Evening Check-ins: how to use the facilities workspace for a smooth shelter check-in process
Author: Reid Lemker | Date Created: May 6th, 2025 | Date Updated: July 21st, 2025
What this is
Night-by-night and entry exit shelters using the facilities workspace must check-in guests with reservations each night to make sure your shelter's capacity is accurate and the guests' shelter stay is recorded in HMIS. This helps avoid over-reserving beds and situations where a shelter guest is turned away due to capacity.
If your night-by-night or entry/exit shelter uses the Facilities workspace in HMIS to check in guests, manage reservations, and assign beds, this article is for you—as long as your guests already have an enrollment in the shelter project.
Follow these steps
Many shelters start their evening check-in by printing a reservation list from HMIS to give to the staff doing roll call.
Before check-in time: print the reservation list
- Make sure you are in the Facilities Workspace and select the shelter program.
- Click on Reservation Check-In to view tonight's reservations. This brings you to the Current Reservations page.
Click on the Printer icon to print in the upper right-hand corner:
- Select Display as a blank form for manual input.
Select Print!
Please Note: This is one way to print a list of current reservations, there are a few. For instance, you can also see this information from the Scheduled Check-In History report.
During check-in: Check guests in and assign beds
Please Note: An Intake/Enrollment into the shelter project must created for the client prior to check-in or reservation! If there is no matching enrollment, you will need to complete an Intake/Enrollment first! Be sure your shelter has a procedure to help shelter guests that show up without an enrollment.
When you are ready to Check-In guests with reservations and assign beds for the night, here is where you go in HMIS:
- On the Facilities workspace, make sure you have the correct Facility selected by clicking on View Facilities.
- Select the Facility you are looking for.
Select Reservation Check-In:
- Click on the reservation row for each client to check them in to the shelter. HMIS will automatically add the check-in and check-out dates for you as soon as you click the row. This is what makes sure your bed capacity reflects the number of guests checked in right now.
- Assign room & bed: If applicable, you can assign a specific Room and Bed on this screen.
- Click on Save when finished.
When you are done
Once all guests are checked in and assigned a bed:
- Confirm that your bed count reflects the current number of guests.
- Store your printed roll-call list as needed for documentation.
- Follow up on any guests who had no enrollment or didn’t show up.