-Initiated feature within Onboarding for Live Entertainment, Heads of Production can add crew directly to a project and set project parameters such as union, occupation, rate, and start date for the employee.

No setup is required for this feature – you will automatically have access to it.

Q: Can employees be pre-approved to be paid as loan-outs?

A: Yes. Admins can pre-approve employees to be paid as a loan-out, bypassing the extra approval step during onboarding. The employee type selector has been updated to include all options, including loan-out, visible at once.

Q: How can admins quickly see if an employee is a loan-out?

A: On the Members page, the Employee Type column clearly indicates whether an employee is paid as a loan-out.

Onboarding Dashboard

Q: What is the Onboarding Dashboard?

A: It's an admin view that surfaces at-a-glance onboarding metrics and provides direct navigation to pending tasks. The Onboarding Dashboard features the following:

"Overdue" status — automatically flags employees whose start date has passed but who haven't completed onboarding
Updated filters — occupation and union filters now match those in the Time tab for consistency
Direct actions — navigate straight to relevant action pages (countersign, review loan-out, etc.) without manual searching
Clipboard copy — quickly copy employee contact information with one click

Timesheet Uploads

Q: Can I upload timesheets in Onboarding for Live Entertainment?

A: You can upload timesheets directly into Onboarding for Live Entertainment by following these steps:

The payroll/implementation team will share a spreadsheet template with you
1. If modifications to the template are needed, please align with your payroll coordinator ahead of time
You will upload the spreadsheet into Onboarding for Live Entertainment
After uploading, contact your payroll coordinator directly via email to notify them
The payroll coordinator then locates the timesheet

Uploaded files still route automatically to Studio+ and then CAPS, so backend processing is unchanged.

Previously, you had to switch between Onboarding for Live Entertainment and Studio+ to complete timesheet uploads. This enhancement removes a step and keeps you in one platform.

Q: Are there any requirements before I can upload timesheets?

A: Yes. This feature requires coordination before it's enabled and the following steps should be completed first:

Contact your payroll coordinator and payroll services leadership to evaluate the import template setup
The payroll coordinator will confirm the correct project being used to run payroll — timesheets must be uploaded to that specific project in Onboarding for Live Entertainment
In Onboarding for Live Entertainment, enable "Timesheets" under Companies > [Company Name] > Settings

Q: Can client admins assign project admins during onboarding?

A: Yes. Client admins can designate project admins during the invitation process, eliminating the need to log in separately after an employee has onboarded.

Custom Onboarding Documents

Q: Can I create my own custom onboarding documents?

A: Yes. Company Administrators can build and configure custom start work documents directly in the platform — no engineering requests, no waiting.

Q: What types of custom onboarding documents can I create?

A: There are three options to fit different needs:

Document for Signature — automatically pulls from employee profile and project data already in the system
Custom Data Collection — gather specific information without a formal document
Custom Data Collection with Document — combine data collection with a formatted, professional output

Q: Where does the data collected through custom onboarding documents go?

A: To access data from a custom question within Onboarding for Live Entertainment, navigate to the “Employees” tab, click the three vertical dots button on an employee, and select Start Paperwork. Select Download All to receive a PDF with the data included.

For bulk collection of data, this is available through Reporting+ for analysis and export, giving you full visibility from onboarding through reporting.

Q: What do I need to do to get started with custom onboarding documents?

A: Company and project admins can begin creating and configuring custom documents directly in the builder. You can visit our Help Center for more information about the custom onboarding feature.

If the feature isn't visible in your environment, contact your CRM or Product Solutionist to have it enabled.

Q: Do custom onboarding documents change anything for our crew members?

A: No. Crew members simply complete the documents assigned to them — the experience on their end remains the same.

Department Management

Q: What is Department Management?

A: Department Management is a feature that lets you build and manage your own department lists — think Camera, Sound, Wardrobe, Grip — and assign employees accordingly. Previously, employees could only be categorized under two hardcoded options: General or Art.

Q: How does the department list work across productions?

A: A company sets up its department list once at the company level, and every new production under that company automatically inherits it. No repeat setup required.

Q: Can a production add a department that isn't on the company list?

A: Yes. A production admin can add a one-off department locally. For example, "Animals" for a specific shoot, without affecting the company-wide list or any other production.

Q: What happens if a production doesn't need a department from the company list?

A: You can turn it off at the production level without deleting it company-wide. Existing employee records remain accurate even if a department is later renamed or retired.

Q: Why does Department Management matter?

A: You can search, assign paperwork, and report on crew by their actual departments instead of a catch-all "General" bucket — giving Admins much greater visibility and control.

Alternate Payroll ID

Q: What is Alternate/Payroll ID Support?

A: This feature gives every employee a stable, unique payroll ID that can be used in place of a Social Security Number when submitting time and payment information. It's designed for clients who manage timekeeping outside of Onboarding — for example, in spreadsheets — and need a safe way to identify employees when submitting to payroll.

Q: Why is this needed? What problem does it solve?

A: Today, the only reliable identifier available is an employee's Social Security Number, a significant security risk. This feature eliminates that exposure by providing a safe, stable alternative.

Q: Where does the payroll ID appear?

A: The payroll ID has always existed behind the scenes, but it's now surfaced directly on each employee's profile, so you can easily reference it without ever needing to handle sensitive personal data.

Q: Will an employee ever end up with more than one payroll ID?

A: No. The ID is verified against Social Security Administration records the first time it's created, and matched to any existing ID if one is already on file, so each person always has exactly one ID.

Q: Does the payroll ID change between productions?

A: No. The ID is stable and carries over from one production to the next, making it a reliable long-term identifier for any crew member.

Q: How do I actually use this?

A: If you’re tracking time in a spreadsheet outside of Onboarding, simply drop the employee's payroll ID into their upload in place of the SSN. The rest of the submission process stays the same.